Zepto calls Bengaluru woman ‘cutie’ in bizarre phone notification

A woman based in Bengaluru was horrified when she got a push notification from Zepto, addressing her as “cutie”.
The bizarre promotional message from the quick-commerce platform that promises to deliver home essentials in 10 minutes was for a brand of banana chips.
The Zepto alert on Mahak Verma’s phone one evening had a slug titled “cutie_mahak”.
“You got a follow request from Namaskaram Banana Chips Original Style Salted,” the rest of the message read.
The Zepto customer said it was unacceptable for a well-known brand to address a stranger as “cutie”.
“Yesterday I received a push notification from Zepto which very conveniently addressed me as “Cutie_mahak”! and suddenly it brought along all the terrible instances that all teenage girls in India go through,” Verma wrote in a LinkedIn post.
“Fast forward many years, we are in an era of startups and POSH acts and all talks about women safety yet a well-known brand finds it appropriate to call a random stranger ‘Cutie’ with no context at all?”
Verma reiterated that it is not acceptable for a brand to call someone “random adverbs” and that safety of women starts at home.
The Bengaluru resident added that when she shared a poll on Instagram on the message she received from Zepto, many of her frineds felt that she was blowing it out of proportion.
Recently, Zepto received backlash for a similar unsolicited promotional notification for a contraceptive pill that it sent to another woman customer in Bengaluru. The message, which read, “I miss you, Pallavi. Says i-Pill emergency contraceptive pill,” accompanied by three teary-eyed emoticons, left customer Pallavi Pareek shocked and questioning the company’s ethical standards.
Zepto responded to Pallavi’s post with an apology, acknowledging their error. “Hey Pallavi, we messed up, and we’re truly sorry. We understand how thoughtless and potentially harmful this was,” the company stated on LinkedIn.
(Also Read: Hyderabad man claims he worked as Zepto delivery partner for a day, shares experience)