IndiaRetailBiz

Pantaloon Retail (India), the flagship listed company of the Future group promoter Kishore Biyani, is expanding its retail chain ‘Central’ by setting up new mall format stores in metro cities like Mumbai and Bangalore and tier-II and tier-III cities like Ahmedabad, Nashik, and Vashi, according to a news report in DNA Money.

‘Central’ is a first of its kind showcase, seamless mall in India. This pioneering concept was created with a view to give an unobstructed and a pure shopping experience to urban, discerning, aspiring, customers in India. These stores offer  products of over 500 well known domestic and international brands. Besides, housing supermarkets and food courts, Central malls to create an experience of ‘celebration’ could even offer facilities for night club. The new ‘Central’ mall complexes, according to company officials, would also house multiplex theater facilities  from Inox or PVR groups.

In short, ‘Central’ mall format stores are one stop destinations for Shopping, Eating, and Celebrating.

The premium chain, which began operating four years ago from Bangalore in May 2004, is currently running five stores at Bangalore, Pune, Vadodara, Gurgaon, and Hyderabad. The number of these mall format stores after expansion will go up to 12 stores in 2008.
‘Central’ stores are housed in big-format mall complexes that occupy around a lakh (0.1 million) of square feet area set up at an average cost of about Rs 2,500 per square feet.

“We expect to touch Rs 1400-crore revenues by June 2009. This format has worked extremely well for us,” said Rakesh Biyani, Chief Executive Officer (Retail), Future Group.

Reliance Retail (RRL), the retailing arm of Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance group, which in a tie up with the US-based Steve Jobs-led Apple Inc. has set up exclusive Apple premium reseller stores called ‘iStores,’ to offer genuine iconic Apple consumer and professional electronic products like iMac desktop computers, MacBook notebooks, Mac Air notebooks (world’s thinnest), Mac pro, iPods, and iPhones to Indian consumers, has decided to set up 60 i Store across the country by 2011. These stores will also offer over 500 accessories and peripherals that complement Apple products.

The company, which so far had set up three iStores at Bangalore, Hyderabad and Mumbai, launched its fourth iStore in Jaipur (Rajasthan). This, incidentally, is the company’s first iStore in North Zone of the country. The new “iStore” at Jaipur spread over 800 sq. ft. space offers customers the opportunity to learn and experience Apple’s innovative products and solutions in a modern and welcoming environment.

“We at Reliance Digital are delighted to bring Apple products to Jaipur through “iStore.” Customers in Jaipur shall now have access to the latest, iconic products from Apple in a world-class ambiance with excellent end-to-end customer support,” said Ajay Baijal, CEO Reliance Digital, in a statement.

Reliance Retail is also selling a wide variety of consumer durables and IT related products under its speciality format called Reliance Digital.

Reliance Digital, which initially was launched from Gaziabad (NCR), now has five stores operating across the country. Reliance Retail is planning to set up 150 stores of ‘Reliance Digital’ over the next two years across the country.

Reliance Digital is competing with Tatas promoted ‘Croma’ and Videocon promoted ‘Next’ retail chains, which are active organised sector players, in the field of durables and IT products.

Reliance Retail Limited (RRL), is a wholly owned subsidiary of Reliance Industries Limited, which in 18 months since beginning its front-end retail operations in November, 2006, has set up over 600 multi format retail stores across 57 cities, in 13 states across the country.

Poor capital market conditions combined with comfortable funds position has prompted Subhiksha– the largest, small format, convenience stores, retail chain, to defer its much awaited entry into capital markets. It had plans to raise capital from public through maiden IPO, soon after crossing the milestone of 1,000 retail stores, which it had achieved by the end of 2007.

Founded 11 years ago in March 1997 at Thiruvanmiyur in Chennai by R. Subramanian, a banker turned retailer, this Chennai-based no-frills, discount retail chain, which sells food, grocery, fruits & vegetables, pharmaceuticals, and mobile products, is currently 24% owned by venture capital firm ICICI Ventures Limited.

Subhiksha, which while entering a new market believes in adopting cluster bombing strategy, is already over 1,300 stores strong with over 600 outlets also selling telecom products. Subhiksha is looking at investing Rs 300 crore with a view to scale up the number of its retail network to around 2,200 stores by the end of this year. No other Indian retailer would be any where near this number. Among the convenience retailers, while Reliance has so far set up around 700 Reliance ‘Fresh’ stores, Aditya Birla Retail’s ‘More.’ and RPG ’s Spencer’s have set up around 500 and 400 stores respectively. It must, however, be mentioned here that Subhiksha store, though, are much smaller in size than its counterparts like ‘Fresh,’ ‘Spencer’s,’ and ‘More.,’ among others.

The IPO earlier expected around July this year is now expected to hit the markets by the end of this year. Vallabh Bhansali-led Enam Securities, which very successfully managed Vishal Retail’s IPO in 2007 is also advising Subhiksha on its entry into the markets.

SRS Group, among the country’s leading real estate developer with business interests in real estate, township development, multiplex cinemas, retail, hospitality and aviation sectors, according to press release issued by the company, has forayed into branded apparel retailing by launching its first exclusive retail store under the brand name of Fashion Wear, at Faridabad (Haryana), in the National Capital Region.

“We are proud to expand our retail repertoire with our first exclusive apparel retail store - FASHION WEAR. As a sub-brand of SRS Value Bazaar, FASION WEAR will imbibe all the inherent values of the mother brand while offering our customers the value added benefits, quality, variety of products, fresh stock and an international shopping experience,” said Sunil Jindal, Managing Director of the SRS Group.

The Faridabad-based SRS group, which has achieved a turnover of around Rs. 700 crore, is growing at 30% every year.

Fashion Wear, which proposes to offer over 30 Indian and International premium apparel brands like Lee, Levi’s, Wrangler, Van Heusen, Louis Philippe, Lilliput will operate as a sub-brand of SRS Value Bazaar.

“Our knowledgeable customer sales professionals as well as warm and friendly ambience will only add to our customers’ shopping experience,” added Gourav Sain, Head of Marketing & Sales.

The group, which already operates 29 stores in the North Zone, has drawn plans to expand the retail chain with 16 new stores every month, and has already signed leasing agreements for over 50 locations with developers like Omaxe, and Chadha Group.

The group is also looking at building and operating 15 hyper markets with an area of 50-80,000 square feet each in metro cities. The group hopes to have around 1.5 million sq ft of retail area under operation by the end of the year 2009.

Reliance Retail, the retailing arm of Mukesh Ambani controlled Reliance Industries Limited, which for about a year has been in talks with Yash Chopra of Yash Raj Films Limited, to form a Rs. 200 crore ($50 million) joint venture, has now initiated discussions with Manmohan Shetty, the founder of Adlabs Films Limited (currently owned by Mukesh Ambani’s younger sibling Anil Ambani), to form a retail entertainment joint venture.

This joint venture, according to reports, will set up an integrated entertainment retail business by pooling resources and expertise of all the three partners together. While, Yash Raj Films will bring its film and TV content creation prowess on the table, Manmohan Shetty will chip in with installation of 500-odd cinema screens. These screens will be set up in the retail malls being operated by Mukesh Ambani.

While, Yashraj Films, which for some time has been at loggerheads with multiplex owners over revenue sharing formula for the films produced by his production house, including the recently released Karina Kapoor starrer ‘Tashan,’ Shetty has detached himself from Adlabs, which has been bought over by Anil Ambani. Adlabs has been known for its expertise in film processing and film exhibition.They are believed to be joining hands to create a joint venture that will produce movies, gaming, interviews, and other digital content. To deliver this content while Mukesh Ambani’s retail Malls could come handy, he is also expected to contribute his strength in setting up communication infrastructure to deliver different facets of this creative content into customer homes. Reliance Industries, the flagship of Reliance group, is believed to be talking to energy distribution companies like GAIL, Power Grid, and Petronet for leasing a part of optic fiber backbone set up by them to carry digital content across the country.

While, contours of the alliance are still under wraps, as potential partners in the JV have either denied or refused to comment on the subject, the new business if it fructifies will compete directly with Anil Ambani’s multi-media, mega-entertainment, business, being unveiled under BIG Entertainment brand.

In fact, all erstwhile Adlab facilities including theaters, originally promoted by Manmohan Shetty under Adlabs brand (now acquired by Anil Ambani), as well as other multimedia activities like music, radio, internet, and DTH are being brought under the BIG Entertainment banner.

Although Ambani brothers, while splitting their industrial empire in 2005 have signed a five years no-compete agreement, there should be no conflict of interest as far as this business is concerned, since, entertainment business was, perhaps, not a part of Reliance portfolio at the time of split.

Source: Economic Times 1 and 2

Lifestyle, a part of the Dubai-based over 30 years’ old Landmark group, which has achieved a position of eminence in the field of retailing in the middle East, is operating a chain of department and other format stores in India. The department stores chain which currently operates 14 stores under ‘Lifestyle’ brand in India, in a major expansion drive, is looking at scaling up the number of Lifestyle stores to 35 within a period of three years. Lifestyle brand is positioned as a trendy, youthful and vibrant brand that offers a wide variety of merchandise at exceptional value for money to its customers.

Lifestyle, which began its India operations with its first store in Chennai in 1999, besides Lifestyle stores, also operates 5 Home Centres and 1 Babyshop store across Chennai, Hyderabad, Bangalore, Gurgaon, Delhi, Mumbai and Ahmedabad. The group is also planning to set up 15 stores of Home Centre format stores in the coming years.

Lifestyle style stores are  apparel and homeware stores specialising in branded and private labels.
It has also recently launched a home decor format, called Home Centre.

The company, which clocked a turnover of Rs. 693 crore in the previous financial year is hoping to treble its turnover in the next three years.

Interestingly, the company despite negative consumer sentiment has been able to register a double digit same store growth in the previous year.

Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER), which at behest of the union government, in February, 2007, undertook a study to assess the impact of organised retail (modern, big) on livelihood security of traditional small traders (kirana stores) has after several extensions of time has completed its report.

Conclusions and recommendations of the study, which involved participation of 1,000 traditional small traders and 2,000 consumers, across the country, according to a DNA Money report, will be submitted to the Government on the 9th May, 2008.

Elaborating on scope the study at the time of assigning the task to the premier economic think tank of the country, Kamal Nath, the Union Minister of Commerce and Industry, had said; “ICRIER has been asked to take into account various aspects of the retail industry and its affect on several elements of the economy. It is essentially a study on big-versus-small rather than foreign-versus-domestic retail.”

The key findings, conclusions, and recommendations of the report to be submitted on Friday, among others, include:

• Although unorganised (or traditional) retail sector over the years will concede a part of its market share to the organised sector, the negative impact of organised sector will wear off with time.

• Despite the inroads being made by the organised sector, unorganised retail sector will continue to retain 84% of the market share even in 2013.

• Bottlenecks would continue until the retail trade is modernised.

• Government should rationalise licensing norms to encourage growth of organised retail.

The study, it may be recalled, was assigned to the premier economic think tank of the country following the ruling UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi’s missive to the Prime Minister Man Mohan Singh. She wanted the government to evaluate the impact of FDI and entry of big retail in the sector before initiating any big ticket reforms like allowing FDI in multi-brand retail in the sector.

The specific trigger for the study, however, was the strident opposition of political activists and trade lobbies following the world’s largest retailer Wal-Mart signing of a joint venture agreement with the telecom behemoth Bharti Enterprises for its foray into the retail sector of India. Small traders and political parties, particularly those following left of the centre, policies were also unhappy with the entry of top Indian business houses like Ambanis into the sector.

Most analysts at the time of assigning the study had thought it to be a ploy of the government to postpone inconvenient decisions on the subject of FDI in retail.

Koutons Retail, which raised capital through IPO last September, has announced sales of Rs 371.2 crore and net profit of Rs 35.5 crore for the fourth quarter ended March 31, 2008.

As the company was listed only six months back, no comparable figures are available for the previous period.

According to D.P.S. Kohli, Chairman, Koutons Retail India Ltd, “Koutons will continue to focus on maintaining and reinforcing the image of its existing exclusive brand outlets and also introduce its apparel to new geographical areas.”

At present, Koutons Retail operates around 1,200 stores under Koutons and Charlie Outlaw brands across India.

“Going ahead, in this year, the plan is to have total 1,800 outlets and eventually have 1,000 Koutons outlets and 2,000 Charlie Outlaw outlets in next 3-4 years,” added Kohli. The company is also looking at scaling up the current 18 number of flagship stores to 120 in the next 1-2 years. These stores house all the brands sold by the group.

Koutons, which launched “Lesfemme” and “Koutons Junior” under womens wear and kids wear categories this year, hopes these brands to make healthy contribution in the coming years.

Bella Casa, among the major tile makers of the country, which has set up a chain of retail stores under the brand name of ‘Tile Bazaar’ where it offers tiles, sanitary ware, accessories and other bathroom fittings, at affordable prices, is expanding its retail network, says a company media release.

“Our objective is to target the section of people who want quality products at affordable prices,” said Ananth Narayan, Chief Executive Officer, Bella Casa India.

The company, which operates a retail network of 22 Tile Bazaar stores in Maharashtra, Gujarat, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh and New Delhi, has recently entered Andhra Pradesh by adding three stores in Visakhapatnam, Vijayawada and Guntur.

Madura Garments, the branded apparel division of Kumar Mangalam Birla-led Aditya Birla Nuvo, which retails branded apparel under several lifestyle and value brands like Allen Solly, Louis Phillipe (lifestyle) and Peter England (value), has crossed the major milestone in sales of Rs. 1,000 crore this year.

The annual turnover of the country’s largest branded apparel player at Rs 1,025 crore during FY 2007-08 was 24% higher than Rs 830 crore in the previous year. The growth between the segments this year was distributed almost evenly as while the growth for lifestyle brands was 28%, for the value brands it was 23%.

Having established leadership in premium segment, the company is now looking climbing the value chain by introducing international brands catering to the needs of customers in the super premium and luxury segment.

To encash on the increased spending on such products (priced higher than its current highest price point of Rs 4,000 apiece), the company will set up mens exclusive lifestyle stores initially at metro cities of Bangalore, Delhi and Mumbai. Through this initiative, it hopes to garner a turnover of Rs. 4,500 crore.

Madura Garments will also invest Rs. 1,000 crore on expanding its existing lifestyle and value brands. While, it will set up 10 to 15 mens lifestyle stores in three years at an outlay of Rs 600 crore, it will also set up 80 new Peter England Family stores in value segment entailing an investment of Rs. 400 crore in five years.

Peter England is expecting to unveil around five new stores within a couple of months, while around 10 are expected to be opened during this financial year. The brand is clooking at clocking Rs. 1,350 crore in turnover over the next five years.