“Our consolidation programme is on. We have already started relocating some of our small format standalone stores inside our large format outlets as shop-in-shops,” a company official said.While, the official refrained to offer details about the number of stores being relocated, he said not all standalone stores would be closed.

“Only a few of them would be relocated, specially those who have been small contributors to our overall business,” the official said, adding, some outlets of its international partners like Replay and LeeCooper are part of the process.

“We have ample space for them. We will move some of the standalone stores of these brands into our large format stores like Big Bazaar and Pantaloon,” the official added.

Kishore Biyani, CEO, Future Group has, however, said that relocation of the international brands’ outlets would not affect the company.

Reliance Retail, a wholly owned subsidiary of Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries, though it may come as somewhat of a surprise, is slowly but steadily growing its retail network.

Despite media reports reporting closure of around 30 under performing stores, the company has more than doubled its stores count from 465 to 950 stores in the last one year. It has thus added 485 store this year. During this period, the company has also expanded its footprint from 58 cities last year to 77 cities across the country, this year.

The retailer’s first hypermarket format store in Mumbai region was launched on 27th February, 2009 at Thane, located on the northern outskirts of Mumbai city.

The 11th hypermarket store at Thane, occupies a space of 50,000  sq ft spread over three floors. The retailer, had launched its first hypermarket format store at Ahmedabad on 15th August, 2007. Apart from Thane, the company is currently operating 10 more hypermarket stores at Ahmedabad, Jamnagar, Pune, Gurgaon, Faridabad, Jodhpur, Bangalore, Ranchi, Hyderabad, and Tirupati.

Reliance Mart, the hypermarket format of the multiformat retailer, is part of its ‘value’ segment. Other formats in this segment include Reliance Super, Reliance Fresh, Reliance Delight, and Reliance Wellness.

Apart from value formats, the company also operate a number of special formats, including Reliance Digital, Reliance Footprint, Reliance Trends, Reliance Jewels, Reliance Time-Out, Reliance Living Homeware, and Reliance AutoZone, among others. Reliance Retail has also unveiled speciality formats like Vision Express (eye-wear products) and iStore (Apple products) in partnership (joint venture or franchisee) arrangements with international retailers.

Reliance Retail is expected to also launch a chain of ‘apparel and home-ware’ product stores soon in patnership with the UK’s leading retailer Marks & Spencer.

Raymond, among the leading players in India’s textiles and apparel sector, has decided to focus on Middle East to increase the share of the region in international sales from 37 per cent at present to 45 per cent within the next three years.

To achieve this, the leading Indian textiles and apparel brand led by Gautam Hari Singhania, its chairman and managing director, is looking at more than dobling its retail presence in the region.

The company, which currently operates 24 stores  of its flagship brand “The Raymond Shop” in the region, plans to raise their number to 50 stores in the next 3 years. Currently, the company’s stores are located in Al Rashid Mall Madinah, Al Khobar and Safeer Mall Dubai, among others, occupy a space of 63,000 sq ft.

The 26 new stores will be set up in various malls inf the region, including, Mall of Emirates, Dubai Mall, Burjuman, Villagio Mall and Pearl Mall, says a company release.

Raymond had forayed into the Middle East 25 years ago when it opened its first showroom in Muscat.

Raymond, as a part of ’Middle East Vision for 2012′ strategy unveiled by Gautam Singhania in Riyadh, is looking at growing sales volume of textiles in region by 50 per cent. It hopes to sell 1.5 million meters of textiles in the region by 2012. He unveiled the plan at a press conference held at the company’s showroom in Riyadh on 25th February, 2009.

”The retail sector in the Middle East is projected at $500 billion by 2010,” said Singhania.

Incorporated in 1925, the company currently owns some of the highly respected apparel brands, including, Raymond, Raymond Finely Crafted Garments, Manzoni, Park Avenue, ColorPlus, Parx, Zapp! and Notting Hill.

Raymond, the contry’s leading textile fabrics and apparel brand, has decided to continue with its aggressive expansionstrategy. Raymond is looking at adding 50 new stores during the current financial year ending 31st March, 2008.

Singhanias-led Raymond is already operating 390 stores across the country. While, majority of these stores (330) are owned and operated by franchisee, balance 60 are owned and operated by the company.

The new stores, according to a BS report, will be set up in small towns and cities and most of which will be operated by franchisees.

“We see good business opportunity in smaller cities. We have large assortment of products such as fabrics, readymade garments to cater to the demand of the population there,” said Aniruddha Deshmukh, President, Retail and FMCG, Raymond.

Raymond is also operating shops under the brand name of ‘The Raymond Shop.’ These are exclusive shops for Raymond’s brands like Park Avenue, and Colour Plus, among others.

Current global economic turmoil has not adversely impacted Raymond. According to Deshmukh, the retail stores have registered the same growth of 12 per cent in the recent months. “We are also seeing robust sales from the ongoing marriage season,” added Deshmukh.

“After establishing ourselves as exporters of a wide array of furnishing fabrics to various countries across Australia and America, we are glad to have partnered with a regional luxury retail group like Rivoli to launch our exquisite products here.” — S K Gupta, Executive Director, Bombay Dyeing.

Bombay Dyeing, the country’s Nusli Wadia owned textiles major, opened its first retail store in Dubai, in a tie-up arrangement with a local business group called Rivoli. The launch, among others, was attended by Indian fashion designers Sabyasachi Mukherjee and Wendell Rodricks.

Dubai has sizable population of Indians and other South Asians who are quite familiar with Bombay Dyeing’s range of clothes. Other Indian textile majos like the Raymonds are also present in the region.

“After setting an unparallelled benchmark in the Indian textile industry, this is Bombay Dyeing’s first concept store in the region. The extravagant showroom done by a team of professional experts in spectacular interiors will showcase an overwhelming collection of bed and bath linen,” said S K Gupta, Executive Director, Bombay Dyeing .

The new store will offer Bombay Dyeing’s premium and designer labels like Sabyasachi Signature Line, Wendell Whites, Urban Living, Country Romance, CMYK, Sorbet and the Bombay Dyeing evergreen printed collections.

“Bombay Dyeing continues to be a dominant player in the export field and supplies to countries in the European Union, USA, Australia and New Zealand,” added Gupta.

Hakoba is a popular brand of embroidered sarees and dress materials across the country.

In the next four years, will invest over Rs. 250 crore, to set up 400 small and 80 medium format stores. Small stores will have an average size of 1,000 sq ft.

In the second phase of expansion, Hakoba Lifestyle, plans to set up 30 large format stores of average 40,000 sq ft size.

Among other initiatives, Hakoba will also introduce a value retail format for hypermarkets.

While, the small and medium formats will house Hakoba’s own brands, large format stores will also offer other brands of non-competing categories.

With these initiatives and increased focus through a dedicated subsidiary, Hakoba expects to garner a revenue of Rs. 210 crore in 2008-09 against 2006-07 revenue of Rs. 44 crore.

While, Hakoba has already introduced a menswear label called Born Rich, it is in the process of introducing a lingerie label by next year. It is also looking at foraying into the home furnishings segment.

With a view to add value to its existing products, Hakoba has roped in well known fashion designers Rockey S for creating a club and fashion wear range and Archana Kochhar for developing a collection for bridal and occasional wear segment. The company is also looking at creating separate brands for large format stores. It will also develop sub brands under the Hakoba brand.

We are all very proud of this moment of reviving the Vimal brand which I am sure will once again regain the market leadership it enjoyed and top-of-the-mind recall : Nita Ambani

Vimal, the first brand of the Mukesh Ambani owned Reliance group, originally launched and popularised almost thirty years ago by Late Shri Dhirubhai Ambani, is back with a bang. It was relaunched in Ahmedabad with a new logo, reports PTI. Nita Ambani, wife of Mukesh Ambani has been actively associated with the relaunch.

Vimal, the iconic textiles brand was named after Vimal Ambani– son of Dhirubhai’s elder brother.

While, RIL is expected to spend Rs 500 crore on Vimal’s retail expansion, it will also spend Rs 100 crore on revamping and promotion of the brand. RIL, according to an NDTV report, is in talks with Music Maestro A R Rehman, Actor Aamir Khan and Chess player Viswanathan Anand to endorse the Vimal brand.

RIL is expected to open 20 stores during this festive season, .

“The new logo displays a new spirit of openness by breaking free from the oblong. The minimalistic letters and styling convey this new open spirit and also are in line with the new fashion thinking of clean and bold lines,” the company said in a statement.

Apart from fabrics, the new Vimal will also offer ready to wear apparels for men including shirts, trousers, suits and jackets.

The apparels will be available in three sub-brands Vimal Red (popular range for youth in value segment ), Vimal White (formals with premium pricing), and Vimal Black (top-end Italian fashion) .

The Vimla Black designed in Italian fashion has been inspired by thoughts and guidance of Italian designer Maurizio Bonas.

While Vimal Red and White will be available in all Vimal stores, Vimal Black will be retailed through exclusive outlets. These will be opened in the coming days, according to the company statement.