Indian Talent, Global Content
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Indian Talent, Global Content |
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March 2010: What's in the breeze |
News Update from the Retail Scene in India
The retail industry could see a sea change with the Government of India considering Foreign Direct Investment. With this in view, Chillibreeze plans to bring you periodical updates on the retail scene in India.The Chillibreeze Business Research Team has writers with interest and experience in the Retail industry, will be populating this page with the updates. Retail News 7th May - 13th May 2006 For other weekly updates click: Weekly Retail Update
May 7th - 13th India Retail News: Foodmart, Illy, Adidas, Wal Mart, Bangalore and More1. Monday, May 08, 2006 The Rs. 4.3 billion Arvind Brands announced that the company will be investing Rs. 450 million to increase its retail outlets by 100 to take the total number of outlets to 300. Owned by the Lalbhai Group which also owns Arvind Mills, the company recently announced plans to launch 4 new overseas brands. Gant, the Swedish lifestyle brand was the first to be launched in Mumbai, with a second store to open in Delhi. Other brands include Nautica and Jansport from the US and Kipling from Belgium. All three brands are owned by the Vanity Fair Corporation who also owns the Lee and Wrangler brands. The first Nautica store will be opened in Bangalore and will be 6,000 sq ft. With these launches, Arvind will own 11 brands including Arrow, Flying Machine and Ruf N Tuf, making it the second largest brand company. Two other brands, Ruggers and Bay Island were recently dropped from their mainstream retail segment and will now be sold at the company owned factory outlet, Megamart. Source: Business Standard 2. Tuesday, May 09, 2006 Speaking at a conference in Singapore, Ramani Sastri, president of the Confederation of Real Estate Developers’ Associations of India, retail regulations in India will probably ease in the next 2-5 years. Currently, international retailers operate in India through joint ventures, franchises and licensing agreements, as they cannot own majority stake in their retail operations. Source: Economic Times 3. Tuesday, May 09, 2006 Pantaloon Retail and Liberty Shoes joint venture, FootMart Retail India will be investing Rs. 3-4 billion to establish a chain of ‘Shoe Factory’ outlets across the country, focusing on both price and fashion conscious consumers. According to Anupam Bansal, director FootMart Retail India, the company is planning to set up 85 outlets in five years, investing Rs. 40-50 million in each store. The first Shoe Factory outlet opened in Ahmedabad due to the city’s mix of metro and non-metro consumers. At the higher price end, the company plans to establish a lifestyle footwear chain, and has hired Italian design company Zero Uno to develop a design format for its stores. These stores will be located in metros and will target high end customers. The first of these stores will be opening in NOIDA by September. The footwear industry is estimated to be worth Rs. 120 billion, with 85% of it in the unorganized sector and very few players in the organized sector. The company plans to target cities with populations of more than 1 million and will be opening eight Shoe Factory stores and two lifestyle stores by the end of the year in Bangalore, Hyderabad, Delhi and Agra. Source: Economic Times 4. Tuesday, May 09, 2006 A division of the Indage Group, Seabuckthorn Indage Ltd (SIL) is finalizing plans to enter the food segment. Initially, the company will be starting with its biscuits and over-the-counter (OTC) products. The company will be focusing on jams, sauces and juices. According to M S Dhanota, president of SIL, “We aim to position ourselves as one of the top three juices brands”. SIL has set up a R&D facility in Shimla and plans to set up its own manufacturing facility also. Source: The Hindu Business Line 5. Tuesday, May 09, 2006 International garment retailer, Giordano launched its India operations with the opening of its first store in India in Chennai. Peter Lau, chairman and chief executive for Giordano International said the company was very upbeat about the Indian market and will be opening around 20 stores in India by 2008. Ishwar Chugtani, director of Giordano Fashions India Pvt. Ltd. said that the company selected Chennai as its launch due to its similarity to South-East Asian and West Asian markets. The company will be Giordano’s exclusive distributor for India. Source: The Hindu Business Line 6. Tuesday, May 09, 2006 Japanese watch company Citizen announced that it will be investing US$3-4 million to expanding its business in India. In this endeavor, Citizen has also signed cricketer Rahul Dravid as the company’s brand ambassador. This is the company’s second brand ambassador after actress Kareena Kapoor. Hideaki Nakazaki, managing director for Citizen Watches India, said that the company plans to double last year’s sales of 200,000 pieces in India. The company had a turnover of Rs. 600 million last year and plans to double the figure too. Currently, there are 27 outlets in the country, which will be increased to 40 with this expansion thrust. Source: Rediff.com 7. Wednesday, May 10, 2006 Amalgamated Bean Coffee Trading Co, the parent company of Café Coffee Day announced that the company will be aggressively expanding across the country. Director of Amalgamated Bean Coffee Trading Co, Naresh Malhotra, stated that besides cafés, the company will also be introducing several new concepts. Also on the anvil are highway cafés and drive through cafés for which they will be tying up with petroleum companies. Source: Economic Times 8. Wednesday, May 10, 2006 V Mart opened its eleventh store in Jalandhar in Punjab. Hemant Aggarwal, director V Mart said that the company plans to open stores in Panipat, Ludhiana, Amritsar and Jaipur. The company targets the middle class customer who is looking for price as well as quality. Source: Business Standard 9. Wednesday, May 10, 2006 Barista cafés has tied up to serve Illy coffee, a Fresh & Honest brand, in its outlets. R Shivashankar, CEO of Fresh & Honest, said that both companies will be investing $15-20 million each to market the Illy brand of coffee in India. Supplying coffee to hotels and building the brand through Barista outlets is the first phase of the agreement. According to Partha Dattagupta, CEO Barista Coffee, “the new brand already accounts for over a tenth of the hot beverage sales at the few outlets that are serving it”. The company is also closing weak outlets and opening 100 new outlets, including some on the highways. Source: Business Standard 10. Wednesday, May 10, 2006 Gangotri Textiles garment brand, Tibre will be tying up with Trailer Ltd, a Switzerland based company to jointly market a new brand. Tibre currently retails at 750 multi brand stores across 12 states and 3 union territories across India. Trailer was established in 1990 and has a turnover of $20 million, and currently has 18 outlets and is stocked in 250 multi brand stores in Europe. Source: Financial Express 11. Friday, May 12, 2006 The former MD of Whirlpool (India), Raj Jain has reportedly been offered the position of president of Wal-Mart Asia. Jain was MD for Whirlpool in 2001, moving to Shanghai in 2004 as regional head, marketing and product delivery for Whirlpool Asia. Wal-Mart currently has 56 stores in China and is planning to open another 20 this year. Its India operations consist of 2 marketing offices in Bangalore. Source: Economic Times 12. Thursday, May 11, 2006 Levi’s new store of 9,000 sq ft located on Brigade Road has been designed to give customers a "multi-dimensional experience of the Levi's brand" and comprises of three themes: Levi’s Lounge, Levi’s Campus and Levi’s Foundry. Currently, there are 90 exclusive stores in India and is also available at 500 multi brand stores in 160 cities. According to Kevin Sargison, Retail Operations Director, Levi Strauss & Co, Asia Pacific Division, “India is a vibrant market and was different from China.” Source: The Hindu Business Line 13. Friday, May 12, 2006 Liberty Shoes Ltd. announced that it will be setting up three manufacturing facilities with an investment of Rs. 800-850 million. Two of the new factories will be located in Poanta Sahib in Himachal Pradesh and on will be in Roorkee in Uttranchal. Both units in Poanta Sahib will start operations in July this year while the Roorkee unit will be operational in January 2007. Source: Business Standard 14. Friday, May 12, 2006 Fresh & Honest Café will be marketing its filter coffee brand Alive in sachets in an effort to make inroads to smaller towns. Its other brand Illy is being marketed at premium segments such as Barista and five star hotels in metro cities. The Alive brand was launched in March in Tamil Nadu and is already available in 11,000, while it was launched in April in Karnataka where the company hopes number of outlets to reach 11,400 by late June. Other states where alive will be available are Andhra Pradesh and Kerala in June and Mumbai and Pune from July onwards. Source: The Hindu Business Line 15. Friday, May 12, 2006 Global sports gear company, Adidas opened its new concept store in Bangalore. The Sports Performance Centre covers over 9,000 sq ft and is the company’s largest SPC. According to Andreas Gellner, Managing Director, Adidas India, “the Indian sports gear market, growing at a pace of 20-25 per cent per annum, was the most promising market for the company, and Bangalore is the most vibrant city in the country, contributing about six per cent to the sales revenue here." The company will be opening 3-4 more stores using the SPC concept, each with an investment of Rs. 30-40 million. Besides these stores, the company also will be opening 100 new stores over the next year. The sports gear market is estimated to be worth around Rs. 7 billion. Source: The Hindu Business Line 16. Friday, May 12, 2006 Lifestyle International Pvt. Ltd announced that it was planning to open 35 stores to reach its goal of tripling the company turnover over the next three years. Lifestyle recorded a Rs. 3.4 billion turnover last year and is aiming for Rs. 6 billion this year. Kabir Lumba, president of Lifestyle said that 27 of the 35 stores will be Lifestyle stores will be balance would be Home Center’s by Lifestyle. New locations include Pune, Ahmedadbad, NOIDA and Jaipur. Currently, there are 10 Lifestyle stores in the country, of which the Hyderabad store is the best performer. The company is planning to open a second store in Hyderabad to capitalize on its reach in the city. Source: The Hindu Business Line
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