Indian Talent, Global Content
|
Indian Talent, Global Content |
|
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 26th March - 1st April 2006 For other weekly updates click: Weekly Retail Update
March 26th – April 1st India Retail News: ITC, Raymond, Big Bazaar and More1. Sunday, March 26, 2006 The world famous Italian luxury brand Salvatore Ferragamo opened its first store in India in New Delhi and announced that it will be opening 10 stores in the next five years. The company plans to open its second store also in Delhi and then major metros like Bangalore and Mumbai as well as more stores in Delhi. Ferragamo has opened the store with SSIPL Luxury Fashion Pvt. Ltd., their franchisee for India. The company had sales worth 575 million Euro in the last financial year. Source: Economic Times 2. Monday, March 27, 2006 According to sources, ITC is looking to acquire a denim brand which can fit with its apparel division. ITC owns the Wills Lifestyle and John Players brands and would like to have a denim brand for the mid-price section. If it is not able to acquire a brand, the company plans to develop one in-house. The domestic jeans market is estimated to be worth 32 million pairs annually and growing at 12-15%. Source: Economic Times 3. Monday, March 27, 2006 When Wal-Mart opened its first store in Shenzhen ten years ago, a local newspaper headline announced, “The Wolf is Coming.” And it was thought to be the end of the domestic retail sector. Wal-Mart has opened 56 stores since then and the domestic retail sector in China is still thriving. Now, the company is putting to use the lessons learnt in China and applying them to India, where the company’s opponents are worried that the “wolf” would destroy competitors and increase unemployment. According to Joe Hatfield, chief executive officer for Wal-Mart Asia, “China and India really represent the future of Wal-Mart.” The company believes Indians will embrace western retailers, who will adapt their stores to local tastes by stocking the right mix of products. Stores in India will be smaller, not more than 140,000 sq ft. Hatfield said that Wal-Mart was interested in both large and small cities and would like to open 12-18 stores in the first 18 months to show the company’s commitment to India. While the metros will offer the most benefit to Wal-Mart, real estate in cites like Delhi and Mumbai is expensive and there is already a shortage of large tracts of land. Traffic congestion is another problem the stores will face. Source: Reuters 4. Tuesday, March 28, 2006 Raymond is planning to open 40 brand stores called The Raymond Stores by the end of 2006. The company plans to open approximately 60% of these stores in malls because of the steady growth of organized retailing in the country. Raymond has several brands for menswear including Manzoni, Parx and Park Avenue and Be: its lifestyle brand. The company announced earlier this year that it will be getting into the kids wear segment with its Zapp brand. Source: Business Standard 5. Tuesday, March 28, 2006 The Indian food processing sector is drawing a lot of attention from corporate India and attracting a lot of investments. The sector is growing at 20%, faster than the home and personal care segments. Several companies such as Reliance, Godrej, FieldFresh (a joint venture between Bharti Enterprises and the Rothschild Group), Snowman Frozen Food (a joint venture between Mitsubishi Group, Amalgam Foods and HLL), Radhakrishna Group, DCM Sriram, Gufic Labs, Jain Irrigation, Tata Group, Dabur, Blue Star and Voltas are drawing up ambitious plans to link farms in India to markets overseas. The government is offering tax incentives for investment in the food processing sector which has led to enormous interest being shown in the sector, especially after the 2006 budget. The companies want to eliminate the middlemen to cut down costs and establish direct contact with farmers. According to the ministry of food processing, the size of the food processing industry is $70 billion, including $22 billion of value added products. Senior industry analysts feel that the rural markets will grow faster than urban markets. Source: Economic Times 6. Wednesday, March 29, 2006 The master franchisee of premium luxury brands like Debenhams, Marks & Spencer, Guess, Next, Women’s Secret and The Body Shop, announced that it will be setting up 500 new stores over the next 4 years to reach a sales turnover of around Rs 10 billion. The company plans to open 10 Debenhams department stores, 40 Marks & Spencer and Body Shop stores and 20 Next and Women’s Secret stores. Besides these, the company will also be increasing the presence of its Planet Sports stores by 100. Planet Retail is a venture between the Pantaloon Group with 49% stake and a NRI investor, having 55 stores and generating Rs 1 million in sales. The first two Debenhams will be opening in Gurgaon and Delhi in 2006 and will be followed by Mumbai, Bangalore, Kolkata, Chennai, Ludhiana and Hyderabad. Debenhams has already been signed as the anchor store for MBD Neopolis, a premium mall in Ludhiana. The company is planning to focus on Punjab due to the state’s strong association with the UK, according to Arun Bhardwaj, managing director for Planet Retail Holdings. Source: Economic Times 7. Wednesday, March 29, 2006 ‘The Great Exchange Offer’ by Big Bazaar has drawn more than 200,000 customers to avail of the scheme. The store is offering a way to dispose of old household items and receive a price 4-8 times higher than what the local kabari-wala can give. The months of February and March are usually dull for consumer buying and the scheme has boosted sales during the period, although exact figures were not available. Source: Hindu Business Line 8. Thursday, March 30, 2006 Harish Bhat, currently the president, marketing for Tata Teleservices Ltd will be joining Titan Industries as CEO of the time products division. He will be taking the place of Bijou Kurien who will be leaving the company to join Reliance Retail. Source: Hindu Business Line 9. Thursday, March 30, 2006 Indian Tobacco Company (ITC) is planning to develop a shopping complex focusing on the needs of farmers in Ujjain in Madhya Pradesh. The new venture, Chaupal Sagar will sell branded products, seeds, fertilizers and agricultural equipment. The company is planning to set up 15 Chaupal Sagars in Madhya Pradesh by end 2006 from which it expects a revenue of approximately Rs 200-300 million annually. These Chaupal Sagars will function as an advisory centre, offering internet access, medical services, petrol pumps and soil testing facilities to farmers. The Ujjain store will be spread over 300,000 sq ft and is expected to open by June 2006. There are 4 Chaupal Sagars functioning currently, at Sehore, Vidisha, Mhow and Mandsaur and will be set up in Dewas, Nagda, Itarsi and Mandideep. ITC plans to set up 2,000 Chaupal Sagars across India by 2008-09. Source: Business Standard 10. Thursday, March 30, 2006 Tata Group’s Tanishq plans to add 8-10 exclusive stores in the country so that it can become a leader in the jewelry industry. The company plans to start an export division to target the large Indian community in the US. Source: Hindu Business Line 11. Friday, March 31, 2006 Provogue is planning to expand its retail network by adding 75 stores by the end of the 2008 financial year. Managing director of Provogue, Nikhil Chaturvedi announced that 16 of these new outlets will be mega stores of 7,000 sq ft each. The first two mega stores will be opening in Hyderabad and Vashi, in Navi Mumbai. Other cities that will have mega stores are Delhi and Kolkata. The company will also be opening stores in several tier III cities such as Jodhpur, Agra and Aurangabad. Source: Business Standard 12. Friday, March 31, 2006 The Mumbai based textile company is considering entering the technical textiles market. Gautam Singhania, chairman and managing director of Raymond, said there was vast opportunity for technical textiles in India but refused to comment on the company’s business plans in the field. Technical textiles are used in a variety of fields such as medicine, automobile, construction ad transport and the industry is estimated to be worth $4 billion which will likely double by 2007. Source: Economic Times 13. Friday, March 31, 2006 Aryan Lifestyle Pvt Ltd, the wholly owned retail subsidiary of real estate development company MGF, plans to open 55 Nike stores in the country with an investment of Rs 450 million. Nike entered India in 2004 and operates mostly through direct tie-ups with local partners instead of using a master franchisee. Source: Business Standard 14. Friday, March 31, 2006 Trent, the retail arm of the Tata Group, announced that they had tied up with Delhi based real estate developer DLF Universal Ltd. to anchor stores for 12 DLF malls in several cities across India. Under the arrangement, one of the three retail brands of Trent, Westside, Landmark and Star India Bazaar will be anchor stores for upcoming DLF malls. Westside recently opened its first store at DLF’s Grand Mall in Gurgaon and now has 22 outlets in 13 cities in India. Source: Economic Times 15. Friday, March 31, 2006 RPG Retail has opened its seventh Spencer’s Daily store in Hyderabad. The president of Spencer’s Retail, J.H. Mehta announced that the company will be opening another 12 stores in the next six months. Source: Hindu Business Line 16. Friday, March 31, 2006 Japanese electronics major Pioneer is planning to enter the Indian home entertainment market. The company plans to import high end products such as music systems, speakers, MP3 players and plasma televisions from its plants in China, Thailand and Japan and is in discussion with Videocon to distribute its products in India. The premium electronics market is estimated to be Rs 60 billion and is dominated by LG, Samsung and Sony. Pioneer has already tied up with Autocop Securities for distribution of its range of in-car entertainment products such as WMA, MP3, CD players and speakers. Source: Business Standard 17. Saturday, April 01, 2006 Stanislas De Quercize, the president and CEO of Van Cleef and Arpels said that India with its passion for jewelry will be a good market for the company. He expects his watch division to hold its own in the well established Indian market. The company will depart from its global retail strategy to establishing standalone stores to be part of a multi-brand retail outlet in Mumbai called Thanks, which already stocks luxury brands such as Fendi and D&G. The company’s long term strategy is to be present in both self-standing boutiques and multi-brand retail stores such as Ashish Chordia’s Thanks. Source: Economic Times 18. Saturday, April 01, 2006 Reliance Retail has formed an agreement with herbal healthcare company Himalaya Drugs for supply of lifestyle drugs and nutritional products. Reliance Retail has been formulating its ambitious retail plan by hiring several key leaders for its management team and is now identifying companies and products for retail space. The company is expected to tie up with several other companies for food and food supplements, consumer durables and cosmetics. Source: Business Standard
>> Read more articles written by Chillibreeze writers:1. Articles related to Content and Outsourcing
|
Services Content Editing Content Development FAQ Writing and Communication Skills e-Publishing NEW! Products
|
Copyright 2004 - 2010 Chillibreeze Solutions Pvt. Ltd. |
.gif)
Writing 
