Monday, September 20, 2004
Retail Destinations
Article being published in the monthly magazine, Images Retail, October 2004 issue:
SHOPPERS' STOP, Hyderabad
“If it’s on your mind, it’s on our shelves.”
The standalone retail outlet of Shoppers’ Stop at Hyderabad has proved to be the preferred shopping destination for the denizens of Charminar City. Awarded “The Store of the Year” by CMAI (Clothing Manufacturers' Association of India) in August 2004, the outlet also has the satisfaction of attaining the highest Customer Service Index across the retail chain.
Positioned as a family store dedicated to delivering a complete shopping experience to its customers, Shoppers’ Stop Limited, the Rs. 4044 million (2003-04) organisation is part of the K. Raheja Group promoted by Mr. Chandru L. Raheja. Currently, this retail giant, engaged in the business of retailing apparel, accessories and home furnishing, owns a chain of some 15 odd department stores strewn across the length and breadth of India. Six at Mumbai, one each at Bangalore, Hyderabad, Chennai, Pune, Jaipur, Delhi, Gurgaon and two in Kolkata. But it’s the Hyderabad store, the second largest through out the Shoppers’ Stop chain of stores, which has managed to walk away with the accolades.
It would be too simplistic to say that for a city as yet unexposed to a glut of malls and hypermarkets such as a Gurgaon or a Mumbai—the six-storied, 72,287 square feet of pure shopping space has caught the imagination of the genteel Hyderabadis. So what is it exactly? The convenience of shopping under one roof, the tasteful ambience, the sophistication and variety of the store’s product range or the frontline service? Our guess would be that a clever amalgamation of all these elements in generous proportions has contributed to its present popularity.
Researchers would have us believe that the average Hyderabadi, not unlike his Bangalorean cousin, puts a large premium over his time—attaching a great deal of importance to the time spent with his family. The city’s standard shopper, therefore, is always on the hunt for a destination that would allow for the maximum shopping convenience with the minimum of time and effort spent. What better place than a six-storied shopping paradise, showcasing everything from cargos and kurtas to cosmetics and kitchenware!
Unlike some of its other regional counterparts that are structured as large format stores in malls that automatically attract a high-footfall rate, Shoppers' Stop, Hyderabad, with its standalone format, has had to work that much harder at creating a ‘destination’ that would attract customers from a city with hitherto conservative spending habits. Though it has to be admitted that the simultaneous growth of employment opportunities in erstwhile Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu’s Cyberabad helped to a large extent by creating a concurrent increase in the disposable income of the city’s middle-class—fashioning the upwardly-mobile class of urban shoppers that the store mainly targets.
But whatever their spending habits, the store has had to constantly contend with both traditional commercial hubs as well as upcoming malls for attracting its customers. This has undoubtedly led to a continuous process of re-invention and self-improvement in terms of quality of service, motivating customers to come back for more.
Location, as any hardened real estate man would tell you, is all. Situated bang in the plush locality of Begumpet, Shoppers’ Stop stands out as the largest department store in the city. Its proximity to the international and domestic airport, the railways station and major hotels makes it equally accessible for both residents as well as visitors to the city.
But customer loyalty is an altogether different kind of fish. It takes much more than space and location to nurture a faithful buyer-base. Convenience and quality of merchandise aside, the customer also needs to feel pampered and taken care of. Valet car parking, central air-conditioning, well-maintained restrooms and trial rooms, an in-store café (Stop Over) and services like gift wrapping, alterations and product exchanges are facilities that keep ‘em satisfied. But it is the attention to individual needs that really makes a shopping destination worth coming back to. And this is what the Hyderabad store delivers to its customers with its play areas and store-prams for children, day-care facility for infants, wheel chairs for the handicapped and a customer paging system.
The creator of the country’s first loyalty membership program called the First Citizen’s Club, which offers privileged shopping experiences to its members, the chain now has a 3 lakh-strong membership base—with a considerable chunk of the pie belonging to Hyderabad. Such loyal customers are treated to exclusive cash counters for express checkout. While accepting payment, the store also accepts foreign exchange in most of the currencies, a practice that has helped it earn brownie points with foreign customers. The outlet has also hit the bull’s eye where efficiency is concerned by earning a reputation for taking less than a half-hour for every alteration job!
All in all, if Shoppers’ Stop, Hyderabad, has been voted as “The Store of the Year”, it would certainly appear to be a sobriquet well earned!
WAY TO GO!
In this special section, Saon Bhattacharya takes a look at some of the hot and happening retail destinations across the country. Large format shopping centres or standalone stores, these have become urban landmarks in their own rights and are creating profitable retail avenues for brands and retailers. However, certain issues—tenant-mix, space leasing practices, product visibility and strategies for increasing footfalls with higher conversions—are common concerns faced by most of these shopping havens.
SHOPPERS' STOP, Hyderabad
“If it’s on your mind, it’s on our shelves.”
The standalone retail outlet of Shoppers’ Stop at Hyderabad has proved to be the preferred shopping destination for the denizens of Charminar City. Awarded “The Store of the Year” by CMAI (Clothing Manufacturers' Association of India) in August 2004, the outlet also has the satisfaction of attaining the highest Customer Service Index across the retail chain.
Positioned as a family store dedicated to delivering a complete shopping experience to its customers, Shoppers’ Stop Limited, the Rs. 4044 million (2003-04) organisation is part of the K. Raheja Group promoted by Mr. Chandru L. Raheja. Currently, this retail giant, engaged in the business of retailing apparel, accessories and home furnishing, owns a chain of some 15 odd department stores strewn across the length and breadth of India. Six at Mumbai, one each at Bangalore, Hyderabad, Chennai, Pune, Jaipur, Delhi, Gurgaon and two in Kolkata. But it’s the Hyderabad store, the second largest through out the Shoppers’ Stop chain of stores, which has managed to walk away with the accolades.
It would be too simplistic to say that for a city as yet unexposed to a glut of malls and hypermarkets such as a Gurgaon or a Mumbai—the six-storied, 72,287 square feet of pure shopping space has caught the imagination of the genteel Hyderabadis. So what is it exactly? The convenience of shopping under one roof, the tasteful ambience, the sophistication and variety of the store’s product range or the frontline service? Our guess would be that a clever amalgamation of all these elements in generous proportions has contributed to its present popularity.
Researchers would have us believe that the average Hyderabadi, not unlike his Bangalorean cousin, puts a large premium over his time—attaching a great deal of importance to the time spent with his family. The city’s standard shopper, therefore, is always on the hunt for a destination that would allow for the maximum shopping convenience with the minimum of time and effort spent. What better place than a six-storied shopping paradise, showcasing everything from cargos and kurtas to cosmetics and kitchenware!
Unlike some of its other regional counterparts that are structured as large format stores in malls that automatically attract a high-footfall rate, Shoppers' Stop, Hyderabad, with its standalone format, has had to work that much harder at creating a ‘destination’ that would attract customers from a city with hitherto conservative spending habits. Though it has to be admitted that the simultaneous growth of employment opportunities in erstwhile Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu’s Cyberabad helped to a large extent by creating a concurrent increase in the disposable income of the city’s middle-class—fashioning the upwardly-mobile class of urban shoppers that the store mainly targets.
But whatever their spending habits, the store has had to constantly contend with both traditional commercial hubs as well as upcoming malls for attracting its customers. This has undoubtedly led to a continuous process of re-invention and self-improvement in terms of quality of service, motivating customers to come back for more.
Location, as any hardened real estate man would tell you, is all. Situated bang in the plush locality of Begumpet, Shoppers’ Stop stands out as the largest department store in the city. Its proximity to the international and domestic airport, the railways station and major hotels makes it equally accessible for both residents as well as visitors to the city.
But customer loyalty is an altogether different kind of fish. It takes much more than space and location to nurture a faithful buyer-base. Convenience and quality of merchandise aside, the customer also needs to feel pampered and taken care of. Valet car parking, central air-conditioning, well-maintained restrooms and trial rooms, an in-store café (Stop Over) and services like gift wrapping, alterations and product exchanges are facilities that keep ‘em satisfied. But it is the attention to individual needs that really makes a shopping destination worth coming back to. And this is what the Hyderabad store delivers to its customers with its play areas and store-prams for children, day-care facility for infants, wheel chairs for the handicapped and a customer paging system.
The creator of the country’s first loyalty membership program called the First Citizen’s Club, which offers privileged shopping experiences to its members, the chain now has a 3 lakh-strong membership base—with a considerable chunk of the pie belonging to Hyderabad. Such loyal customers are treated to exclusive cash counters for express checkout. While accepting payment, the store also accepts foreign exchange in most of the currencies, a practice that has helped it earn brownie points with foreign customers. The outlet has also hit the bull’s eye where efficiency is concerned by earning a reputation for taking less than a half-hour for every alteration job!
All in all, if Shoppers’ Stop, Hyderabad, has been voted as “The Store of the Year”, it would certainly appear to be a sobriquet well earned!
Article continued...
SPENCER PLAZA, Chennai
“The mall has it all.”
Over the years, Chennai’s Spencer Plaza has become much more than the most popular retail destination of the city—it has metamorphosed into a major landmark! When an enclosed commercial complex begins to be associated with a metropole’s identity, much may be said about the abstractness and inwardness of modern urban spaces. Viewed from such critically social quarters, the phenomenon speaks volumes for the growing importance of leisure and non-labour activities together with increasing economic competition.
And economic competition is exactly what has kept Spencer Plaza a step ahead of its competitors. In fact, as matters stand at present, it has no competitors! Its sheer size, surfeit of branded franchisees, central location and a century old name in Chennai’s commercial circles have all successfully conspired to keep competitors at bay.
Mangal Tirth Estate Ltd., the sole promoter of the property, conceived of this huge retail-cum-office destination way back in the ‘80s with the Spencer Co. Ltd., after the old Spencer commercial complex was burnt down in an accidental fire in 1984. Incidentally, the Spencer Group currently operates as RPG with specialised outlets—such as Food World, Health & Glow and Music World—that have dedicated spaces within the Plaza. Launched as the city’s first retail shopping centre as early as 1990, Spencer Plaza started out modestly enough with a few jewellery and garment stores since the concept of the ‘mall’ scene had still to catch up with the Indian market. But the spot gradually gathered momentum in the mid-90’s, with franchisees of major brand names like Proline, Karnataka Handlooms, Titan, Louis Phillips, Adidas, Levis and Color Plus joining as anchor tenants. And ever since, Spencer Plaza has never had to look anywhere but ahead.
Apart from the joint venture with Spencer Co. Ltd., majority of the tenant mix in the Plaza include individuals and small investing companies, who have bought space and given it out on rent to retailers at an investment return of around 11 per cent. The few inducers include brand names who have bought space for their own use, such as Color Plus, Levis, Florsheim, Westside and Lee.
With an influx of retailers and investors, the Mall, which started out with a super built up area of 300,000 square feet with only 1,25,000 square feet of retail space, now has a total area of 1,850,000 square feet with 550,000 square feet of dedicated retail space! But owing to its premature and unconventional beginnings, Spencer Plaza operates differently from the country’s newer and upcoming malls, where retail spaces may only be leased out—here one can still purchase retail space.
This hugely popular mall experiences an estimated footfall of nearly 32,000 per day on weekdays, which shoots up to 40,000 - 42,000 per day during weekends and festive seasons. Conversion factor for the complex is approximately 12 - 15 per cent, with anchor tenant Landmark single-handedly accounting for a weekday footfall of roughly 5,000 per day and 7,000 per day during weekends and a conversion rate of 30 per cent during weekends. Another successful tenant, the Pantaloon showroom, records a weekday footfall of about 600 – 700 per day and a conversion rate of 35 per cent, which rises to 1,000 – 1,200 per day during weekends with a conversion rate of upto 50 per cent during weekends!
The USP of the Plaza lies in providing better spaces with maximum visibility to its anchor stores, coupled with services such as air-conditioned interiors, multi-level car parking and car lift facilities, 24-hour security services, information counters at strategic positions and much more. Located in the heart of Chennai’s business quarter, in close proximity to major banks, hotels and tourist offices, the Mall attracts the best of customers actually interested in converting a casual visit into a purchase visit.
Spencer Plaza has succeeded in revolutionising the concept of retailing in Chennai, and in the process, has become a landmark in itself. The same city that saw the rise of such retail giants like Foodworld, Nilgiris and Saravana Bhavan, needed a Spencer Plaza to bring in the first organised mega format for retailing. It has succeeded in setting an example as a premium shopping complex in Chennai, where no competition with any organised retailing space existed.
It is this very monopoly of Chennai’s retail market that Spencer Plaza has enjoyed over the years, which may now be challenged by new and upcoming malls.
R-MALL, Mumbai
“A destination of choice for the common man.”
Can a popular shopping centre ever pack enough punch to put a whole neighbourhood under the spotlight? The owners of R-mall claim to have done just that by strategically putting Mulund and the city’s eastern suburbs at the forefront of the retailing scene in amchi Mumbai.
Deliberately positioned as a large format retail shop that caters to both the ‘classes’ as well as the ‘masses’, the ISO accredited Runwal Group’s R-Mall, nevertheless, mainly targets affluent sections of the growing suburban areas of Mulund, Bhandup, Powai, Ghatkopar, Chembur and Navi Mumbai. This, approximately, 30 lakh-strong customer base has been the best thing going for the Mulund Mall. Its success as a retail destination lies in its being the first to bring the convenience and experience of a shopping mall to the growing chunk of middle-class suburban Mumbaikers with disposable incomes.
Owned by the Rs. 500 crore Runwal Group, headed by Founder Chairman Subhash Runwal, the venture has also cashed in on the Group’s established goodwill in the market as the ‘preferred developer’ of real estate in the State of Maharashtra. The Group set out to launch the Mall as a wholesome family destination for a district that seriously lacked in world class shopping and entertainment options. A fully functional, four-storied mall with 100 percent occupancy in a record 18 months, was a major milestone for the Group.
And their vision has more than paid off, if the fact that it attracts more than 150,000 footfalls per week is to be taken into account. Estimated to generate a turnover of more than 100 crores for the fiscal year 2003-04, the mall has proved to be profitable in more ways than one.
This sprawling 2,50,000 square feet mall stands out in Mulund’s landscape because of its unconventional 700 feet façade. The mall interior has been designed in such a way as to make every shop front visible from the central atrium, ensuring equal customer weightage for all tenants. Big Bazaar, Lifestyle and Westside are the major anchor stores—together with the four-screen in-house multiplex, these stores draw in the maximum portion of the mall’s footfalls. Among the more popular brands present at R-Mall are Pizza Hut, Café Coffee Day, Subway, Cream Centre, Planet M., Tanishq, Raymonds and Provogue Studio. The place also houses an entertainment arena for children and adults alike, with a multi-cuisine food court occupying the top floor.
But what really takes the cake in innovative concept design is the seven-level free car parking area spread over more than 1,80,000 square feet. It has a capacity for accommodating 800 vehicles and is connected to each mall floor with two full sized parking elevators. Someone sure has been concentrating on customer convenience!
The biggest challenges faced by the Runwal Group in setting up the R-Mall in Mulund, Mumbai, lay in convincing big retail brands into changing their South Mumbai mindsets in favour of the potential suburbs. At the same time, the group had to simultaneously work on the shopping, entertainment and eating out habits of Mumbai’s suburban customer base.
Article continued...
OPTIONS, Rajkot
“Your power to choose.”
A premier lifestyle store that single-handedly accounts for nearly 30 percent of Saurashtra’s retail market in branded apparels and over 60 percent in branded watches and perfumes – that’s Options for you. A pioneering endeavour of entrepreneur, Bharat Thakkar, Options is the final fructification of his vision to offer his community a complete, quality-shopping experience.
Options, which began as a modest apparel and accessories showroom, was one of the first retailers to induce big-time brands into coming to Gujarat, way back in the late ‘80s. And ever since, the store has grown from strength to strength, emerging as the single-most tenacious link between the retail industry and the potentially pregnant market of Gujarat. In a region starved of quality merchandise and retail services at par with metropolitan (if not global) standards, there lay a vast bank of consumers waiting to be tapped. This is the customer base that the store had been quick to target.
Other than their loyal band of local residents, the trendy outlet also targets consumers from the neighbouring areas of Saurashtra, corporate travellers and NRI visitors. Conspicuously situated along the posh locales of Yagnik Road, right in the heart of Rajkot, this preferred shopping destination is easily accessible from all parts of the city. Not that the shop’s location could in any way have daunted the intrepid Hasmukhbhais and Kantabehns from getting to it, considering the local penchant for shopping and Navratri festivities (not necessarily in that order)! A destination on the lines of Options is all that the affluent community was waiting for. But it has to be admitted that for their part, the management and staff at Options had to face the challenge of creating product and brand awareness among the consumers, instilling into them a sense of quality-consciousness – in short educating their target consumers to an understanding of global buying trends.
Built over an area of 18,000 square feet, with an effective display area of more than 11,000 square feet, the store is spread over three floors. While the ground floor displays perfumes, watches, footwear, jewellery, leather accessories and women’s and children’s ethnicwear, the first floor caters to casualwear for men and women, and the top floor is entirely dedicated to formalwear. The store’s collection of apparel and lifestyle accessories includes more than 150 national and international brands, such as Levi’s, Scullers, Allen Solly, Lakme, Maybelline, Revlon, Omega, Rado, Tissot, Titan, Paco Rabbana, Hugo Boss and many more.
Registering an average of around 600 footfalls per day is impressive for a store situated in a non-metropolitan location. That the footfalls have positively contributed to the store’s profitability, is amply borne out by the turnover figures for last season’s quarter (October 2003 – March 2004), which shows that sales reached over Rs. 14,000,000 during that period. Through all this, Options, Rajkot, has emerged as the city’s landmark retail destination, preferred by both residents as well as out-of-towners. Loyalty programmes, efficient and friendly customer service, creative merchandising and innovative value retailing has seen to it that people keep coming back for more.
True to its name, the mega store has introduced Gujarat’s consumers to a whole new range of buying ‘options’!
THE LOFT, Mumbai
“India’s biggest footwear store.”
This one definitely has to be seen to be believed. A three-storied shoe store displaying more than 120 national and international brands of footwear, together with a huge range of footcare accessories and an in-house repair/ alteration corner! And if you thought that was mind-blowing, try this – this multi-brand, large format shoe store also offers pedicure services, with free fortnightly consultations by expert orthopedics – this is innovative retailing in action!
Owned and managed by M/s. Lakewood Malls Private Limited, which is headed by Susil S Dungarwal, The Loft is the amongst the very few retailers who are affiliated with the FDDI (Footwear Designs & Development Institute) in India. But then the company, now a chain of the biggest footwear store in South East Asia, had always nurtured bigger plans for itself by launching such an innovative retail store format – the likes of which had never been seen in the country. That such originality of idea was also a profit-wise viable option, was proved by the unexpectedly high turnover of Rs. 7.5 crore in the very first year. And this was no flash-in-the-pan either, for the company has clocked close to Rs. 7 crores for the fiscal year 2003-04, with estimates of crossing Rs. 25 crores by the end of this year.
Currently operating its 18, 000 square feet flagship store from Powai, Mumbai, and a 22,500 square feet branch at Hyderabad, The Loft has plans of launching eight more stores by 2007. The result of nearly of 18 months of extensive research on the Indian footwear market, the efforts certainly seem to have paid off. This first of its kind, multi-brand footwear store has come a long way since its experimental beginnings and within a very short span of time has managed to create its own niche in the as-yet unorganised footwear sector.
More than the sheer volume and variety of the merchandise displayed, it’s the unconventional format of the store that hits a first-time customer. Built on three levels, each level having two circumferences – the walled, outer shell operates as the storage area, while the inner works as the display area. The store has been custom-designed as the first specialty footwear store in the country without a loft.
The more than 1,00,000 pairs of shoes on display include brands such as, Bata, Liberty, Lotus Bawa, Woodland, Reebok, Nike, Adidas, Gaitonde, Birkenstock, Rockport, Lee Cooper, Clarks, Barker and Florshiem, to name just a few. The ground floor houses formal and party footwear for both men and women, while the first floor displays sportswear, casualwear, ethnicwear and foot accessories (such as branded socks, shoe polish, shoe shiners, shoe storage units, shoe bags, medicated insoles, laces, shoe horns, shoe deo's, perfumes and foot talc). The top tier is solely dedicated to children’s footwear. Free pedicure services come with purchases of certain amounts and are also available on payment.
India’s biggest shoe store goes by the belief that footwear is all about the right size, leather quality, brand and comfort. Having already positioned themselves as a complete footcare destination, this attitude has stood the store in good stead, creating a much-coveted loyal customer-base of all socio-economic sections of society. The store’s value for money pricing strategy, which offers shoes from Rs. 40 to Rs. 40, 000, has also helped in harnessing their customers. This one-stop shoe shop, which can even fit into your shoestring budget, despite its grand presence, is now one of Asia’s Best known retailer, thanks to its unique services, well-trained and knowledgeable store staff, and of course, the discerning customer.
Concluding part of article...
THE FORUM, Kolkata
March 2003, which saw the opening of Forum, could be considered as a major turnaround in the development of quality retail space in Kolkata. The success of this mall shattered the image of Kolkata as a conservative market.
—Mr Anuj Puri, MD, Chesterton Meghraj Property Consultants
The launch of Forum, the brainchild of Sunsam Properties of the Saraf Group, was a much-awaited event for Kolkata’s discerning public. Offering a wide range of shopping, catering and entertainment options, it has quickly earned itself the reputation of being the city’s trendiest hotspot for everyone from PYTs to pater familias. This four-storied, 180,000 square feet of retail space on Elgin Road proved to be an instant success in a city where disposable incomes and a demand for a complete shopping destination were both on the rise.
The biggest draw, however, has been the anchor store Shoppers’ Stop, which occupies a retail space of around 55,000 square feet across three floors of the mall. Some of the first tenant stores to set up shop were Satya Paul, Bizarre, Cotton World, Anokhi and Be:. Other branded outlets included those of Benetton, Planet Sports, Samsonite, Hidesign, Niké, Swarovski, Home Store and Music World. The mall also houses a 300-cover food court and a 4-screen multiplex, INOX, which can seat over a 1,000 viewers. Spread around 30,000 square feet, the entire top floor is dedicated to the city’s first multiplex.
Kolkata’s Forum has been drawing footfalls in excess of 75,000 per week, with retail outlets recording almost 30-35 per cent increase in sales after the opening of the multiplex in September 2003. Ticket sales at Inox, in fact, have been averaging at almost 90 per cent of the theatre capacity – the highest box-office sales amongst all the multiplexes in the country!
Despite enjoying the first mover advantage, Forum also faces problems as the pioneer of an innovative concept in the city. The mall needs to keep working at building a distinct brand image to increase footfalls with higher conversions.
THE FORUM, Bangalore
Shopping is, after all, all about creating impulse opportunity and once that is there, it is up to the brands and products to convert that opportunity.
—Suresh Singaravelu, Chief Executive, The Forum, Bangalore
Bangalore’s first shopping mall, The Forum, was recently launched in 2004 by Prestige Estates Projects Pvt. Ltd., the city’s leading retailer-cum-real-estate developer. The group goes about fifty years back, when they had just started out with a Raymond showroom on Bangalore’s Commercial Street. Over the years, they have pioneered the construction of shopping complexes, including 5th Avenue on Brigade Road.
Located at Koramangala, one of the most happening hubs, it is also Bangalore’s fastest growing commercial cum residential areas. Home to many of the city’s major offices, MNCs, entertainment complexes and a large North Indian population – the area is just ripe for the taking.
The Forum, built on a total land area of about 192,000 square feet, is Bangalore’s first integrated shopping mall, with over 400,000 square feet of retail space dedicated to a mix of retail, entertainment and dining outlets. Carefully planned and designed by the Prestige Group, the maximum space (35 per cent) has been allocated to retail, out of which, 36 per cent has been earmarked for the apparel section. The five-story mall’s multi-level car park has a mammoth capacity for 900 cars, making lateral entry to the mall possible, instead of traditional ground-level entry that often puts upper-level stores at a disadvantage. In fact, the 26,000 square feet atrium has been designed to allow for more browsing space, according better visibility to upper-level stores. A separate area has also been dedicated as an exhibition space within the mall.
The main anchor stores are Landmark, spread over 43,561 square feet, Westside with 37,426 square feet of retail space, and the Cineplex housing PVR (104,875 square feet) and FabMall (12,003 square feet). Landmark’s Bangalore outlet at Forum is, in fact, the largest across the retail chain.
