The textile major Raymond Group has been strengthening its retail presence with ‘The Raymond Shop’ (TRS), a premium chain of retail stores, offering complete wardrobe solutions, through top-of-the-line brands like Raymond, Park Avenue, Parx, Manzoni and ColorPlus.  TRS has been a pioneer in organised retailing in the country, having started operations around five decades ago. Its wide network reach and a complete range of clothing solutions, make it the largest exclusive branded apparel and textile retail network in the country.  Since its inception, TRS has stood out for prime five values – Trust, Excellence, Quality, Leadership and Service, which are tightly woven into a cohesive whole. The chain has always been practising customer-driven policies, and providing superior merchandise across a wide range of products at diverse price points, with the added benefit of service excellence.

Its offerings

TRS offers its customers a fine range of fabrics and ready-to-wear collections from Raymond, Park Avenue and Parx, which are available throughout the chain. Besides these brands, ColorPlus and the luxury brand Manzoni are available to customers at select stores.  TRS offers over 3000 qualities, shades and designs of fabrics to its customers. In addition to fabric, the clothing collections for customers comprise suits, jackets, trousers, shirts and accessories. Besides an elaborate product range covering fabrics, branded apparel and accessories, the service offerings in TRS is also exhaustive, including Custom Tailoring and Made-to-Measure.

Wide reach & brilliant customer experience

Its reach across the length and breadth of the country, including large cities and smaller towns, has allowed TRS to cater to a wide spectrum of consumers. Further enhancing this reach, TRS is now present in some of the leading malls in a new retail format. Importantly, 1/10th of the repeat purchasers visit TRS outlets at least once in two months and more than 30 per cent visit at least once in three months. Rakesh Pandey reveals, “The size of TRS is determined by the market needs, and thus varies from location to location. It ranges from 1500 sq ft to 12,000 sq ft depending on the range and variety of the merchandise, which is reflective of the consumer trend locally.” TRS has taken great care in building an excellent customer experience in staying contemporary and fresh. This includes elements of store design and product collections. On store design, TRS’ interiors are designed to provide a customer friendly ambience and a quality service experience. The product range ensures that TRS is a one-stop-shop for the growing millions of India’s discerning shoppers, thus making it a retail concept in itself.

Marketing strategy

“The brand’s marketing strategy during 2010 has been focused on making TRS relevant across age groups and contemporary to the modern Indian customer, in terms of products and services. Accordingly, TRS launched a new and clutter breaking brand communication that has been playing a pivotal role in enhancing TRS brand proposition. The campaign that was launched nationally during the festive season helped increase footfalls of both loyal and new customers”, informs Rakesh.

Designing – a key component

TRS believes not just in providing contemporary and relevant clothing solutions to the Indian consumers, but offering a shopping environment that is modern and warm. This and several other attributes constitute TRS’s signature brand experience. “Our team of dedicated architects and designers shapes the look of TRS and makes it contemporary and modern. In addition, we employ international consultancy firms and architects who advise us on ways to stay abreast of international designs and trends that have helped transform TRS into a shopping destination for the modern discerning male,” avers Rakesh. Talking about product designing, Rakesh informs, “Our in-house brand design teams map fashion trends and launch collections twice during the year – in Spring/Summer and Autumn/Winter. International fashion trends are married with domestic consumer trends while designing these collections.”

Excellence through training & technology

In an endeavour to excel in services, regular training sessions are conducted to impart product knowledge and upgrade selling and operational skills. Talking about technology implementation, Rakesh says, “Technology is the backbone of retail operations, especially for a brand like TRS which is geographically spread across the length and breadth of the country. Information technology has been a key business enabler for Raymond’s retail business, given our focus on providing customers a uniform signature experience of our product and service excellence across India. A key initiative in this direction is installing the latest Point of Sale (POS) systems for an integrated solution for monitoring sales and customer behaviour across the 500 plus strong network. Added to that is the business analytics tools that help us map customer preferences and assist us in merchandise planning and optimising stocking.”

Focus on smaller towns

“The smaller towns and cities of India have indicated huge potential for retail growth. As pioneers of taking Indian textile and apparel retail to these markets, we believe that this trend will further accentuate, given that the difference in dressing aspirations between the urban and small town males is narrowing exponentially. The strong brand legacy of TRS uniquely positions us to capitalise on the emerging opportunities offered by these new markets.  Factors like rise in per capita consumption, increasing consumerism across India, increased penetration of various brands in the smaller cities and the resultant  change in consumer lifestyle contribute to the high growth and rapid expansion of the consumer industry in India,” informs  Rakesh. He further adds, “High rentals in cities, limited expansion opportunities in urban centres and fashion retailing catching up in small towns have encouraged retailers to move into tier IV and V towns. These markets are today accessible with distribution opportunities and adequate media reach. The markets are connected and will further fuel connectivity development in coming days.  Also, local entrepreneurs with local employment stimulate local activity, thereby sustaining further development. Thus, small towns are exhibiting strong potential for growth. Based on market potential value, there are over 700 potential towns across Class IV and V towns in India. For TRS, we have identified 289 towns which we plan to tap for our store network.”

New age retail demands service differentiators

Elaborating the factors that pose a challenge to retailers in India, Rakesh states, “The Indian retail market is registering a scorching pace of change. There is change in customer preferences, their habits and buying behaviour. With growing FDI, there is also the looming threat from international competition that is slowly rearing its head. Further, as per latest statistics, India as a country is growing younger with over 241 million set to join the working age during the years 2010 - 2030. This growing population, coupled with growth in IT and related services, has brought in youths who constitute the primary target of retailers. Retailers need to cater to over 47 per cent of youth who fall under the age of 25 years. It is observed that their changing buying behaviour is moving from being need-based to impulse-driven, and from being in-shop to online. Added to this are their growing aspirations, which is the equalising factor across towns and classes. They are brand conscious and willing to pay more. To cater to this growing demand, retailers will need to provide differentiators through in-store service experience, better visual merchandising to enable impulse purchase and building long term customer relationships.” The parting comment of Rakesh underlines once again how TRS is strategising its business plan to offer consumers something unique coupled with excellence in service, to help them complete their wardrobes.

Quick Facts

Rakesh Pandey, President - Retail and Business Development, Raymond Limited