Leaving others behind

Excluzen.com is one of India’s leading luxury service and products website catering to a very niche segment of the market. Recently, the website tied up with the Prestige Ticketing, official hospitality partner for Olympics London 2012 to offer travel and stay packages for corporate in India and Singapore. Urvashi Bahuguna Sahay, Founder & CEO, Excluzen.com shares her plans and experience so far in the online industry with Gunjan Piplani of Indianretailer.com.

Gunjan Piplani (GP): Excluzen has recently tied up with Prestige Ticketing, can you inform our readers more about the tie up?

Urvashi Bahuguna Sahay(UBS): Excluzen is about offering its members fine experience of life. We cater to both individual and corporate as well. Prestige Ticketing is the official partner for providing hospitality packages for London Olympics 2012. With them, we will be providing tickets for all the events at Olympics ensure food, stay, transfer to the venue and also visits to Olympics village. We will book everything from tickets to stay, complete hospitality, once a customer buys this package from us.

GP: What is the price of the package offered and how has the response been?

UBS: The packages are ranged between 5,000 – 15,000pounds/person. For this, we are in the final stages of signing details with seven to 10 corporates, for their top management or top guy. Apart from that we have a lot of enquiries coming in.

GP: How are you promoting these limited edition packages?

UBS: Such packages or offers can never be promoted over a mailing blast. It requires a lot of one on one interaction with corporate, ensuring them great service and hospitality. We are talking to our network of 100-250 corporate and taking them through what the offer is like. We also enable them to talk to Prestige directly as well.

GP: Do you also have exclusive tie ups with any other hospitality company?

UBS: Apart from Olympics, we are also promoting and providing hospitality packages for Formula One that will be held in Singapore. For this we have tied up with hospitality companies in India as well as Singapore to offer packages.

GP: What is your take on ‘Exclusive’ going Online?

UBS: Indians are now having the wealth to spend and are also becoming aspirational about a lot of things, from brands to luxury and to better services. But the Indian online space is filled with only mass market products and brands. Apart from Excluzen, there is no Indian site that gives exclusive services or offers exclusive deals and products.

GP: What is the current status of Excluzen in terms of members and product?

UBS: For us we don’t believe in numbers, it’s a website for people who love luxury and exclusivity. We have about 10,000 Excluzen members and of this 25-30 per cent of them are repeat buyers. In terms of SKUs, we have about 1,000-2,000 (split between product and services). Of this watches and gadgets are the best selling products.

All products are high value purchase as they are almost 20 times costlier than the brands or products sold on mass market e-retail portals.

GP: What are your expansion plans?

UBS: In terms of expansion, we plan to grow our number of SKUs and bring in international brands which are not available in India as of now. We have the import export license from the government. So, any international brands who want to enter India can launch themselves through Excluzen very easily.

We are also looking at designer handbags and also start off with events where in we will provide international artists to perform on occasions.

Claiming to be the only Indian e-retailer to offer customised ethnic and western wear to the consumers with their own manufacturing unit, warehouse and design team, co-founders Narender Kumar and Pankaj Thapar of efello.com share their take on their recent entry in the Indian market and their future plans….

Vrinda Oberai (VO): You offer customised ethnic and western wear to the consumers. How do you practically carry out that?

Narender Kumar and Pankaj Thapar (NK and PT): Yes, we are the only e-retailers to have our own manufacturing unit and team of designers to manufacture Indian style ethnic wear and western wear. We manufacture ethnic wear which includes suits, sherwanis, saris, lahengas, kurtas etc and western wear includes jeans, t-shirts, trousers, shirts, formal and informal wear. With our own manufacturing mechanism, which is supported by team of designers, tailors and stylish, we are able to offer customisation on ethnic wear as required by the consumers. The team continuously works to keep the stocks and fabric ready in the warehouse. We usually keep the average size of cloths ready. As soon as an order is placed online, the team gets ready to work on the customisation part, alter the size and the product gets delivered the same day of order from Delhi NCR.

VO: Where is your manufacturing unit, warehouse and design team located? How do you plan to expand in this space?

NK and PT: Yes we have worked behind the scenes to get all the necessary aspects of e-retailing fixed before we actually announce our entry in the market. Now we have equipped ourselves with our own set of design team, tailors, warehouse unit and manufacturing unit. All these are located in Okhla, Phase-II. Our headquarters is also located in Okhla from where we operate. We have already registered over 1800 users daily who visit our site and make purchase. We are getting good response from Delhi NCR, tier II and tier III cities. We expect 4500-5000 daily clicks in another 4-5 months. Our international exposure is helping us in gaining grounds in the Indian market. We have started with western and ethnic wear. We will gradually extend to bags, jewellery and fashion accessories. We want to break the problems of logistic and delivery system and are working to reduce the delivery time to 4 hours in Delhi/NCR.

VO: What is the USP for your brand?

NK and PT: We have been working to strengthen our backend so that we can come in the market with full force. Our USPs lies in our own warehouse, own manufacturing unit, in-house team of designers and tailors, exposure of the international market in the segment and offering customisation on the ethnic wear. We believe we are ahead of the existing players in the segment and in no times we would be among top five.

VO: What is your target audience? What are the focus areas?

NK and PT: We are targeting the global audience with our presence in over 72 countries. Our target audience includes the middle and upper middle class between the age group of 18 to 40 years. We have started with the ethnic and western wear and would gradually extend to fashion accessories and jewellery, footwear, innerwear, etc^.

VO: What kind of revenue figures you're targeting for the current financial year and what shall be your marketing strategy?

NK and PT: As startup we are generating good revenue. We have touched Rs 8 crore last year and we expect Rs 10-12 crore in the next financial year.

VO: Give us a backgrounder for Koyal Online Pvt Ltd. What has been the learning?

NK and PT: Koyal Online Pvt Ltd founded by us in 2008 - is engaged in the manufacturing of ready-made garments ranging from Indian ethnic wear to western outfits for men women and kids. The company has been promoting the creations under the brand name D Jeans London (for western wear) and Shree (for Indian ethnic wear).

We started exporting ready-made garments in the early 90s and latter migrated to UK and started importing pashmina scarfs, kurtis and slawar suits. After becoming a known name in the sector, we finally launched efello in India to serve the Indian online customers.

We started with international market which is very different as compared with domestic market. Unlike international market, India faces the problems of logistics, payment modes, timely delivery system, etc. We are working to overcome these problems here and provide a convenient shopping option to the growing number of Indian online consumers. We started with ethnic product, now we have western wear and bags; gradually we are adding other categories like jewellery, accessories, innerwear, footwear, etc.

VO: How do you plan to position and portray your brand, given the fierce competition in the market?

NK and PT: We want to be known as “one stop solution for all your fashion desire” and this is going to be our tag line. As market grows competition increases, and that’s good for all retailers. Our USPs will keep us ahead.

VO: There is already boom in the segment and few leaders have already captured the market. How will you cope with that? Don't you think this is late entry in the market.

NK and PT: We do not agree to that, we are rather much ahead in the segment. We have an international experience which is tough as compared to the domestic market. We understand the consumer’s behavior which would help us in the Indian market. It’s true that leaders in the segment have already emerged but our expertise and backend support would help us. There is a saying “better late than never”. We believe this is the right time to enter as the sector is on boom.

VO: Why did you first choose the international market and then decided to launch in India?

NK and PT: We had been operating in the international market through our export business that was the

 reason we decided to start with international market first  because we have an experience if 12 years in serving the global consumers. We are operating in 72 countries and in India every state is like a country. We are sure that we will achieve our targets.

VO: Which all categories you are dealing with and is there any plan to add other category? If yes what categories?

NK and PT: At present we are in ethnic wear, western wear and in jewellery. We have a plan to enter in foot wear, bags, accessories, inner wear, sun glasses, appliances, mobile handsets, etc. gradually we will increase our product profile further as the demand rises.

VO: Are you focusing on achieving the fastest delivery system? What is the time frame you are targeting to achieve? 

NK and PT: Yes, that’s going to be our next target. We are looking to strengthen our in-house delivers system further for Delhi NCR, for out stations we are talking to various courier companies or else we will start our in-house system for speedy delivery in tier II and III cities as well.

Fashion lifestyle e-retailer, Myntra.com, has come a long way since its inception in 2007. From getting heavy PE funding, to recently adding an array of Fabindia products to its portfolio, Myntra is all set to be a leader in the fashion lifestyle e-retail space. In a conversation, Mukesh Bansal, CEO and Founder of Myntra.com, tells us about the company’s growth and current structure.

Vrinda Oberai (VO): What is your mantra for success?

Mukesh Bansal (MB): It would certainly be persistence, flexibility (we are not catering to a niche product category any longer) and hiring top quality talent.

VO:  What have been the stumbling blocks?

MB: Initially, serving a niche category was difficult, since it does not account to a scalable business. Also, dealing with logistics and sorting that out has been an area of concern.

VO: Please tell us about the PE funds that you have received.

MB: We have received a total of $40 million of PE funding. We are not looking at any more PE funding in the next two years as we have received enough funds.

VO:  Flipkart and Smile Group have developed in-house logistics capacities. What is your take on developing and having in-house logistics capabilities?

MB: We have been working on that. We have built in-house logistics capabilities in five cities – Bengaluru, Delhi, Mumbai, Pune and Hyderabad.

VO: How would you position myntra.com? What are the categories witnessing maximum growth?

MB: We are a fashion lifestyle e-retailer and focus on apparel, footwear and accessories. We are witnessing robust growth in the category and plan to stay focused on that.

VO: What are the expected revenue projections for FY12-13?

MB: We are targeting Rs 500 crore of revenue.

VO: Your deal with Fabindia. Is there any set duration for this deal?

MB: The initial deal is for two years and depending on the kind of response we get, we shall work on renewing the same.

VO: E-retail has come to be known as a “research-before-purchase” tool. Having said that, how many customers just come on the site for research purpose(s)?

MB: As per my opinion, that takes place more in the electronic categories and comparatively much lesser in the lifestyle categories. In the fashion lifestyle category, it is not the case.

VO: How many registered users do you have and how many transactions do you carry out on a daily basis?

MB: We have 2.5 million registered users and carry out 5,000-7,000 transactions per day.

VO: What is the total number of daily visitors to the site?  What is the ratio between traffic and sales conversion online?

MB: The total number of daily visitors to the site is 300,000 and the conversion rate is 2.5-3 per cent.

Sher Singh is another feather in the cap of the ever zealous NRI entrepreneur, Sonny Caberwal, Co-founder & COO of the organisation, with the growing popularity of his lifestyle retail portal Exclusively In around the globe; he has finally made his way back to where he belongs and has given brand India the perfect platform to stamp its authority on the international market.

Aadeetya Sriram (AS): How did the idea of Sher Singh come about?

Sonny Caberwal (SC): Sanjay and I have been friends and colleagues for a long time. Our journey started 3 years ago, when we started up Exclusively In, a global retail portal that represents India, and now we’re the world’s largest online retailer of Indian fashion. Our tradition has been incorporated by designers across the world and loved by the finest celebrities. Now we are looking to build world’s finest lifestyle brand from India to the world. Keeping that in mind we took the finest lifestyle brands and designers as our benchmark and tried and tested the range that we will be offering. The general perception with Indian brands in the global brand has been one of inferior with regards to quality. We made the product online in India and within a couple of months the response was fantastic.

AS: How do you see the brand performing on an e-commerce platform?

SC: The online market in India has doubled itself when it comes to interest penetration from 42 million to 88 million. It is one of the fastest growing internet populations, so we have an opportunity to reach all part of India and the world, which has excited us. Considering our target is customers from 25-35, who appreciate quality yet prefer something which is accessible. We will be looking to partner with other e-commerce players also, like-minded brands across the globe.

AS: Now that you are an e-commerce brand, how will the distribution/delivery take place?

SC: We will provide free shipping of our product range available and make sure that the convenience quotient of online shopping compared to the brick and mortal store stays intact, and since we are present through the e-commerce platform, we don’t have to support the retail infrastructure of stores. This way we are able to pass on the cost savings to our consumers. Even though our products may meet the top lifestyle brand we can actually afford to deal at reasonable rates.

AS: How has the whole brand and its product range been brought about? Have you conducted testing earlier?

SC: We have actually done a lot of research to understand the taste and preferences of customers in India, conducted the required testing of our products, this way we have ensured that our products can be suitable to the weather conditions and also clear the product quality testing with high marks. With regards to difference in physical appearance in the country, we have deployed the same strategy as most of the global lifestyle brands do, which is to provide products in two different cuts, ie, slim fit and a regular fit. Our main objective is to meet the requirements of Indian consumer first then the global base. We have tested these products in the US and UK markets and the response from these markets have been quite interesting as they are more than comfortable with the products we provide and the price range is really attractive to them. Customers find the concept exotic, which clearly works in our favour.

AS: Are you designing the products yourself or they are being sourced from vendors?

SC: The designing and manufacturing of products are being done by our in-house team with the support of vendors in India. Our range includes everything from half sleeves, round necks, v-necks to blazers, long sleeves, sweatshirts, etc.

AS: What are your expectations from the brand in its first year? Any specific targets in mind?

SC: We expect to really ramp up our e-commerce sales in India and when we look to augment that with international sales and compete with traditional retail channels.  Earlier this year, we did some pop-up store experiences around malls in the country which enables us to interact with the consumers in a better manner and the responses have been positive. 

Day by day you see some or the other player foraying into the e-commerce platform.  There’s a steep competition making the segment exciting. Vivek Gaur, CEO, Yepme, Brand of Vas Data Services Pvt. Ltd, talks up plans of the brand with the launch of their e-fashion portal.

Aadeetya Sriram (AS): Your idea behind Yepme.com? When did you come into existence and how much investment for start-up?

Vivek Gaur (VG): I have been associated with e-commerce since 2007 and started bagittoday.com. Over the years, while Travel e commerce has taken off with multi-billion dollar transactions, Retail e commerce has remained a sub scale business with biggest site Flipkart at $ 5.5 Million monthly rate. The key reason for sub scale Retail e commerce is not that there not enough Indians on the net. It is primarily because most apparel, accessories and footwear sold on e-commerce are of end of life cycle/ knock offs/ previous season. Since everybody is selling the same stuff, there are no margins.  Our vision is to build a Differentiated Online Private Label business in Apparel, Footwear and Accessories that is Sustainable and Scalable, High Margin and High Volume opportunity and exploit the First Mover advantage. The total market size in India for Apparel, Footwear and Accessories is $ 48 billion growing at over 15%. One of the bigger retailers, Westside with Rs 7680 million turnover has only 57 stores. There is now way they can reach out to 350 million Indians in urban India and over 700 million in rural India. We figured out that quality products are not available in non-metros and hence we have a large untapped market. We get 35% of orders from places that are not serviced by courier and can only be reached by the Indian Post. My sense is that this opportunity is as big as Telecom opportunity in India, and Internet will help overcome scale limiters placed on physical stores. We raised Series A investment from Helion. We are getting huge traction for investment for Series B not only from traditional venture capitalists but also from large private equity players as they see it as a huge opportunity. This space hold very high degree of traction for financial investors as current gross margins are close to 40% and room for further improvement by 10%.

AS: Which brands are associated with you? How many SKUs you offer?

VG: We display Men’s Shirt, Trousers, Jeans, Footwear, Belts, Wallets and other Accessories. We have price range of Rs 899 to Rs 1999. We continuously add products to the site, close to 20-25% new products are added monthly. We display close to 150 styles.

AS: Your view on the E-Commerce industry in India? Where do you see it moving?

VG: Globally Apparel / Fashion is the biggest category online. Zappos.com, Vancl.com has built multi billion dollar businesses online in this category. There is no reason why the trend will not be same in India. However, when you require a change in consumer behaviour, the business needs to do risk mitigation. We are doing it by a) Virtual dressing room on the site   to try products virtually before you buy b) Sending return envelope with every packet to help hassle free return in case customer did not get what he wanted, 30 day return policy and reimbursement / pick up of courier for sending the consignment back to us c) Call Me feature on the site for real time call connect with our Call Centre d) Over and above, we try and replicate the offline experience online, e.g., when you enter an apparel store the sales person asks you the occasion for which you want to buy say formal, casual, outdoor or party, we have divided our collection by ‘Dress by Occasion’ concept.

AS: Which are the sectors you cater to with your brands? Do you reach out to Tier II & III cities?

VG: Men in the age group of 25 – 44, living in semi and urban India with deep desire to look and feel good. He has discerning taste on what, when and how to wear. He wants to be noticed for his style quotient

We want to reach to all Indians irrespective of whether they have access to online payment or not. We have cash on delivery option for buyers, wherein Buyer pays courier / post office person at the time of receipt of the packet. Our endeavor is to dispatch the packet within 48 hours of verification of orders. We have integrated site, only products that are available in inventory are shown on the site.

AS: The fashion segment has grown rapidly over the past couple of years, how has this benefited your brand in particular? What are the recent trends in the fashion for footwear, men's wear & women's wear?

VG: With the massive growth of the fashion industry in India, customers today vouch for the comfort, the fit and oomph. They desire brands that let them confidently put up a bold and contemporary style statement amongst peers.

All Yepme products are a result of best practices followed right from fabric to fit and fashion. Every single stitch, colour, the choice of fabric, everything has been designed and put together to give the best brand feeling. Yepme is a comprehensive collection of finest Formal, Casual, Outdoor and Party Wear for day long, all round confidence. Targeting the urban Indian males in their 20s to 40s, it is a first mover in this domain and has well laid out plans on building a profitable venture. The Yepme menswear range is a culmination of Fit, Fashion and Fabric, the ideal brand that understands and delivers fashion for the confident, young urban male. Our range is targeted towards the brand conscious 'Alpha male' constantly seeking peer appreciation. The collection befits the growing generation of individuals who carry a keen sense of what, when and how to wear. In the near future, the fashion brand also has plans to venture into collections for the fashionistas and personality conscious women with its own range of apparels for women.

AS: What are the challenges that you face while managing your inventory, also the discarded items? How is Supply Chain Management designed?

VG: Logistics and warehousing hold the key, we have gone in for IT solution that tracks product at the bin level. All our system works on single back-end and hence in real time. There is no batch processing hence no two sets of data due to interface delay. This looks simple but is a complex integration at IT level. Despite being a Fashion Brand, our biggest team is in IT, we have close to 20 people team, technology will be key to success to this business

AS: Your marketing strategy and future plans in the pipeline?

VG: We launched the brand at F Bar, New Delhi with Dino Morea, Rahul Dev, Rajneesh Duggal and Shawar Ali as Show Stoppers for our Party, Formal, Casual and Outdoor range. You will see us being very active on Fashion Show circuit. The next big one is planned in Mumbai.  Our brand is for Alpha Homo Sapiens. The basic insight is that people dress well to be an Alpha Male / Female in the context and environment. Our brand is built around this basic premise. Everything that we do as a brand will connote the same. Even tactical promotions will be on the same lines.

With e-retailing gaining prominence in the country, a lot of players are entering the segment, Mr. Shailen Amin, Co-Founder & CEO, Bestylish.com, highlights the definite need to provide efficient services to the customers.

Aadeetya Sriram (AS): Bestylish, your brain-child, how did the idea take form?

Shailen Amin (SA): Bestylish is a brainchild of the Smile Group and combination of partners coming together; it’s basically a four-party idea. Smile Group has already developed into the deal-based and flash sale-based; we’re talked about moving into the Fair-Price retail convenience model, variety model, within which the idea of Bestylish has made its foray. We are a completely customer focused from both product availability to the delivery to the experience focusing e-retailer. Bestylish is a footwear centric e-portal, we have couple of guys with us who have an impressive amount of expertise in the footwear segment and hence we hope to function well over the years. Our name suggests a style house and we plan to cater to every foot in the country.

AS: You’ve got a lot of brands associated with Bestylish; tell us about the line of agreement?

SA:  Our association with brands is a direct relationship; every brand has a way of interacting with the retailer, because of our pre-knowledge of brands, we have inroads into a lot of brands, existing in India as well as globally. We are basically working directly to build confidence with brands themselves, so that we maintain their brand presence, pricing strategy everything. We adhere to the standards and customisation of these brands on our portal, without differentiating from their actual existence, and making it available to consumer in the same way as it should be done. We will be involved in co-branding advertising with them on our website.

AS: What according to you is the scenario of e-commerce industry in India?

SA: E-commerce industry in India is still budding, arriving. I think a lot of consumers are e-friendly, having already done transactions online, whether it’s buying ticket for rail, airline or even done their shopping online, people are definitely getting more comfortable with it.  Given the fact that any large nation which is developing, people prefer services provided to them in a very convenient manner, since shopping consumes a lot of time as well as patience, especially when shopping for fashion,  it requires time, touch and feel, that is something that will develop online with people becoming aware of the benefits of shopping online. In India, it’s an easy platform, to introduce brands with low-capital intensive, for a brand coming into India.

AS: With e-shopping gaining its share quickly in the market, how exactly do these services differ from the conventional brick and mortar shops which encourage touch and feel of the brands for the consumer?

SA: There is general consensus that the brick and mortar stores are the only way to deal in retailing, which as time bides is becoming more of an inconvenience, which a customer does not prefer facing. What the e-shopping model provides is a lot of variety under one house, which is hard to find even with a brick and mortar store. At Bestylish, we have over 2000 styles of footwear available for women, men and kids. This is one of the pluses of retailing online, where we can accommodate lots of styles, brands and size availability. Secondly, the model is cost-effective in the sense that, other than paying for what you buy, you don’t need to play any other charges related to shipping etc. You just need to spend couple of minutes on our website, and within no-time your order gets delivered to as promised.

AS: Do you have any offerings incase of any discarded product delivered to the customer?

SA: Bestylish offers the opportunity to try the same shoe in two different sizes, get them delivered and the other obsolete pair will be taken back, without any extra charges. Its bringing convenience to you house. As long as the shoe and packaging is unused, or not in a dire condition, its free returns, with a money-back guarantee, which could also be converted into a voucher, using which one can undertake their shopping on our website to fulfill their requirement.

AS: What is the mode of communication of Bestylish with their customer?

SA: We have our very own Customer Care service to stay in touch with the customers. Each customer has an account, through which he can communicate with us through email, [email protected], is a great way to communicate with us, also developing feedback mechanisms on our website. We’re open 7 days a week; we have recruited our customer care guys who have expertise in the field of sales marketing and convenience shopping.

AS: What is the current trend in the footwear market in India?

SA: The trend that has been visible to us during our market research is that, people have a taste for stylish, unique and comfortable shoes. People shop differently around the world, Indian consumers shop differently, but ultimately they express themselves through their shoes. People in India, still prefer having a single pair of shoes which they wear for office-use everyday.  Shoes are no longer an accessory for men & women; instead it’s more of style statement on the feet which expresses their taste in fashion. Women have always preferred having multiple pair of shoes, and the frequency with which their style alters is quite remarkable, compared to the men, but that is gradually taking place and soon you’ll see the men’s footwear market evolving rapidly. This being summer season, we are prominently displaying bright colored footwear on our portal.

AS: What are the challenges for a retailer as a buyer & seller?

SA: As a buyer, it is difficult to find the variety we are looking to partner with brands, that don’t exist in the country, and there are a lot of brands who do not even sell in India. So working with manufacturers like this to introduce such ranges is a challenge that takes time, it happens gradually, he needs to develop a strong relation and communication with the brand. Sourcing is another challenge for the brands as most of the materials are made available to them through export, then you have the challenges of supply-chain that a buyer faces. From a selling point of view I’d say that the customer service & experience is the biggest challenge for a brand.

AS: Over the years the internet penetration in the country has increased, do you feel the convenience part as well as the e-retailing part go hand-in-hand for the rise in e-shopping?

SA: Comparatively the growth has been visible as far as the internet penetration is concerned. Talking about the co-relation of convenience and e-retailing, it is definitely one of the factors for the rise in shopping, but not the sole reason. Other than the Bestylish website, we will be also launching our kiosk businesses, and the idea of having kiosk is to be able to merge the offline-online servicing. These kiosks are being brought across to various cities in India; we’re focusing on Tier II & III cities initially, the idea of kiosk in these regions is to encourage the awareness of our services to the ones who do not have the facility of internet.  These kiosks will be present at existing footwear outlets across the country, which have the catchment that is worth targeting.

AS: Your projected expectations for Bestylish by next year?

SA: We expect to mirror the growth of sister company, i.e. growth of 20-25% year-on-year. In terms of units, we hope to have sold around 2000 pair of shoes on a daily basis.

The Body Shop has been spreading the beauty quotient factor with its products worldwide, Ms. Shriti Malhotra, Chief Operating Officer, The Body Shop India, gives a lowdown on the impact of the brand on the country over the years.

Aadeetya Sriram (AS):  Which market segment does The Body Shop target?

Shriti Malhotra (SM): In India, people have difference of opinion in terms of fairness cream. We are targeting a much wider space that understand the difference between the terms and also want clearer skin rather than fairer skin. Ours is a blemish-free and glowing skin market.

AS: How has The Body Shop been operating in India?

SM: We operate our stores ourselves; we have 65 stores in the country, under our operation. We have closely-run operations like speciality retailers; we have our National Operation Team, our regional operations team. Etc. Training is a vital cog of our operation set- up; they both go hand-in-hand.

AS: Could you elaborate on what kind of training procedure you undertake?

SM: Our training has been set-up The Body Shop way; we have a global training programme called the Retail Academy, where there is a lot of focus on product, brand and customer. We spend a lot of time in hiring our staff, as we understand the importance of inculcating the right ethics comes only when you have a team of qualified and capable recruitments. We get them trained in the stores itself, making them understand about the brand, different products on offer as well as developing the level of expertise required to handle the customers. For this we make them familiar with art of selling, then art of customer service, which is all about inspiring the customer, keeping him happy and provide him with a positive image of the brand.

AS: What is your marketing strategy for The Body Shop in India?

SM:  Our primary strategy has always been to reach out. The products, pricing campaigns, campaigns like brand celebrity ambassador, reaching out to Tier II & III cities, to work with vernacular magazines, The Body Shop involves itself in anything that could provide us with an opportunity to attract more customers. We also have our marketing done through 360 degree way as well, be it T.V, radio, print as well as the ever-growing internet, in-store, out-store we make sure that every possible mode of communication is utilised.

AS: How has the re-alignment of pricing strategy in Tier II & III cities result for you?

SM: Our re-alignment strategy to cater to the Tier II and III cities has been to our benefit, we operate at the same price-level all over the country, even if you look at Delhi, every pocket in India has different segment of customers based. Our pricing strategy caters to the vast mass taking care of their sensitivities, we are not very niche, and we are broad. The response that we have received from these cities has exceeded our expected levels, and we have understood that these corners of the country are no more to be leftover.

AS: How vital do you feel has the green-way of brands been in order to attract customers?

SM: Customers these days are very aware of the happenings in and around them. India as a country, being a young nation, the young mass of the country, is well-educated and updated to the current trends in the world. India is very alert and aware when it comes to the environment; we provide 100% recycled packaging, in most of our products we do not have any packaging, it’s just the bottle that we sell.

AS: How much growth have you attained over the years?

SM: The growth has been significant for The Body Shop. We’re growing by 50% year-on-year, and we hope to grow the same for the coming years as well.

AS: What is your future strategy for The Body Shop in India?

SM: Our strategy is very clear; we always do things that resonate with us, specifically in India, where the customer is well-aware of the brands available to him. We make sure that we make sense to the consumer, and even if we talk about the celebrity ambassador, we felt the need for one, so as to get associated with lot more consumers. Our primary strategy over the next few years will be to open as many stores as possible, i.e. 100 stores in 2 years & 150 by 2014, which will act as our access points, we never pre-plan things for the long term, but always keep in mind to position it with relevance. We plan to have our Hair-oil products made available designed primarily for the Indian market, which has always been a hair-oil market.

Mukesh Bansal, CEO, Myntra.com founded the company in February 2007 and started as a personalized portal of products. He discusses his recent moves and ties up with the sports brands and thereby launch of separate sport category for its buyers. His company is also expanding aggressively into a complete fashion lifestyle retailing, across all ages and groups. Mukesh shares the roadmap and the response of World cup fever to his business with Avinder Batra. Here are the excerpts.

AB: What is Myntra.com all about?
MB: We are an online e-commerce portal, which deals in fashion lifestyle retailing. We initiated the business as personalization portal and had a catalog of products which could be customized such as T-shirts, mugs, jersey. Three months ago we launched our sports lifestyle catalog for our consumers. And have tied up with Nike, Reebok, Adidas etc and gradually we are developing the lifestyle fashion category. Youth wear, Sports-wear, Casual wear, footwear etc all are in the pipeline.

AB: Recently you have tied up with Nike. The World cup fever is growing like wild fire, how are you encashing the opportunity?
MB: As the world cup fever is building up, our partnership with Nike is doing very well. Huge jump in selling the jerseys approximately 500-600 per day as compare to normal day selling of 30-40 only. Our sales has surged almost 10 times and at this point of time we are facing the shortage of stock with we are effectively dealing with. Lot of people in India like to watch match sitting at home with their names at the back of the jersey.

AB: How do you build that hype around the event?
MB: We have been doing lot of advertisements on radio, prints, online especially in Delhi, Bangalore cities.

AB:How much is the budget assigned to it?
MB: It is close to 1.5 crores for this World cup.

AB: Which age group usually visits your portal?
MB: 21-25 years who are young and bachelors and the others are from 30-35 years who have small family with kids. Since we are expanding our portfolio so people wants to customize the name of their family members especially on mugs, t-shirts etc. That is why we are building up a huge range of fashion lifestyle portfolio for our customer base.

AB: How would you go for your marketing strategy What would your budget?
MB: We would advertise in prints, radios and also gradually go for TV commercials. Approximately we have lined up the budget of 10 crores.

AB:Who are your regular buyers and the price points with sell?
MB: Price range from Rs 400 to Rs 2500.  Our larger categories that popularly sell (in the descending order) are—sport jerseys, T-shirts, mugs, track pants, footwear.

AB: What was the concept that went into to start with the customized products?
MB: Inspiration was from outside India where companies have lot of personalized products. We felt that the idea is very powerful to build the concept around it. Customers can give their own inputs to make the products for them. But we also want to go beyond personalization. We started with sports lifestyle because we have been selling lot of sports products where we got phenomenal response.

AB: How do you position your discount strategy vis-a vis brick and mortar store?

MB: We deal in current season merchandise. So there is not much price difference but we offer other benefits-- information about the brand or the product, you can buy the product irrespective of the place you are residing. Other  online portal deals with the merchandise just to liquidate the leftover stock.

AB: How is your distribution network? How challenging is it?
MB: We try to dispose the product within 24 hours and it has been a challenging job. Our team is working on automation. We have a very large warehouse in Bangalore where we keep our stock. It takes 2-4 days is the maximum.

AB: Any other developments you would like to share with us?
MB: We are developing lots of customer engaging activities—for Team India jersey we have launched an application on the facebook where you virtually purchase the Team India jersey and support the country and then we have around 4,80000 fan following.

Aimed at those who wish to open online store and leverage internet or mobile based sales, Martjack comes integrated with Amazon, eBay, Google Merchants, Yahoo etc. and is a white label account that allows complete branding of your store. Any large scale retailer, manufacturer or even a small time single-shop owner can open an account, at a paltry Rs. 1000/- a month or go upto Rs. 50,000 a month depending on the size of operations.

Aadeetya Sriram (AS): The concept of MartJack is unique, could you elaborate on the services that you provide? What actually drove you to introduce this retail platform?

Nitin Padmawar (NP): Reasoning came up with MartJack to provide retailers/organizations with a multi-channel retailing solution which enables any business to showcase their products in a rich way, influence consumers through a rich product experience, drive consumers to make purchases through promotions, provide flexible & convenient shopping options, enable online sales and also drive consumers to the physical stores of the business.

AS: There has been sudden rise in no. of e-shoppers in the country, what are the engaging factors for virtual shopping?

NP: Increase in internet penetration and brands offering products themselves has increased trust and comfort of online buyers. Genuine products, value proposition, backing of brand service guarantee is fueling buying in online space. Virtual shopping offers product discovery opportunity to online shoppers. Most of the time buyers get better offers than offline stores.

AS: How can brands subscribe to your services? Which are the brands that are of prime importance to you?

NP: We are offering our services to biggest brands / retailers to single shop owner. All the brands and categories are of prime importance to us. We are getting enquiries from metros as well as from tier 1 and tier 2 cities.

AS: What sort of clients are you catering to?

NP: Scalability of the Martjack platform has been proven with the prominent brands in India like Videocon, Big C mobiles, HCL, Next Retail, Ddamas, Nakshatra, Cygnus, Gili ,Olive Telecom, the Bombay stores, Sangeetha Mobiles, Neerus, Being Human watches, UB Group, Basecamp etc. and several international brands like , Sage Clothing, Geraldonline  and many more – use the Martjack platform to establish their online stores, get direct online sales, and also  increase the footfalls at their physical stores. We are catering to all the categories; Apparel, Jewellery, Electronics, Laptops, Mobile phone and accessories, Digital Cameras & Handicraft.

AS: How much investment went through during your inception? When did you break-even?

NP: We have raised $ 4 million till date and we are growing at more than 150% YoY.

AS: Whom do you view as your competitors?

NP: At this point of time, quite surprisingly, we do not have any sort of competition in this market.

AS: “Future of E-Commerce in the country” your view?

NP: We feel that India currently reached tipping point for Ecommerce, in next 3 years Internet is going to play major role as sales and marketing channel. With Government focus on Rural Broadband development and Increasing acceptance by Tie 2 and Tier 3 cities we expect ecommerce to grow 35% YoY for next 3 years.

AS: What plans do you have for MartJack in the near future? Are you coming up with any m-commerce solution?

NP: Apart from the online stores powered by MartJack, Reasoning Global is also powering marketplaces such as www.Makemygiftz.com of Gati Courier, and www.HDFCBANKSMARTBUY.com (an Initiative of HDFC BANK) where the retailers get the opportunity to capitilize on the present consumer base of these businesses to drive sales. “We aim to influence directly or indirectly influence 30% online transactions in Indian ecommerce industry by FY  2012. Reasoning will empower more than 10000 stores through the Martjack platform the end of FY 2011-12. The company plans to expand its’ presence in GEC countries post April 2011.” Reasoning has also ventured into the new growing aspects of digital commerce such as mobile commerce & social commerce and is planning to empower retailers using MartJack to leverage these channels actively in early FY 2011-12

Having been recognized as a one stop destination for buyers, “Deals and You” continues to grow and revolutionize the group buying space. Getting more out of life is what “Deals and You” focuses on. Group buying is a discount shopping technique pioneered by GroupOn. However, we decided to learn more about the same from Gaurav Kachru, CEO - Deals and You.

Vrinda Oberai (VO): How do you ensure the customers that what you’re delivering is a ‘desired quality product’, given the discount you offer?

Gaurav Kachru (GK): “Deals and You” hand picks merchants and establishments for our members very carefully. Our team works diligently to find the best deals and ensures that the establishments are upto  the standards set by “Deals and You”.  We promise the customer that all the deals on our site have been tried and tested by our sales team to ensure quality and service.

VO: What is your company’s USP?

GK: “Deals and You” is not just another ‘deal a day’ portal. We offer the best deals with the best value to all our members in India.  “Deals and You” aims to create a deal based lifestyle which allows customers to enjoy the best things in life without spending huge bucks!

VO: Who are your immediate competitors and what remains to be your marketing strategy to tackle the same?

GK: “SnapADeal” is our immediate competition.  Our strategy remains to bring an exciting mix of products and services, the widest range of deals in each category and incredible savings to our members. We constantly innovate on the types of products and services that can be offered in this model & keep delighting our members with an element of the new & desirable. In addition to this, we still maintain our core belief in service quality and customer satisfaction. We will continue expanding throughout India and bring trendy & relevant experiences to our members.

VO: How do you view the future of this retail format 2 years down the line?
GK: This retail platform lends itself to several mediums and will blend the worlds of offline, online and become a true “click and mortar” model in the near future.  Being such a versatile means of retail, D&Y sees many formats happening in the next few years including mobile phone applications and even strategically located kiosks.  Being a performance based marketing model, it allows SMEs in many segments to enjoy the marketing presence of larger companies without paying for their marketing spend upfront but rather pay only once the consumers have redeemed their services, thus, turning marketing from a business cost to a revenue earner.
 

VO: What is your presence and what are the expansion plans in store for the near future?

GK: We already have a nation-wide presence with many deals available to our members all over India. We serve members in over 30 cities and have a physical presence in 8 cities. We are expanding rapidly and plan to have physical presence in over 24 cities by the end of this year.

VO: What are building blocks on which the concept of Deals and You rests?

GK: As a business, we value the quality of our deals, to be relevant to what our members want and above all customer service. We invest time to handpick our deals which are first sampled by our team & qualified before we present them to our members. We hope to build trust & confidence in D&Y’s ability to curate the best experiences that their city has to offer all with incredible savings for our members!
 

VO: What is the kind of market research that you do before entering a target market?

GK: Since a large number of our deals are available nationally, most often we have tried and tested the markets that we plan to launch our physical presence in already! We research the trendiest and most happening places in each city and place our sales team to try to collaborate with them. We also encourage feedback through many social media sites that help us engage the level of interest in the deal and work towards complete consumer satisfaction.