In an interaction with Indian Retailer, D Sathish Babu,Founder,UniverCell Telecommunications India Pvt Ltd, shares scope in selling mobiles.
Tell us about your brand’s journey till today and about any milestone you have achieved so far?
UniverCell is as old as mobiles. It was founded in 1996 with the intention to give a professional and superior service to the customer when the category was dominated by grey market. We started selling connections and then we moved to selling mobiles.
We have been the pioneer in mobile retailing and every innovation of ours has been a milestone for the entire category. To list some of our milestones
The first mobile retail chain to offer EMI on credit card in 2000
Grew from 10 stores to 100 stores in just 1 year in 2005
Pioneered the concept of mobile phone insurance in 2006
Launched the world’s first fully LIVE store in 2007
2013 – Brand launched in West in Pune and Mumbai.
2013 also saw UniverCell cross the 1000Cr mark to become 1300Cr company
How many stores you run currently and how many you are going to start in near future?
We have about 400 stores now that are company owned and about 20 franchisees. We intend to open about 200 stores in the coming fiscal.
What kind of consumption pattern you observe in your region? What kind of products are popular amongst consumers?
Today, every individual, young or old, male or female wants a BIG screen smartphone. Many of our customers change their phone more than once a year. We have seen the price points of 5-10k grow very aggressively in recent times. Consumers also want cool gadgets like good music headsets, smart watches.
What are your preferred real estate choices when it comes to running retail business in South India? Do malls earn greater revenue per square feet or it is the high street outlets that give you good return?
Both formats have worked well for us. We have some fantastic high street stores as well as mall stores. Of course all malls are not the same and we need to select the mall carefully.
Kindly share your personal views on any particular High street or Mall that gives good per square feet revenue earned in any of the mentioned format recently.
We are present in Phoenix Mall in many markets and all the malls are doing very well for us. Some of our best high street store is in Annanagar- Chennai, Ameerpet- Hyderabad and Indiranagar – Bangalore.
What kind of growth opportunity you see in your area of operation? How has been the response so far to your brand?
Our brand is a trusted and respected brand. We get very good feedback when we launch in new markets and our service philosophy resonates very well with the customer.
The opportunity for growth is immense. With smartphones becoming ubiquitous in people’s lives and with growing need for connected devices and data, we see a great future ahead of us.
What has been your biggest achievement so far according to you till today?
A recent study mentioned that South Indians are ‘smarter’ than the rest of the country when it came of technology and gadgets. We ushered and drove smart phones from way back in 2009 and the penetration of these devices is much higher in South and we feel very proud to have been the catalyst.
What are your future plans in terms of expansion and expanding product portfolio?
We will expand into new markets. Our immediate focus is west, but we are exploring other regions as well. We are in the business of mobility retailing and our focus will be to offer the universe of products for our customers. We are also considering launch of our brand of devices and gadgets.
Do you have any plan to launch an IPO soon?
No
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