Second-tier retailing is a Smart Idea

Posted on February 8, 2008

Second-tier retailing is a Smart Idea
Rajiv Banerjee & Ravi Balakrishnan with Preethi Chamikutty , TNN

Even within India’s retail solar system, not many would have heard of Anil Adamane from Nagpur or Rajasekar Reddy Seelam from Hyderabad . And if the names do ring a bell, it certainly won’t be beyond the vicinity of the cities they dwell in. They don’t enjoy the nationwide fame that’s reserved for the likes of the Biyanis, Ambanis and Mittals — yet Adamane, Reddy Seelam and their ilk are charting a course which, sooner or later, will bring them national recognition .

For they are the second tier of marketers who’re building up retail networks far away from the glitz and glare of the major metros. They have painstakingly built equity in their home turf and are now spreading their wings. From Bellezza saloon to 24Letter Mantra to Khadim’s to Witco, they are the emerging faces of specialised second-tier retailing in India.

Adamane and Reddy Seelam are shining examples of mini-metro entrepreneurship that stemmed from the desire to break out of the daily rut and chase opportunity . Adamane, an MCom graduate, was forced to start a daily provision shop in Nagpur for want of good job prospects. To augment his income, Adamane converted part of his shop into an ice cream parlour and STD booth, starting work at four in the morning and shutting shop by midnight. During his visits to the neighbourhood saloon for a shave, Adamane observed the business closely. “It was a dirty ramshackle hole in the wall, with hygiene being the last thing on the barber’s mind. Yet it was doing brisk business, and the wait sometimes was as long as 30 minutes,” he reminisces. That’s when he hit upon a unique service proposition: a saloon with an emphasis on hygiene, ambience and value pricing. Bellezza came into existence in 2003 with the first outlet in Nagpur. Today, Adamane runs 22 Bellezza saloons across Maharashtra, Gujarat , Madhya Pradesh and Chattisgarh. From a two-man outfit — with Adamane learning the craft on the job — Bellezza employs 300 people, and has a turnover of Rs 9 crore.

Out in Hyderabad, it took nearly two years for Reddy Seelam to get an efficient supply chain in place before he rolled out 24Letter Mantra, a retail format specialising in organic farm produce. Reddy Seelam says that launching the format was a culmination of a dream from the time he started working to starting a light engineering firm, which he later sold off. “It was a pure profit venture,” he admits.

His hailing from an agricultural family helped ease the task of convincing farmers to be a part of the venture. The first 24Letter Mantra started in 2005, and since then three more stores have been launched in Bangalore and Pune. “The spread has been slow. But in such a venture , one requires efficient procurement processes, given the nature of products we retail,” explains Reddy Seelam.

The evolution of formats like Bellezza, 24Letter Mantra, Yo! China and Khadim’s indicates an interesting geographic spread these players have envisaged. Yo! China, a quick service restaurant and takeaway chain specialising in Chinese cuisine, has outlets across tier I and tier II cities across India. Likewise, footwear retail chain Khadim’s started operations in Kolkata before moving to states in the east, south and then west. In Maharashtra, Khadim’s has presence in cities like Aurangabad, Nagpur, Sangli and Satara.

These players have adopted a bottom-up strategy, where the brand gets built in markets devoid of cut-throat competition, and then gets scaled up to major metros. Jim Lucas , director of retail ecology, Draftfcb, states that this phenomenon is largely unique to India, where small retailers are innovating even when it comes to expanding their network . “Ten years back, the move was always from the centre to the periphery.

But now formats are been launched from the periphery and are coming to the centre,” explains Lucas. Operating from the fringes has enabled them to tap enormous opportunities which exist in tier II and III towns and cities. “In cities like Patna, we are pretty much the only branded food chain,” says Ashish Kapur, MD, Yo! China. Adamane is clear that the small towns are where the potential is. His strategy is to look at small towns with populations of 40 lakh and target 1% of the population which owns cars and bikes.

Chennai-based premium luggage retailer Witco, however, presents a contrasting case of a regional brand which has shed its ‘small-pond aspirations’ and wants to compete across major metros. VP Harris, MD, Witco, reveals that five years back, the format gave up the positioning of a retailer of travel goods and accessories, a positioning that’s been in existence for nearly four decades. Harris says that post liberalisation, competition from overseas prompted Witco to relook at not only its positioning but also its physical presence.

Premium luggage and accessories was chosen as a plank, and Witco decided to exit small towns like Ooty, Salem and Trichy to focus on metros like Chennai and Bangalore. “In the premium segment, 90% of the market is in the top 12 metros, with maximum consumption coming from international air travelers. Once we have exhausted the metros, we will look at tier II cities,” says Harris. With 12 Witco stores across Chennai and Bangalore, Harris’ plans for forays into Western markets have hit a barrier — high real estate costs. Harris says Witco has now hired the services of an investment banker to help identify a strategic partner. “More than infusion of funds, the partnership will enable us to speed up the process of identifying real estate for store expansion,” he explains.

Kapur of Yo! China says that his format is present in tier II and III towns as restaurants and food courts because in these centres, acquiring volume is important. “Consumption is great and the cost structures are far better. Real estate is more reasonable,” he explains. Kapur believes that the biggest mistake players make is assuming expansion has to be retail-driven , with the approach invariably being to begin in a mall. “Now we know who the target audience is. We want to go where he resides and be in the format best suited to him. My target is young professionals and so we are at tech parks. Even in Tier II towns, we study where the target segment resides and situate ourselves irrespective of the new property being developed,” he says. Vikram Thaploo, VP – projects & marketing, Express Retail Services, which owns Big Apple stores with formats across Delhi and NCR — with Gujarat and Karnataka on the anvil — agrees, saying the company doesn’t have any store in malls and isn’t planning any either . “We offer convenience of time and neighbourhood. We are for customers coming in daily or weekly — not as a destination supermarket,” says Thaploo.

With expansion, these regional players have to contend with establishing a presence in markets with near-zero brand recall. It also means working on distribution, logistics, manpower and understanding unique purchasing behaviour as well. While foraying into other eastern states was easy for Khadim’s given the presence it already had through its wholesalers, Suman Barman Roy, president, Khadim’s , admits that the move to the southern market in 2000 was a challenge. “Dealing with the different cost structures in terms of logistics, transportation as well as taxes which, in those days, were in wide variance from state to state… Other issues were recruiting and training manpower, setting up a distribution chain, revamping the IT backbone,” explains Barman Roy. He says that in 2000, the company chose to open self-owned outlets to gain acceptance amongst the local vendors, before opting for the franchisee route. Also, each state has specific size assortment requirements , making distribution a logistical nightmare.

“We have styles and size assortments suited to the needs and tastes of specific regions . Eastern and southern India will have more basic styles, while the north and western India requires ‘fashion items’ . Also footwear being fashion driven, there is rapid obsolescence of style, which makes the situation even more complex ,” he explains. Kapur of Yo! China believes that supply chain problem solutions is a high-cost one, and he hopes that riding piggyback on overall retail growth makes distribution easier. “Vendors across India need to be far more innovative. They are currently waiting for retailers to work with them rather than coming up with innovative solutions and products that cater to the food services industry,” he states.

Having acquired scale, most second-tier marketers are looking at new formats. Adamane plans to start a gents-only saloon called Bello — Bellezza is for both sexes — with a low-cost value offering as its proposition . Khadim’s , for its part, has opened a large format department retail called Khadim’s Egaro in Kolkata, which it plans to take it national . Reddy Seelam says that his company is experimenting with smaller shop-in-shops formats of 24Letter Mantra with a national chain, and if successful, wants to rapidly scale up to around 150 shop-inshops by next year. “We are also looking to brand the produce we export to Europe and other markets once we acquire a retail portfolio,” he states.

The blueprint to the future appears to have been well chalked out. These tier-two retailers have spent decades polishing their skills and are now limbering up to play in the big league. It’s obvious that not everyone will succeed. Over time, some will falter and would have to go back to the drawing board. A few others will inevitably get acquired by the heavyweights. The most patient , persistent and innovative of the lot, however, will go on to rewrite the rules of the game. And maybe even end up writing a book on how It Happened in Nagpur. Or Hyderabad. Or Kharagpur.