STOrai profiles the inaugural edition of the Kongu Retail Summit at Coimbatore on March 18 2014. Southern India is the home of both retail and organized trade and RAI’s Southern council has long been of the view that networking events in markets such as Coimbatore, Madurai and Kochi were required, in addition to the meets at Chennai and Bangalore.
The event was attended by 150 people, including RAI members and academic partners.
STOrai presents quotable quotes and glimpses:
“South India is the birthplace of both – retail and modern retail in India. It has 25% of the population of the country but 30% of the retail turnover” – said Bijou Kurien during his Key Note Address. “South India has built strong vibrant brands – and malls recognize that they need local and regional brands as much as they need their national counterparts”, he added.
– Bijou Kurien
“Family owned businesses are an extension of the family environment for our staff” said M. Banumathi, Head Naidu Hall, Kovai, during the panel discussion on the Dynamics of Family owned businesses. Her co-panelist, T.Shantakumar, MD, Kirtilals said “Professionals have a role to play as family owned businesses grow. However, the key to success for both sides is to ensure that the professionals are able to align with family culture and business values”.
Read More Here: http://goo.gl/f3flrQ
The panel on “The Art and Science of retailing” provided rich insights.
K.R. Nagarajan, Founder & MD, Ramraj Cotton spoke about his journey of converting the traditional ‘veshti’ into ‘occasion wear’ – something to be worn with pride and dignity , which resulted in a business which today spans 59 stores. “The power of white is in its purity. Customers who wear pristine white clothes for 21 days, find themselves unable to revert to colored clothes. But white does not mean simple – we sell 2500 designs of dhotis – because customer tastes change from Kochi to Kovai to Kumbakonam”.
Read more here: http://goo.gl/WQb3KL
Nigam Patel, Director, Prozone CSC spoke about how tier 2 cities in India are attractive mall destinations.
“Managing a mall is a long term play – it needs patience. We’ve also learnt that we need a mix of local and national retailers”.
His co-panelist, Girish Pande, COO, Fun Cinemas, concurred – “We’ve built malls in 9 tier 2 cities and we find these markets to be vibrant. Kovai Fun Cinemas sees 100,000 people per month, one of the highest in India.”
Read more here: http://goo.gl/vKbtyA
P Subramaniam, Consultant, RmKV Silks, spoke about the learning process they went through while deciding to move from high street to malls.
“Inspite of being a strong brand in Chennai and Tirunelveli the decision to set up a store in Brookefields mall in Kovai was taken after much debate – and was driven as much by market potential as by the lack of high street properties”.
Read more here: http://goo.gl/vKbtyA
The panel on multi-channel retail pointed out that for regional retailers – going online, or being present on social media is a non-negotiable.
“You either leverage technology or go out of business” – was how M. Ramakrishnan, MD, Thulasi Pharmacy put it .
Read More Here: http://goo.gl/KTZET6
Delegate feedback showed that RAI’s use of bi-lingual panel discussions met with much appreciation, something we intend to continue in future events in the South.
The panel discussion on “Realty facts in the emerging cities for Retail in South India” had industry experts analyzing & providing insights about the topic
Panelists in the discussion were:
Moderator: Anand Sundaram, CEO, Pioneer Property Zone; Nigam Patel, Director, Prozone CSC; P Subramaniam, Consultant, RmKV Silks (P) Ltd.;
Shubhranshu Pani, Regional Director, Retail, Jones Lang LaSalle; Girish Pande, COO, Fun Cinemas and Mani Chinaswamy, MD, Appachi Cotton
Question from Moderator: Anand Sundaram, CEO, Pioneer Property Zone: How do you choose a market to set up a mall?
Nigam Patel, Director, Prozone CSC
“Mall management is all about patience”
- First mall in Aurangabad
- Our concept of Ground + 1, large car parking, ‘dominant shopping center’ – helps us capture emerging markets.
- We need a good mix of local plus national retailers. It took us time to understand this in Aurangabad, but we’ve been able to apply this markets like Coimbatore.
P Subramaniam, Consultant, RmKV Silks
“Key questions for us : What is the ‘fertility’ of the market? How does the brand connect and consumer relevance operate in that city?”
- Each brand needs to look at its own areas of strength and how those can be leveraged
- RmKV has its roots in TIrunelveli (TN) – it’s a familiar and a family brand in that market.
- In spite of that – we had to analyze to understand why move to a particular city and not another city
- For example – our hypothesis was that Coimbatore is a ‘feeder’ market – catering to Salem, Erode, Tirupur, Pollachi, and Palakkad
- We are an established brand, but we had to answer some key questions when moving into emerging markets like Coimbatore
Girish Pande, COO, Fun Cinemas
“In deciding to open up a mall in a tier 2 city, we go back to the basics: Do consumers have money? Do they want to spend? Do they have other opportunities to spend?”
- We’ve opened 8 malls before Coimbatore and we’ve found that tier 2 markets give us much better success.
- Cities like Ahmedabad, Chandigarh & Lucknow – these are places where we see growth.
- Coimbatore has emerged as a flagship market for us – we have the highest ad rates in Coimbatore, and we see 100,000 customers a month at our multiplex.
- At the mall – the anchor retailers – Reliance / McDonalds are also doing exceedingly well.
- When we open a new mall in a tier 2 market, we go back to the drawing board and ask basic questions about consumption patterns.
How do you view the retail / mall opportunity?
Mani Chinaswamy, MD, Appachi Cotton
“Retail can build an ‘aura’ around niche businesses – malls provide footfalls.”
- We are a one-store wonder; a factory outlet in a niche ‘sustainable cotton’ market.
- Our ‘product’ is niche, high value handloom sarees, stoles, scarves etc. The retail arm for us is a channel to absorb all the organic cotton produced by the contract manufacturers whom we work with.
- We’ve used the sustainability plank to create a “cotton trail” a visual imagery of how organic cotton reduces the ‘man-animal’ conflict.
How do you make malls more desirable than a high street – for retailers? Do they need to be?
Nigam Patel, Director, Prozone CSC
“Partner with retailers to make malls work in the long run.”
- Building malls is about making relationships with Retail work.
- It’s a buyers market – we need retailers more than they need us.
- Malls are more attractive than high streets – because they are a secure environment – with parking. Appeals to all three generations.
- But the mall business is about patience – and break evens are northwards of 3 years.
- Building partnerships with retailers which will ‘go the distance’ is important.
- When times get tough, it’s relationships and not LOI’s (Letters of Intent) which come to the rescue.
Why did you choose a mall in Coimbatore over the high street?
P Subramaniam, Consultant, RmKV Silks
“Strong brands in good malls act as a pull factor for consumers.”
- Three reasons:
- Shopping has become experiential
- Our brand challenge is to connect with the younger consumer – and malls give us this.
- There was no good property (which matches our brand) available on the high street.
- Shopping has become experientialOur brand challenge is to connect with the younger consumer – and malls give us this.There was no good property (which matches our brand) available on the high street.
- Also the mall option was a way to derisk our investment into a new market like Coimbatore. The alternative would have been to build our own store. Given we were entering a new (albeit adjacent) market, we wanted the flexibility that leasing provided us with.
What do regional retailers prefer – malls v/s high street – in tier 2 cities?
Shubhranshu Pani, Regional Director, Retail, Jones Lang LaSalle
“Brands have to balance high streets and malls. They have to bring the experience of malls into the high street stores and the personal touch of high street stores into the malls. “
- Number of malls coming up in tier 2 cities is limited. In the last 15 years, malls have covered only the top 50 cities. India has 117 cities with population > 4 lakhs – the tipping point for mall development.
- In the near future high streets will continue to be more dominant
- Brands prefer high street stores and stand alone stores, as long as mall capacity is limited.
- Once the malls comes in then brands will move.
- For any retailer – to expand into tier 2 / 3 – they have to therefore look at high street.
Question:Partnership dynamics between malls and retailers
Shubhranshu Pani, Regional Director, Retail, Jones Lang LaSalle
- In tier 2 markets, lack of space on high streets, and limited mall capacity means that strong retail brands may chose to build their own space.
P Subramaniam, Consultant, RmKV Silks
- Brands may not want to build their own stores in new markets – they will want to de-risk and ‘feel’ the market out before committing – i.e. a ‘low stakes’ approach.
Shubhranshu Pani, Regional Director, Retail, Jones Lang LaSalle
- Mall managers / landlords are usually willing to partner with strong brands – and waive lock in’s.
- Regional brands in malls – this combination attracts maximum footfalls.
P Subramaniam, Consultant, RmKV Silks
- Consumer perception is that the prices in malls will be higher as compared to the high street –that facilities such as the air-conditioning, parking, clean toilets will be priced in.
- We had to undertake a ‘uniform pricing’ campaign to deal with this perception.
- Consumers are willing to travel to malls to buy.
Girish Pande, COO, Fun Cinemas
“If you build, they will come”
- High streets with a long history (Linking Road – Mumbai, Connaught place in Delhi), with decent parking will thrive.
- The issue is whether tier 2 cities can attract enough investments for new malls.
- Stores in malls take time to attract footfall. Unlike high streets where presence ensures footfall – malls cannot immediately compete with high streets where consumers have shopped for decades. Malls take 3 years to settle.
- As a retailer, take a view on the future of your high street – will it last 15 / 20 years? What developments are planned? How will the parking problem evolve over the next decade?
- If you are not happy with the answers, move to a mall, if there is one available.
Audience Question: What should small retailers entering into malls be careful about?
Shubhranshu Pani, Regional Director, Retail, Jones Lang LaSalle
“Malls can be trial and error – it takes 3 years for a store in a mall to settle. Once you settle, stay.”
- Look at the intention of the mall developer – they should be in the business long term, and want to run the mall. They should have the infrastructure to maintain the mall.
- Who is the anchor? The anchor tenant draws the catchment – smaller retailers get the benefit of their ‘name value’
- In tier 2 cities – you need strong regional brands to be present. – check whether they are.
- Check that the catchment does not have other shopping centers / malls. What is the consumption potential of the catchment? What is the income profile?
- Check the design of the mall / shopping center as a customer would – Is their parking? How does public transport work? Are there schools / colleges / markets in the catchment.
Question: Why do kiosks get ‘second hand treatment’ from malls?
“Malls are not targeted at kiosk owners but at retailers.”
- Malls are not in the business of kiosks.
- Depending on what is sold in kiosks – there can be issues of security, safety, cleanliness and hygiene (food kiosks).
- 70% of Kiosk owners are often first time retailers – not often serious about he business and do not have financial wherewithal. They need to prove credentials and are often asked for a deposit.
- Kiosks must not inconvenience long term tenants – hence sometimes, they are priced prohibitively – to keep non-serious players out.
From L-R: Anand Sundaram, CEO, Pioneer Property Zone; Nigam Patel, Director, Prozone CSC; P Subramaniam, Consultant, RmKV Silks (P) Ltd.;
Shubhranshu Pani, Regional Director, Retail, Jones Lang LaSalle; Girish Pande, COO, Fun Cinemas and Mani Chinaswamy, MD, Appachi Cotton
Malls are the new temples of consumerism and are the sign of improving standard of living. The cycle of mall development leading to commercialism leading to consumption which raises property values around the mall is well documented. But malls are also part of their local community and create structural changes when they come into being. The question is how sustainable is the mall for the community, and how do these malls ensure that they do not disrupt and bottleneck surrounding areas? STOrai presents a photographic essay on the question “How green is your mall?”
Retailers are an intrinsic part of their local communities – and a natural aggregator of community opinion. In this role they are capable of both setting and driving/ amplifying local themes and concerns around sustainability. Globally retailers such as Carrefour S.A., M&S, IKEA, Starbucks, Timberland, M&S, Puma and Consumer Product companies have adopted a “triple bottom line” approach – People, Planet & Profit. STORAI profiles 2 malls in India – Inorbit malls and the Great India Place – and their endeavors in this regard:
Transforming the marsh
Inorbit Malls is the pioneers of the mall culture in India. The company has six operational malls – the first mall was set up in Malad, in 2004, followed by other five others in Navi Mumbai, Hyderabad, Pune, Whitefield and Vadodara.
Inorbit’s first mall came up in the suburb of Malad. In the late 1990’s – Malad was synonymous with marshland. Inorbit was developed on a plot known simply as “504” – and was created by using the garbage from a defunct dumping ground to stabilize land reclaimed from the marsh. The mall, at 500,000 square feet was large – for its time – and went on to become a run-away success when it opened. With two anchor stores – Group Company Shoppers Stop and Lifestyle, the Diwali season of 2004 clocked revenues for both companies much higher than projected targets. The mall offered a large parking facility, easy access to the main road and the nearest railway station served as a hub to transform the sleepy residential suburb of Malad into a destination shopping area for people living as far as away as Colaba – which is the southern-most tip of Mumbai, Inorbit became the focal point of “Mindspace” – a commercial cum residential complex. Mindspace became one of the ‘business districts’ in Mumbai (in addition to Bandra Kurla, Powai, and the traditional south Mumbai commercial destination of Nariman Point) – which helped to reframe traffic patterns in the city from the traditional North-South direction (where people lived in the north and worked in the South of the island city) to a a “east west” direction.
Since then, Inorbit malls have gone through a thorough location selection process. “Location selection process starts with intense market research and catchment analysis in various cities. Consumer insights focusing on buying behavior, purchasing power, changing trends, and access to national and international brands, availability and price of the land in the area form crucial stage of evaluation,” says Kishore Bhatija, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Inorbit Malls.
In 2006 the Malad area faced challenging feedback from environmentalists who contended that the fumes from the reclaimed land were causing an environmental hazard. In response the K Raheja Group (which owns Inorbit malls) worked with the Clinton Climate Initiative to ‘retrofit’ the mall, reduce its carbon foot print and ensure that the mall achieved LEED certification (LEED stands for Leadership in Energy and Environment Design). The group also built a public park and created a protected green zone atop the specific site of the erstwhile city dump to rebalance environmental concerns.
Inorbit mall has transformed the face of Malad. In addition to Mindspace, the 3 km stretch around Inorbit and Mindspace has seen the development of several commercial complexes, residential buildings, parks and has become a BPO hub. Currently, the 5 km stretch of leading upto Mindspace has 3 big malls and departmental stores like Hypercity, Inorbit, Infiniti 2, Dmart, and Croma. It has become a weekend destination for suburban Mumbai.
Apart from being a catalyst to development, Inorbit has also undertaken community development initiatives.
“We believe our strength lies in understanding the pulse of the local catchment and giving them exactly what they would like to see in a mall. We have a series of community initiatives where we engage with the patrons from the catchment and work towards creating a value add to their experience. Inorbit strives to increase ‘dwell time’. The response has been great and most people in Malad look at Inorbit as a community mall than just as a shopping destination,” says Kishore.
Mall Walk – A unique initiative
Inorbit Mall, Malad introduced the concept of ‘Mall Walk”. Inorbit lets senior citizens and fitness enthusiasts use the area inside the mall for their morning walk. It’s safe, clean and free of any hazard of pollution or traffic. “The mall walk is a savior from the humid climate and torrential rains of Mumbai. It’s a community-building exercise that helps to create a personal connection with the customer. It was not started with the goal to generate more footfalls but it has fostered greater brand loyalty. We also conduct Art of Living programs across our various properties.”
“This is the first time ever that any company across the world has taken this initiative and undertaken such a tie-up. These energy-efficient practices would not only help Inorbit save energy, but also achieve a significant reduction in the carbon footprint of the mall,” says Kishore.
Great India Place, Noida
Inaugurated in 2007, The Great India Place is one of the first malls of Noida; and at 1.5 mio square feet, is one of the largest operational malls in India. Developed by the International Recreation Parks Pvt Ltd (IRPPL), a JV between Unitech Ltd and International Amusement Ltd, it is located adjacent to a NOIDA Metro station. The mall is itself a part of the larger entertainment city amusement park (called Worlds of Wonder).
The mall structure is giant stone building. Sanjay Chandra, MD, Unitech Ltd, says, “The building’s design has practical advantages – not only is a stone wall cheap to construct, it is conducive to efficient air-conditioning and allows more room for retailing; when compared to a glass facade. A glass window would not only take up room for window dressings but would also require elementary paneling before the shelf area can start, which means wasted space.”
The mall was designed by Callison, one of the largest architectural design firms in the United States. As part of the “Worlds of Wonder” – the mall has become a destination for retailment in Noida.
“We have registered all our commercial developments in NCR in LEED Core and Shell rating LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environment Design). As far as social forestry is concerned, we take pride in the fact that the Unitech brand is associated with ‘Green’. We plant trees on a continuous basis in and around all our locations,” says Sanjay. Some of the other efforts include Rainwater Harvesting, Energy Efficient Buildings, and Social Forestry. In addition, the company runs “Sankalp” a program where employees can volunteer their time in areas such as healthcare, labour welfare, child education and skill building.
The BPO industry ‘wave’ created the Knowledge Industry. It also resulted in a young, affluent, cosmopolitan society, which was leisure focused. Secondly, the 2000’s saw a wave of entrepreneurs– in IT / ITES / Life-sciences and Retail. The “Have idea, and online presence, will build and sell” – wave attracted entrepreneurs. Bangalore also emerged as a “test market” / launch market for retail and lifestyle concepts (e.g. micro-breweries) – and for international brands, who wanted market reaction from a cosmopolitan audience without making large investments.
Bangalore is not land-locked (as with Mumbai) and hence the city has been consistently growing. Urban planning did not keep pace – though three ring roads and a few flyovers were created. Each wave of expansion created ‘mini townships’ – self-sufficient suburbs with commercial and residential spaces – E.g. Whitefield, Bannerghatta road, Sarjapur road. When the city expanded, each ‘mini-township’ included both residential and commercial spaces. However, these expansive waves did not always provide for retail space or for social infrastructure such as public schools and hospitals. More than 80% of schools and hospitals in Bangalore are privately owned / managed.
The leisure focus of the Bangalore workforce meant the creation of ‘second homes’ on the outskirts – often around a golf course or around some agricultural land, a ‘farm’ away from home. This was another factor leading to the outward expansion of the city; aided by the new airport which opened in 2008 – 45 kms from the center of the city.
Another factor driving investments has been the historical link with the NRI community. The first ‘migration’ wave outwards in the 1970’s was Bangalore centric – as technical specialists from its engineering schools, studied and then settled down in the States. This provided a captive audience with the ability and willingness to invest when, in the 1990’s real estate developers started converting the ‘township’ thought process into high–end gated communities – from White field to Sarjapur to Bannerghatta – these gated communities provided a way to stay ‘rooted’ for the NRI community; and act as a natural floor to any recessionary tendency in the property investment market. They also provide an easy bridge for expat workers to live in India, insulated within a slice of “suburban California”.
Compared to the other metros, Bangalore remains India’s most livable city. However, the pressures of the slow pace of infrastructure development and the inevitable clash between cosmopolitan immigrants and its local population are starting to tell. Petty crime has increased; infrastructure projects such as the Phase 2 of the Metro and various flyovers have been delayed.
One final significant factor. The recent redrawing of electoral lists has meant that Bangalore Metropolitan area accounts for about 25% of Karnataka’s legislature. These structural changes should increase focus on infrastructure – as greater political will manifests itself, once the 2014 electoral equations are clear. Some of this is visible – phase 2 of the metro has picked up, the NICE road has been commissioned. The investment case for Bangalore has proven its mettle in the 2008 – 2012 recession – residential yields have been steady, and have been driven by the increased number of ‘hubs’ and mini suburbs getting created. Bangalore has also started to witness ‘iconic’ properties – triplex villas near the KGA golf course in IndraNagar and Mantri’s “South India’s Tallest residential tower” @ 55 floors – at Bannerghatta. It only remains for growth plans to get a bit more structured and include retail spaces and social infrastructure as part of the whole – in order to create a long range vision for the city to be truly India’s most livable – the “Melbourne of South Asia.”
“An abridged version of this article appeared in the Property Times on 31/10/2013 – you can find that link here”
]]>