If we consider the hierarchy of economic development and subsequent impact, progressively we see:
• Subsistence farming giving way to modern farming
• Cottage industry developing into larger scale manufacturing
• Small towns and poor villages transforming into a vibrant and balanced urban and rural Mix
• Fragmented retail businesses growing into modern retailing, and
• Generic merchandise paving the path for brand development

In this evolution tangible values give way to intangible values that are much greater in magnitude with the inflexion point coming when the transition to modern retail happens. The reverse impact of modern retail on those very steps – manufacturing, agriculture and urban development – is huge. At this stage, the economic development starts spiraling through this feedback loop.

The prime factors for such a wide and deep impact of modern retail are mainly three, and all have an impact on agricultural supply, manufacturing and other SME suppliers, town planning, services infrastructure, as well as having an impact on the socio-cultural environment.

Firstly, as retailers grow larger, into chains, the need for efficiency grows. Process and system-led planning and execution become the norm. Second, a related factor, is the need for consistency across the chain since any modern retailer would wish to communicate certain core brand messages from each and every store. Both of these factors push the need for more structure into the supply base, whether farm or factory. The third major factor is the need for differentiation from competitors. The successful players start pushing more product development, private label growth etc.

All this, of course, looks like the development path followed by the Western economies over the last 150-years. Unfortunately, this seems to be the development path being pushed by a lot of people in India.

Economic growth or prosperity can be looked at in two ways – on average how prosperous a country is (in comparison with other countries), and what is the relative position of people within the country. Economists measure the second factor using the Gini Coefficient, which essentially measures the level of income inequality in a population. A Gini Coefficient of 100% would theoretically be completely unequal with one person holding all the income in the country, and the lower the Gini indicates that incomes are more equal within the country. The more overall prosperous countries (such as the Scandinavian countries) have also more equal distribution of income within the country, while relatively poorer countries (such as in Africa and Latin America) tend to have higher Gini figures.

The biggest problem that I see in the current push for consumption-led growth (retail-led growth) is that the focus is totally on the first measure (per capita GDP, average income etc.), rather than on the second.

In this focus, there is a single minded focus on earning and spending “More” – if you want to fit in you need to acquire more, if you want to stand-out acquire something different (more), if you do not have something you need to acquire it (more), and if you do have something it is always good to have (what else!) more.

From: www.just-style.com, 31 October 2006

Benetton brand Sisley has entered the Indian market with a store in capital New Delhi.

The store, which is almost 400-sq-m big, contains Sisley women’s and men’s clothing collections plus accessories ranges.

Speaking at the official opening of the store, Benetton Group chairman Luciano Benetton said: “The launch of our trendsetting label in India strengthens Benetton’s presence on a market that is strategic for us, and with which relations are becoming increasingly strong and profitable.

“The expansion plan includes not only the opening of new stores in Delhi, but also the exporting of this experience to other major Indian cities. I am certain that Sisley will gather the same success and the same admiration which sophisticated
Indian customers have shown United Colors of Benetton.”

Top fashion brands have been increasingly investing in the Indian market recently as its retail sector, helped by an increasingly affluent consumer class, continues to accelerate its pace of growth.

As Devangshu Dutta, chief executive of advisory and business services firm Third Eyesight, said earlier this year: “With growing urbanisation, we see a sustained growth in the (Indian) consumer market. Credit and debit spending is rising by 30%-40% a year.”

1968-established Sisley has 850 retail outlets globally. Benetton’s other brands include United Colors of Benetton, Playlife, and Killer Loop.

Benetton India said in June it plans to open 100 stores in India by the end of the year, adding to its existing chain of 80 stores.

The company is also developing India as a sourcing hub for its Asian market, which it has identified as the growth engine of the future.

By Devangshu Dutta (Column from The Economic Times – 31 October 2006)

Normal human tendency is to label what one doesn’t understand. And so we call the younger members of society by various names – youth, teens etc. By putting them into categories of age, we claim complete understanding of what they are, what moves them, and what they want, in effect adopting convenient disguise for the fact that we actually don’t have a clue.

My personal favourite term is “tweens”. In my dictionary, tweens are that magical, difficult, weird age somewhere in the region of 10-16 years, give or take a couple of years, when one is not quite an adult to be allowed an opinion, and not quite young enough to be indulged one. I believe that is why rebellion is the hallmark of the tweens and the teens.

Let’s look at the broad segment of the young (under 20) population – about 450 million individuals in India are estimated to be below 20 years of age. 105 million individuals are in the age group of 15-19 years, already in their early years of discretionary consumption. About 112 million individuals are in the 10-14 years segment – within 5 years many of these will be making career choices, and in another 5 years most would have already begun earning and spending. Imagine the power of the tweens and the teens.

However, this is not one homogenous mass of youngsters who think in the same way. Some, of course, will be a typical marketer’s delight – gulping heavily-advertised colas and wolfing down pizzas and burgers at a birthday party with their pals, while demolishing each other on the latest game console. Others may only be aspiring to acquiring a fraction of such a lifestyle in their later years. Many – too many – will not only not have these things, but may not even be able to dream of a lifestyle that looks much different from their parents.

Some are motivated by firang lifestyles, and may look at the earliest opportunity to apply for a student visa in the west. Others are surprisingly loyal to the idea of staying within the country, and actually contributing to progressing it. An increasing number find their “Indian skin” very comfortable to wear, even while moving in rhythm with a semi-westernized lifestyle.

They’ve got a whole bunch of different ideas about relationships. To many, career options are always wide open and whoever works for life in one job may have no other options. Yet, when it comes to personal friends, the buddies from pre-school may still be the ones they hang around with.

Clearly age, then, is not the key differentiating or grouping factor. Neither, it would seem, is income or education. SEC segmentation more or less breaks down when dealing with the youth. There are many, possibly hundreds of segments for a marketer to deal with.

“What’s hot” may change every week – if it’s really hot, it may stay around 3-4 months. RDB ( Rang De Basanti ) was a protest against the society the young are inheriting, and its candle-light march was emulated for many a cause. But Munnabhai is cool today, and Gandhigiri is now the road to follow. On the other hand – are these really two sides of the same coin?

Some very global trends catch on very fast, while others are uniquely Indian.

So how does one make sense of this kaleidoscope? How is a marketer to predict what will appeal to the most consumers? How can we lead the consumers into our store, to our brand counter, to the product that we want to promote?

If I were to pick one learning for the youth market that made – and still makes – youth markers successful, it is the fact that they do not predict fashion and trend. They do not attempt to lead the consumer but follow diligently. They identify the opinion leaders, identify with them, and understand what’s hot with them. Then they place their bets – a lot of them, well-spread out. Sure, not all of them are right, but it’s a whole lot better than trying to predict fashion 8-12 months in advance.

An equally critical step is to let go of the trend even as it is being picked up by others. After all, if you’re really with it, by now you ought to have identified the next hot trend rather than flogging the same horse that everyone else is on.

Here a newsflash, the youth are bright, for all the appearance of vacuity; extremely opinionated, despite the apparent boredom they display; fully-charged up with the current domestic social concerns and a clear view – well-informed or not – of what’s happening around the world.

We’ve seen some successes in the Indian market, with a few companies being at the forefront of trying to understand and cater to the youth with offerings that are innovative and promotions that talk to them in their language. And yet, most companies are still working at them in the same mould as they were a decade ago, while others are simply trying to transplant strategies that worked in another country.

The largest market opportunity in decades is going a-begging. What’s going to be your platform to make the connection? What’s the relevance of your message? Unless you’re listening to the youth, they’re unlikely to be listening to you.

The author is CEO of Third Eyesight (More articles on www.thirdeyesight.in )

The Economic Times, Chaitali Chakravarty & Bhanu Pande

19 October 2006, NEW DELHI

CALL it the Reliance effect! The retail boom has sent the aspirations of small regional retailers soaring. Delhi-based pharmacy chains, Guardian and 98.4, garment retailer Ritu Wears and Bombay Selections, department store Big Jo’s , VMart , Gokul Mart and SRS, South Indian durables retail chain Viveks are all engaged in talks with banks, high networth individuals (HNIs) and private equity funds to raise money for expansion. Not surprisingly, scores of terms sheets and investment seeking proposals are floating in the market.

For instance, Guardian Life Care is looking to raise $20m and is in talks with a few PE firms. “We want to put in place 2,000 – 3,000 outlets in the next five years and the fund we are raising will help implement our first phase of expansion (600-700 outlets),” says Ashutosh Garg, CMD, Guardian Life Care. Similarly, South Indian durables retail chain, Viveks, wants to raise around Rs 150 crore to complete its expansion in the South . Subsequently, it has plans to go for an IPO to fund its pan-India expansion. Gokul Mart and Bombay Selection are looking for funds to open 10 new stores.

Small retailers have sought the help of financial consultants who can devise innovative ways to raise funds. Says Jyoti Gadia , director of Resurgent India, a management and financial consultancy, which has the mandate from six retailers to tie-up funds, “Banks put forth too many conditions on small players. Under such circumstances , we have to look at new ways of raising funds. Credit card securitisation is one of them.” According to him, many HNIs have also shown interest in the retail sector. “Some of the retailers want only Rs 25-30 crore to help them open the first few stores and that’s not much for an NRI,” says an industry source.

“Even private equity players find the sector interesting as most retailers are no longer single store entities. As they show reasonable scalability, PE firms see a clear exit prospect,” says Devangshu Dutta, CEO, Third Eyesight, a retail consultancy. “On the other hand, small retailers are finally showing appetite for external investors and willingness to share ownership.”

For instance, last month PE fund Actis invested $65m in the Nilgiri’s group, a South Indian food brand. GIC Special investments from Singapore has joined Actis in making this investment. The funding provided by Actis will be used to expand the company’s South Indian franchise network and strengthen its supply chain and distribution capacity as well as to expand the group’s food manufacturing operations.

RELIANCE BOOKS PRIME SPACE IN ANSAL MALLS

New Delhi: With the fight for retail space heating up, Reliance Industries, which has major plans for this sector, has reached an understanding with Ansal Properties and Infrastructure (APIL) for taking up the anchor space in the real estate major’s upcoming mall projects, report Mayur Shekar Jha & Joji Thomas Philip. According to sources, the first of the deals has already been signed, under which Reliance Retail will be the anchor tenant in the upcoming Ansal Plaza malls in Greater
Noida and Palam Vihar, Gurgaon. Even as sources confirmed the development , this comes as a blow to Shoppers’ Stop, which is currently the anchor tenant in most of the Ansal Plazas. This move also assumes importance considering that APIL has already outlined plans to build about 18 new malls, most of which would be located in tier II and III cities. “With Reliance Retail too actively targeting these cities, the company can now ride on the APIL’s infrastructure,” sources added.

When contacted, an Ansal Properties and Infrastructure (APIL) spokesperson said, “We are hopeful of a long lasting relationship with Reliance, but there is no formal agreement as such.”

Textile Industry Report Calls for Capturing Billions in Lost Value

India is neither the cheapest producing country nor possibly the quickest in terms of delivery, but it already provides buyers with value in terms of product development and design. According to Third Eyesight, this is the winning formula that needs much more focus. The report describes how design, merchandising and product development capabilities can enable Indian companies to become strategic suppliers to global industry. India’s domestic industry, and its skill at understanding market needs, creating and merchandising product, can also play a valuable role in the industry’s growth in the global area.

Devangshu Dutta, chief executive of Third Eyesight, said that India already had a significant cachet as a brand in the 1960s, but lost its position until the beginning of this decade. While the trade-brand of India has now started becoming stronger, it is time for the industry and the government to emulate successes created by countries such as Italy. By creating an ecosystem focused on design and product development, India can create and capture the billions of dollars worth of value that is being lost to other countries.