Amazon has beta-launched a consumer-facing business in India with its comparison shopping site Junglee.com. The company has been engaged with India as a support and development centre for several years now, and its traffic and business from India has also grown steadily ever since it started shipping products to the country. Given the critical mass that is now becoming visible in the Indian e-commerce market, it is logical for Amazon to look at a more direct customer-facing presence here. Its recent moves to set up a fulfillment centre and now the Junglee.com launch certainly look like precursors to a retail…
Raghavendra Kamath & Sharleen D'Souza, Business Standard Mumbai, February 1, 2012 Spending on the High Street has never been cheaper for such a long period of time. If you walk through Mumbai’s Linking Road that houses the showrooms of some of the world’s biggest brands, it’s almost a surreal experience: be it Mango or Vera Moda, or Jack & Jones, or even shoe brand Aldo – all these premium retailers are literally shouting from the rooftops that they are offering up to 70% discounts. Some like designer wear Mogra has gone one up and is offering up to 80% 'sale'.…
As the debate over FDI (even for single brand retail) continues, over 250 international brands in the food service and fashion and lifestyle sectors alone continue to service the Indian consumers. Interestingly more than half of them are present in the Indian market through the franchising route. Franchising has been a preferred entry strategy especially in case of the food service sector. Many of the international food brands have opted to give the master franchise to an Indian partner who can use the international brand’s name but is responsible for sourcing the ingredients and maintaining the international quality standards for…
Priyanka Golikeri , Daily News & Analysis (DNA) Bangalore, February 1, 2012 Reader guidance: the following story will likely make a mouth-watering read, potentially making you salivate and yearn for a calorie-rich sweet food that some pregnant women allegedly crave in the middle of the night. Okay, with the disclaimer-cum-warning out of the way, let’s dive, head first, into the changing world of ice cream in India. Walk in to any 21st-centuryish ice cream parlour in Bangalore, and in all likelihood you will see hot golden-brown caramel sauce jostling for space with chilled milky-white whipped cream to drip gradually over…
Sarah Jacob, The Economic Times Bangalore, January 30, 2012 The world's second-largest apparel retailer Hennes & Mauritz (H&M), which usually enters large markets on its own, is not so sure about opening shop in India despite finding the market "interesting". Earlier this month, India relaxed laws allowing foreign retailers to wholly own their businesses with the rider that they source 30% of their products from SMEs with revenues not exceeding Rs 5 crore. Until then, foreign investment was limited to 51% or retailers were forced to franchise. But the Swedish retailer is not entirely convinced by the norms which make…
Geopolitical friction has again sparked renewed concerns over inflation and rising input costs for FMCG companies as @itmeansjustice @whysnavi write. @devangshu commented.
