Vishal Krishna, Businessworld 1 October 2011 An ineffable air of desolation and despair hangs over the Star City mall, situated on one corner of east Delhi’s Mayur Vihar Phase 1. Over three quarters of the retail space inside is empty glass-fronted shells, waiting forlornly for tenants. And by the looks of it, the wait has been on for a long, long time now. Few customers ever walk into the mall proper — and those who do, do not stay for long. A couple of liquor shops and a Café Coffee Day outlet draw much of the miniscule clientele that the…
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Shailaja Sharma, Daily News & Analysis MUMBAI, 29 September 2011 High prices and economic uncertainty appear to be turning consumers stingy, if not altogether unwilling to spend. Going by sector analysts and retail companies, spending on discretionary items is definitely shrinking and even items of daily consumption aren’t quite flying off the shelves as they used to. In fact, consumers are increasingly hunting for more value for the price they pay at retail stores. All this gives reason to believe consumer spending is set to decline in the second half of this calendar year. “Commodity-led categories like soaps, detergents and…
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Vishal Krishna Businessworld,24 September 2011 Even as participants at the Indian Retail Forum in Mumbai, the industry’s annual jamboree, are being cautiously optimistic about the implications of expanded foreign direct investment (FDI) in retail, preliminary data from the first quarter of 2011-12 (FY12) reinforce the perception of a slowdown. Compared to the fourth quarter of FY11, growth has been slower in the first quarter of FY12. Shoppers Stop had negative EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation) growth of 26.3 per cent, while Trent declined 69 per cent; Pantaloon grew by just 6.5 per cent. “Marking down of products…
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Suneera Tandon Businessworld, 10 September 2011 We serve biryani and parathas at our highway outlets,” says Venu Madhva, chief operating officer at Café Coffee Day (CCD). At Barista, you can knock down a few glasses of beer or sip wines, while a mug of coffee is to clear your head. “This is for variety,” says R. Shivashankar, director of South-Asia region at Lavazza, the company that bought Barista from the Tatas. Costa Coffee will have more affordable food. “We want to increase our footprint in ‘non-Costa’ locations,” says Costa’s CEO, Santosh Unni. Existing coffee chains have woken up and smelt…
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Sapna Agarwal, MINT (A Wall Street Journal Partner 9 September 2011, Mumbai Tommy Hilfiger Group has bought out the Murjani Group's 50% stake in the latter's joint venture (JV) with clothes maker Arvind Ltd for an undisclosed sum, as part of a global strategy of consolidating its operations and having a more direct role in its various markets. The US company has also bought the Murjani Group's licence for Tommy Hilfiger trademarks in India, ending the Mumbai firm's six-year association with the brand. Mohan Murjani, chairman of the Murjani Group, launched Tommy Hilfiger in India in 2004, sub-licensing its clothes,…
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