Sapna Agarwal MINT, Mumbai, February 18, 2010 Grocery supermarket chain Spinach appears to be caught up in a slide that has seen a number of Indian retailers, particularly from low-margin food and grocery industry, down shutters in the wake of the economic slowdown. Empty shelves and aisles greet you at the chain’s flagship store in Mumbai’s Bandra Kurla Complex. Its branch in Juhu, known for its prime location and suburban Mumbai clientele, presents a similarly dismal picture. Fresh stock hasn’t arrived for past three months at any of the Spinach stores, owned by Wadhawan Food Retail Pvt. Ltd, a Wadhawan…
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According to The Daily Telegraph, Asda has devised a system for customers to "buy fabric conditioner from a vending machine which pumps the liquid from a large vat in the stockroom directly into a pouch". The project aims to cut packaging costs and help reduce prices for consumers. The scheme is partially funded by the UK government's anti-landfill agency Wrap. A lot of debate was generated on retailwire.com ("Do it yourself all over again"). A number of people who were underwhelmed by the whole concept and questioned the value, including labelling the initiative "anecdotal" and "one-off" with "limited appeal". I feel somewhat differently.…
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Raghavendra Kamath Business Standard, Mumbai, February 12, 2010 Aigner, the German luxury brand, and Genesis Luxury, the up-market retailing arm of Genesis Colors, have ended their tie-up in the country, as their plans did not go as expected, said a person close to the development. Genesis and Aigner had agreed in 2007 to import and distribute merchandise. The partnership ended last month. Genesis Luxury, which ran the Aigner stores in Mumbai and Delhi (three in all), has shut these, through mutual agreement. Aigner, part of Etienne Aigner AG, hadn’t tied up with any other company, sources said. The company did…
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Reporting by Aniruddha Basu; Editing by Ramya Venugopal Reuters, Thu Feb 11, 2010 Utilisation levels are high and given the growth in domestic consumption it would be very encouraging if the allocation under TUFS is increased as textile makers are investing more," said Sunil Khandelwal, Chief Financial Officer at Alok Industries Ltd. The textile industry had been battered by the economic slowdown for much of 2008/09 but has begun to recover in the past 2-3 quarters with major textile firms such as Alok Industries, Raymond and Century Textiles & Industries Ltd reporting higher sales and profits in Oct-Dec. But analysts…
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An article in the San Francisco Chronicle sparked off a debate on whether ecologically friendly can be mainstream, whether customers will switch from traditional to eco-friendly fashions and if so, when. There is the view that eco-friendly products are necessarily niche and cannot match up in fashionability and affordability to 'mainstream' products. I don't think it is an either/or choice between styling and eco-friendly. To sell, eco-friendly merchandise absolutely MUST be comparable to or better than eco-unfriendly merchandise, both in style and quality. Pricing is another story. The article also quotes Joslin Van Arsdale (founder of Eco Citizen, a San Francisco…
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