Fabindia may pump Rs 90-100cr in expansion, thrust on tier-II cities

Fabindia, the country's leading lifestyle retail chain, has set its eyes on tier-II cities for expansion of its Fabindia Experience Centres, a top official of the company said. It all looks at expanding the omni-channel model to all its stores to push e-commerce sales, Fabindia managing director Viney Singh said at the sidelines of the inauguration of Kolkata's first Fabindia experience centre.

The measures constitute the company's aggressive retail expansion plan entailing an estimated investment of Rs 90-100 crore in the current fiscal, he told PTI. Fabindia Experience Center is a relatively new format, which are large stores to showcase maximum products categories under a single roof.

Besides apparels, Fabindia has home furnishings, furniture, gifts, jewellery, organic food and personal care products. "We want to raise the number of the experience centres to 40 by this fiscal from 13 now. We have covered all metros and tier I cities. Now, we will open these in tier II cities," Singh said.

A Fabindia Experience Centre has opened in Chandigarh and more are lined up for cities like Amritsar, Jaipur, Coimbatore and Thiruvananthapuram, he said adding another 50 regular stores would be added in the current fiscal but through a franchisee route. The brand has a total of 301 stores spread across the country, of which 230 are owned by the company.

Singh said the size of an experience centres is between 9,000-10,000 sq ft and the investment is between Rs 3000-3500 per square feet. Based on this, the company's estimated investment would be Rs 90 crore to Rs 100 crore.

Fabindia is emphasising on e-commerce and will expand its omnichannel capability to all its stores from just 100 now. Online sales account for less than 5 per cent of its total sales, whose figures the company declined to share. Fabindia said it is not using the Khadi Tag anymore.

Singh said Khadi account for meagre business of the company but declined to discuss further on the subject as the matter is sub-judice. Ethnic fashion is a major segment in the total fashion sales of Fabindia, he added.

(With inputs from agencies.)