Biyani plans small stores to sell mobile phones

Future Group founder Kishore Biyani seems to have taken a liking for small stores. After compact grocery stores and fashion outlets, which are in the works, he is looking to set up small shops selling mobile phones and small electronics items within large formats such as Big Bazaar, Central and Brand Factory.

The group is planning to open 70 such shop-in-shops in the next four months and the stores will be run by his electronic and durables chain Ezone.

Each store will measure 300-650 sq ft and the group is expecting incremental annual sales of Rs 500 crore from this venture.

"These will be high-density stores and we will change the assortment, depending on the format we are in,” said Rajan Malhotra, president, retail strategy, Future Group.

Ezone has already done pilot studies for these concepts within Big Bazaar, Central and Brand Factory.

Ezone is aiming for Rs 1,100-crore revenue in 2013-14, 30 per cent growth over the previous year, and Rs 1,800-2,000 crore in 2014-15, growth of 80 per cent.

Essar-owned The Mobile Store also has shop-in-shops within modern trade outlets.

Biyani has neighbourhood grocery stores called KB's Fair Price which are mostly present in Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore. These stores sell staples, fruits and processed foods, among others. Currently, there are 200 such stores and the group is looking to open 1000 such stores in the next couple of years. He is looking to open small neighbourhood stores for apparel under Fashion at Big Bazaar (FBB) brand.

The apparel stores will be spread across 4,000 sq ft and sell T-shirts, salwars and kurtas.

Apart from metros, the stores will also come up in smaller cities. "While the large standalone stores of FBB are present inside malls, the convenience stores will be in residential areas and markets,” said an executive in the group.