Covid-19 : How retailers in Telangana are coping

Retailers Association of India organized a Webinar on ‘Telangana Focus – Impact of COVID-19 on Retail Business’. The Webinar brought together industry leaders from the state of Telangana to discuss pain points of stakeholders and how they can be addressed.

The webinar was moderated Suhail Sattar; Director, Basics (HASBRO Clothing Pvt. Ltd.). Panellists included Avnish Kumar, MD, Neeru's; BVK Raju, MD, Q-Mart Retail Ltd.; Chaitanya Muppala, MD, Almond House; Murali Retineni, Director, Celekt Mobiles and, Yeshwanth Nag, Founder, The ThickShake Factory.

Presenting the challenges faced by retailers of essential goods, BVK Raju, MD, Q-Mart Retail, who operates several stores providing essential food and sanitary items to people, said, “Regular supply is a problem, consumer behaviour is changing. What was a goal for us is now a problem. We went from chasing footfall to avoiding footfall.”

“Conserving cash seemed to be the highest priority. But we also realized that we have to generate some revenue to keep the machine running. So we quickly pivoted into hyperlocal deliveries through platforms, tech to deliver to gated communities. Regulatory uncertainty shut us down,” saidChaitanya Muppala, MD, Almond House, explaining the tact his business used to stay relevant in such grim times.

Talking about the changed business landscape, Yeshwanth Nag, Founder, The ThickShake Factory said, “We need to adapt to the new norm. How quickly can we adapt is what will define us, our existence and our relevance in the future.”

“Fashion retail has always been about location, location and location. But now we are dependent on three things ‘Support’ from the government, ‘Safety’ of our customers now and in the time to come and ‘Sustainability’, which is totally based off of a business owner,” said Avnish Kumar, MD, Neeru's said the impact on the business of apparel.

Murali Retineni, Director, Celekt Mobiles, quoted, “At this moment, we can’t let constraints cloud our mind. We need to seek the entrepreneur in ourselves.” He continued, “You have to keep your team motivated, right now you are not in a position where you can hire multiple people for different roles. We must motivate them to multi-task. Creating new customers will be harder now, so focus should be on retaining existing customers, especially, till the time the market becomes conducive to winning over new consumers.”

Key Takeaways from the webinar:

Impact on Business

• Most grocery stores are understaffed currently, and are operating at about 30% workforce capacity.
• An average customer has to wait for about an hour before getting into the store.
• With trend based items like Mobile phones which are highly imported, due to lack of liquidity of stock, and revival of manufacturing in other countries, CDIT retailers will be forced to adapt to new products with existing dead stock. 
• The pandemic is casting its shadows on celebrations like Ramadan Eid and the festive month of Ramadan. This will affect the business in Telangana particularly.
• If the government doesn’t provide support, 50% of the restaurants in Telangana are expected to be shut in the next 2 to 3 months.
• Some retailers are preparing for a no-footfall situation for the next 6 months as they don’t really expect people to come to the malls and consume.

Government Support

• The government needs to work towards bringing back confidence into the market.
• Government needs to provide clarity on regulations, relief packages and realistic expectations for operation of businesses.
• The government needs to increase the moratorium to 6 months (interest free). Also, a 4-5% of waiver on business loans taken.
• Wages, Moratorium, Rentals and Electricity are the four common pain-points for all retailers and must be addressed by the government.
• Stimulus wise India is the worst, the government has just given 1% of the country’s GDP as stimulus, while Japan has given 20% of its GDP, USA 10% and UK 15%, the government must look at creating demand through economic stimuli.

Guidelines for Retailers

• Employees need to be reskilled to work in the post-COVID world.
• Fashion must move away from the usual season cycle and look at a 12-months 12-seasons model.
• Brand is most important right now for survival of businesses.
• F&B stores must explore adding new product lines to improve sales.
• Collaboration within the industry will be key. Particularly between grocery retailers and other retailers who are currently craving foot traffic.
• Businesses must have proper SOPs in place.
• Safe Shopping experience will be the new normal. Retailers must make it mandatory for all customers and staff to wear masks and get tested with thermal guns.
• Other safe shopping methods to explore going cashless to avoid interaction; the invoice too should preferably be digitally sent to customers.