Business-wise, your last 7-8 quarters have been impressive. Please share your expansion strategies across food and non-food categories.

Non-food category holds a much larger share of our business growth. However, it has been and will always be our moot effort to strike a right balance between food and fashion. In terms of expansion of both Big Bazaar and Central, we have done extremely well. Now, the idea is to keep up the standard. We plan to open about 2530 stores for both these entities. Easyday is another entity that we are working hard on. With Easyday, we will ensure expanding doors as well as boosting sales. Several acquisitions kept us busy last year. However, our focus is back to expansion again. 

While other retailers are trying to create seamlessness across online and offline, your focus is mostly on offline retail. Please throw some light.

Yes, our idea is to redirect even the online traffic to offline. Lately, we have been backing up the plan with strong digital media presence and running online campaigns. However, we are strengthening our omni-channel paths too. Recently, we have launched services like “order at store, get delivery at home” with Big Bazaar. While continuing with our effort to enhance our omni-channel presence, we are always focusing on greater footfall in stores, unlike many retailers.

Private labels these days are fortifying MBO business. Who are your frontrunners in this segment?

Lee Cooper deserves special mention in this segment. Looking at the success of this brands, which is primarily a denim brand, we brought in footwear too recently under this brand name. We foresee Lee Cooper to emerge as a large brand in next three years. Other private labels that are growing rapidly are denim wear brands Buffalo and Scullers, amongst others.

In the world of retail, where store sizes are shrinking perpetually, Central, sized around lakhs of square feet, is breaking all norms. How do you justify the sale per square foot?

As one of the early risers to departmental retail boom, we strongly believe in the celebration of service. We visualised Central to amplify the retail experience along with heightened customer engagement. And guess what, that’s reflective even in sales. With Big Bazaar too, we revamped the retail concept to Gen Next and we further revamped it in our Ambience, Vasant Kunj, Delhi outlet. The retail design with good service and engagement is here to stay, and that’s what departmental retail experience is all about.