Currently, what are the retail design concepts that Lacoste follows in India? How is Le Club poised to be different?

Currently, Standard basic and Standard premium concepts are available across Lacoste stores in India. Generally, retail design and VM in Lacoste stores are based on the nature and materials of the fixtures. Le Club, the concept which will enter Lacoste store design in India soon, is already available globally at certain locations in London and Paris. This concept will have circular and semi-circular fixture units and we call them “Polo Rooms.” The design will also incorporate seating capacity in the stores and will have different wall fixtures.

In-store VM is something that unifies all Lacoste stores. What are the principals of the global VM guidelines?

In VM, we follow the global guidelines closely. Although our VM presentations depend on fixture design, India’s stores have tad different design in fixtures. Our standard concepts have two colours of fixtures – brown and white. Based on this design and colour of the fixtures, we represent our merchandising and decide on colour schemes.

What’s your retail positioning in India and how do you plan to scale it further?

Globally and in India, we follow “selective distribution network” and we make sure that we are present in premium locations and premium adjacencies. We no longer open stores in high streets. However, we started strengthening our store network in mini-metros like Pune and Ludhiana since 3 years back. We are currently present through 49 POSs including EBOs, SISs and e-commerce. We generally add 6-8 POSs every year and we would stick to this expansion plan for a few years to come.