‘Wrogn together’ for just the right experience

CMH Road at Bengaluru’s upmarket Indiranagar recently gained an interesting new destination - the Wrogn x Milano Bakery Café, a retail concept that blends the best of fashion and café experience under one roof. In this exclusive interaction with Retail4Growth, Nishant Poddar, Chief Marketing Officer & Head Retail Experience at WROGN, shares more about this experiential store concept, how it transforms the brand experience and connects with its TG, and about the brand’s plans to open 100 stores.

Tell us about Wrogn’s new store concept and how it adds to the brand experience in retail?

The concept itself has existed earlier, where we have seen the café experience within a department store format. For this particular store, we wanted to have a café partner where the ‘Wrogn’ identity is not lost, but both work as one. There seems to be a sense of unanimity between Milano and Wrogn, where we complement each other’s offering. That’s why we have a bold statement on the wall which says ‘Let’s Be Wrogn Together’. From the signature retail identity & experience of Wrogn’s bold and fun design elements, customers can walk through to the inviting café area. Both areas maintain the experience with synonymity through the use of seamless grey walls & ceiling, common flooring with the only exception of lighting that’s altered for the café area to keep it soft. The blend of store & café allows one to indulge and relax, a unhurried way to savour the shopping experience.

What kind of customer response do you observe?

This is the first time we are trying this format, it’s been a month and the response has been good. A lot of people walking into the café are converting to Wrogn’s customers. You see, the ticket size of probably an ice cream lures about 400-500 customer, and eventually leads them to explore the store and brand. Even if about 10% conversions are led by the café, I do know it will lead to brand recall and them converting later through any of our channels.

We noticed a very large, prominent digital display on the store exterior. Can you tell us how this adds to the brand experience?

We have always believed that as a brand we have got the best of content, so why not show the consumers about the brand & all that’s new, including showcasing fashion with or without Virat Kohli. This particular screen will also highlight the café’s food & beverage. It is probably one of the biggest screens that we have in the CBD region in Bangalore, and since we had our offices on the upper floor we took advantage of this. We have sizeable screens in our stores in Jayanagar (150 sq ft) & HSR (120 sq ft), and we find this important for consumers to see what the brand has to offer.

Is there a way to derive data on this digital display & make it drive more footfalls?

We see this as a marketing billboard, grabbing a lot of attention of passers-by and it plays a big role in holding attention for quite sometime, even if it doesn’t lead to immediate walk-ins. But at present we don’t have the metrics to measure this and correlate it with footfall.

How do you differentiate yourself in this category? Also, how is the brand connecting with the Gen Z & Millennial TG at the store level?

The in-store experience is very important for the brand and how customers are engaging with the brand in the offline space is critical. We have infused the brand’s attitude across the store through design, display, communication and even touchpoints such as trial rooms that are selfie-enabled and in-store events such as seasonal promotions like ‘Wrogn X Milano Coffee Rave party’ and more. All stores are enabled with online interface for convenience, but customers walk in too see what’s new, what the cricket players are wearing this season, the in-trend style and looks, etc. Our stores are also very high on creating a sensorial experience, from the store fragrance that’s signature to us (it’s refreshed regularly on our garments), the little touchpoints like Virat’s playlist QR code for customers to engage with, to fun & quirky messages in the store, and more. Our stores make the most of two major seasons – the season of cricket with us being a sponsor for IPL & then the festive season around Dussehra & Diwali. We do play at sharp price points, but the brand doesn’t pull the TG only with price drops & deals.

Can you tell us about Wrogn’s store expansion plans?

We are very careful about plotting markets and believe in penetrating through the clustered approach. We are going deeper in markets such as Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and also Bangalore. We recently opened four stores in Bengaluru, and have a factory outlet coming soon near the Bengaluru airport. From the current 62 stores across India, our plan is to scale it to 100 stores.