After hypermarkets, department stores, supermarkets and malls, Pantaloon Retail is focussing on rolling out a chain of small discount stores. The small stores will be neighbourhood stores called KB’s Fair Price, with limited varieties and limited services.
The margins on these would be low, but it would offset by economies of scale and lower costs. Initially, around 12 of these would open in Delhi.
Pantaloon is also exploring tie-ups with foreign partners for joint ventures. Earlier it has tied up with Staples, Axiom Telecom, Lee Cooper and reports indicate it is in talks with Burger King and Starbucks.
Pantaloon hopes to expand its retail space from current 7 million to 30 million square feet by 2010-2011. By early 2008, it will also open its cash-and-carry stores named KB’s Wholesale Club.
With this entry, Pantaloon could extract lot of business from small stores and retailers, and also take on the existing players such as Subhiksha and Reliance Fresh. These stores would target daily staple buyers unlike Big Bazaar/ Food Bazaar, which focus more on weekly/ monthly and bulk purchases.
Find this article at: http://www.labnol.org/india/corporate/pantaloon-to-focus-on-neighbourhood-stores/1063/
Tags: mall, pantaloon, reliance retail, retail, subhiksha, Corporate, India
