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| Priya Complex at Vasant Kunj, Delhi: A
shop-cluster that is in with the smart set right now |
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Young
Bangalore's favourite pastime is cruising the strip, a couple of
kilometres or so of tarmac, labelled Brigade Road, connecting two
of the city's arterial thoroughfares. With restaurants, coffee-bars,
cyber cafes, pubs and quaint eating dives tucked away in side-streets,
shops vending fashion accessories, garment and footwear retailers,
and with almost no parking space available, Brigade Road is organised-retail
Mecca. In a city with several dozen ersatz malls, it is the closest
to the real thing, a few square kilometres of heaving humanity engaged
in the kind of activities malls were made for: walking, shopping,
window shopping, eating, drinking, or simply hanging out.
That last is an established human trait. "Human
beings will discover newer ambiences continuously," chuckles
Harish Shetty, a Mumbai-based psychiatrist. "The malls provide
anonymity, space, a friendly ambience, food, and glamour."
Achal Sondhi, a 17-year-old Delhi boy who can, more often than not,
be found in the capital's first mall, Ansal Plaza, doesn't know
anything about ambience or wide-open spaces. People like him, he
says, hang around malls, "because we have no life." A
friend points to the image on Sondhi's tee, a dot in a maze. "He
even needs a T-shirt to remind him where he is."
A thousand and a few hundred kilometres away
in Chennai's Spencer Plaza sixteen-year-old Sweta and 14-year-old
sister Avaanti Muralikantan, two out of a group of five, are similarly
hard-pressed to put a reason to explain their presence in the mall.
"We like to ride the escalators," pipes in Sweta's companion
Divya Raghunathan, also 16, a reference to the series of escalators
running through the 1 million-plus square feet mall.
Rattus Mallus
The common Mall Rat: generally found in enclosed malls, but
can also thrive in a shop-cluster. Normally found in packs,
the species has some unique characteristics |
 Time
You'd normally find Mall Rats in action in the evenings and
on weekends and public holidays. However, even when they are
meant to be elsewhere-like school-you are likely to find the
occasional one, or two, or 20
Feet
Made for cruising. Mall Rats invariably keep on the move;
some clock as much as five kilometres over a few hours in
large malls or shop-clusters
Mind
These rodents are at the bleeding edge of fashion, as their
peer group sees it. Also seem to possess that subliminal understanding
of which mall or shop-cluster is in; and which is out
Wallet
Not thick, but certainly not thin either. Mall Rats typically
burn money on food and low-cost accessories. As for that Rs
2,700 dress, Mom will provide
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Yet, this isn't a nowhere generation. Mall Rats
like Sondhi-that's what he is-are relevant to retailers of the kind
who populate malls, as customers, or-hope springs eternal-potential
ones. "Young people often stroll in with no intention of buying
what they see," says Nilesh Mehta, the CEO of Mumbai-based
Oobe, a company with an eponymous Western-wear-for-women brand.
"Then, they see something that catches their eye and they buy
it instantly; more important, they tell their friends about it."
One of Sondhi's companions, 18-year-old Vir Raina swears that he
doesn't ever shop at Ansal Plaza, but another, 15-year-old Sasha
Lulla admits that the gang does blow up between Rs 400 and 500 at
Barista's or McDonald's every now and again.
Food retailers know mall rats mean business.
"It is important for us to be present in malls," says
Sandeep Vyas, Executive Vice President (Marketing & Communication),
Barista. "A mall is a fun place and a lot of young people throng
it," adds Vikram Bakshi, Managing Director, McDonald's, echoing
Vyas' sentiments about the relevance of just being there.
Then, there's the feel mall rats lend to a
place. "Out of 100 people visiting our store, only 30 actually
end up buying something," says N.V. Subramanyam, the concept
manager of Lifestyle's Hyderabad store. "(Mall rats), give
a young look to the store, and we see them as potential customers."
Benetton's Senior Managing Director Vivek Bharatram agrees with
Subramanyam. "Our experience tells us that a brand tends to
grow along with its young loyalists." There's numerical backing
for such confidence, such as a study conducted by Kolkata businessman
Rahul Saraf who is building a mall in the city. "Nearly 20
per cent of customers in a mall are below 18," he says, "and
it is too important a segment to be ignored."
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| Mall Ratting in Naidu Nadu: Factor out
the dresses and the signage and this could be a scene from the
first world |
Still, for every Saraf, Subramanyam, and Bharatram,
there is a H. Suresh Kumar, maybe more. Kumar, a manager at Mangal
Tirth Estates, the company behind Chennai's largest mall Spencer
Plaza is dismayed that nearly 10 per cent of the 30,000 footfalls
the mall receives everyday belongs to students. The larger labels
in the mall, he claims, are unhappy with this because non-serious
shoppers (especially boisterous ones) do tend to deter the serious
ones. "We may consider levying an entry fee." Mumbai's
Crossroads, which got everyone in India talking about Malls, did
think along those lines too (an effort to preserve the homogeneity
of the mall that would have done any radical right party proud),
before saner counsel prevailed and the mall's handlers realised
the benefits of letting the benign rodents be.
Mall-ratting isn't new. The larger phenomenon
of hanging out is as old as Connaught Place, New Delhi's 72-year-old
once-glorious shopping district, maybe older. But malls are new
and mall rats, or lizards, as Dipankar Gupta, a sociologist at Delhi's
Jawaharlal Nehru University, terms the species, have become as ubiquitous
as the Golden Arches that are starting to crowd the skylines of
Indian cities. "Malls give you a feeling of being in with the
smart set," says Gupta. That they do and they can make anyone
over 25 feel old (and in the way).
additional reporting by Abir Pal,
Debojyoti Chatterjee, E. Kumar Sharma & Nitya Varadarajan
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TREADMILL
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| Yours Truly
 BT
readers who write to the magazine usually focus on the more
hard-core stuff-fiscal deficit, reforms, et al. So last week,
when a reader wrote in to Muscles Mani, I was pleasantly surprised.
Check out how our letter writer, once a sedentary slacker,
is now on his way to becoming a gym rat.
Dear Muscles Mani,
'Ouch' has been the word foremost on my mind lately, 'ooh'
and 'aah' not very far behind. I live in pain like I never
have before. Since early childhood, I have been smart enough
avoid such potentially painful situations, like gym classes
in school. A few feigned maladies, and finally a letter to
the principal from my loving mother-God rest her soul-kept
me away from the sweating hordes for the rest of my schooldays.
It was fun then. To watch the rest grind their behinds while
I sat in a shade and munched on the masala chips I carried
surreptitiously in my pocket.
I never let small stuff bother me. I could always count
on myself to come up with something glib to counter remarks
about my sagging belly or my third chin. I learnt to believe
in my repartee. My belief was reinforced by my mother and
our family doctor, an old man who had a prescription for every
problem that showed up in the not too frequent check-ups I
had to undergo at the insistence of my wife. When she left
me for a slim young man, the first feeling, honestly, was
relief that I would not have to take those tests any more.
No more forced diets either, for I was moving back in with
my mama.
It all began to go wrong when mama died. The old doctor
passed away soon after and that's when certain chronic physical
discomforts were starting to become too agonising to ignore.
The new doctor turned out to be a fitness freak who believed
that regular exercise and a controlled diet could cure me
of most of my ills. I did not take him too seriously. Not
until the pretty young thing who usually laughed the loudest
at my jokes in office, burst out clutching her toned mid-section
when one day I finally gathered the nerve to ask her out-as
if that was the biggest joke I ever cracked.
So I have begun to exercise. I try not to get demoralised
by the sight of healthy muscular guys working out around me.
I ignore the smiles on their faces as I pant and puff on the
treadmill set to 'walk'. With five pound dumbbells, I try
to regain some of the confidence I lost when on the first
day I tried to yank up a hundred pound barbell and creaked
my back. The constant pain all over is unbearable. But like
all good gym instructors say-no pain, no gain...OUCH.
-MUSCLES MANI
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