 | | PICTURE SPEAK | |  | | HAUTE: @Home offers global quality at domestic prices | | If you are a fashion fiend and enjoy wearing your attitude on your Ferragamo ties, then now is the time to extend your passion for designer threads into the bedroom because the world's leading home fashion brands are flooding Indian stores. And as new home stores mushroom, consumers are skipping annual shopping trips to London and New York. Ramesh Kumar, a project consultant in Bangalore, usually shops in London for Portico furniture and Ralph Lauren duvets. But for his new villa, Kumar feels that Indian retailers like HomeStop, a home store brand from Shoppers' Stop, are offering him all the bells and whistles by leading global and domestic brands in his city. In the second phase of retail boom in India, retail chains like Shoppers' Stop, Lifestyle and others are addressing home improvement, ranging from accessories, hardware to furniture and furnishings. The market is estimated at Rs 65,000 crore, of which organised retail accounts for only six per cent, a business prospect that few seasoned retailers can resist. Says C.K. Nair, business head, HomeStop, "The consumer needs a complete home solution under one roof for bed, bath, kitchen, home decor, furniture, furnishing, consumer electronics and hardware." And HomeStop offers all this at its pilot store in Bangalore. And in the last six months, players like Nilkamal Plastics, Welspun, Lifestyle, Pantaloon and Shoppers' Stop have opened home stores across India. Considering the home décor market is largely unorganised, several companies are eyeing this space. Says Gibson Vedamani, CEO, Retailers Association of India, "Home improvement was only restricted to shop-in-shops in the past, but now players are looking for standalones. At Rs 2,500 crore, this market is expected to grow 25-30 per cent per year. "Each retailer has entered the fray with a unique positioning. Shoppers' Stop, with its ear-to-the-ground approach, has taken its time to define consumer expectations before launching. While HomeStop's offering is driven by the feedback from its customers who want everything under one roof, Nilkamal Plastics, whose core business has been moulded plastic furniture, has started its store chain @Home with a clear focus on ready-to-assemble furniture, a very unorganised and fragmented market in India. | | PICTURE SPEAK | |  | "Spaces was a brand for bed and linen. Retail stores were launched in 2005"
ANSHUMAN SINGH, CEO, WELSPUN | | Typically, home stores are all over 20,000 sq ft in size and are located mostly in the suburbs, but delivery is free. Players like Home Centre and HomeStop provide complete home solutions; thus their product mix and focus is sharply defined. Arif Malik, head of Home Centre, says: "The concept of home fashion is undergoing a rapid change. People want contemporary furniture with the right kind of tapestry, upholstery and accessories today." A complete home store, according to Malik, devotes 60 per cent space to furniture and 40 per cent to soft furnishings and kitchen. And mock-ups of several bedroom combinations reflecting different styles is critical. Lifestyle, for instance, offers Italian furniture brand Natuzzi along with classical Indian furniture for the fusion look-a combination of contemporary and traditional. Apart from the retail biggies, domestic companies like Nilkamal Plastics and Welspun are looking at home retail as a part of their forward integration strategy. Welspun, the largest manufacturer of terry towels in the world and a large exporter of soft furnishings, started its retail foray with its factory outlets and small home stores called Spaces, a bed linen brand. Says Anshuman Singh, CEO of Welspun Retail: "Spaces was a product brand for bed and bath linen but the retail stores were launched in 2005." | | PICTURE SPEAK | |  | "The consumer needs a complete home solution under one roof."
C.K. NAIR, BUSINESS HEAD, HOMESTOP | | Another new kid on the block testing retail waters is Nilkamal Plastics, which has entered the market with its @Home stores. Known for its moulded furniture, Nilkamal is the brainchild of second generation entrepreneurs Hiten, Manish and Nayan Parekh. Says Manish Parekh, director of Nilkamal Plastics: "The future is in ready-to-assemble furniture that promises the customer quality and warranty." Even as competitors wonder how the company is offering international quality at great prices, Parekh admits that dealing with international vendors is not easy but the company has managed to get the quality and price right, "thanks to our manufacturing knowledge, rigorous quality control, warehousing and other backend expertise." Home improvement, however, isn't just an area of opportunity in the domestic market but in the global market. "Last year, India exported about $1 billion in the bed and bath linen categories. This is growing by 25-30 per cent each year and the industry is looking at closing this year with $1.4 billion," says B.K. Goenka, managing director and vice-chairman of Welspun. The company plans to invest Rs 1,500 crore over 18 months to boost capacity for its high quality bed linen products. The home business is a tough one, confess retailers, as inventory management is critical to profitability. Unlike apparels, home décor is never an impulse purchase, so products move at a relatively slower pace. This affects their pricing model as they need to recover the cost of real estate and overhead investment. Since a good home store would devote at least 60 per cent space to furniture, which isn't a fast moving consumer good, retailers need to have a large footprint so that with supply chain management, prices can be brought down. Large format global players like Lifestyle believe they have the footprint and experience to manage large stocks. On the other hand, other smaller players are expanding fast to capitalise on large volumes. For home décor in India, this is the Next Big Thing.
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USP: One stop shop for stylised linen, soft furnishings, mattresses, accessories, ceramics and crockery. 
