It’s the fashion!

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: thinks he looks good in it.”

Spencer’s Sheikhawat clarifies that the term fashion embraces a larger world than ready to wear, and includes the experience factor.

Work in progress

“We are now focusing on fashion in a big way,” says Sheikhawat, listing the things he has been doing and plans to do—right from building a top-class sourcing team to holding ramp shows.

“We have taken several steps, starting with merchandise—there is brand new merchandise in all the stores,” he says. Among the brands Spencer’s has are Levi’s, Lee, Wrangler, Peter England, Turtle and so on, with the merchandise spanning all segments.

Spencer’s has brought in top talent for visual merchandising—the entire bells and whistles stuff from decoration and the mannequins to models and props. Spencer’s has put in place a brand new team of buyers, merchandisers, front-end, back-end people, based in Gurgaon, a Delhi suburb.

Lastly, Spencer’s is hiring a specialist to handle the brand marketing part—from ramp shows to end-of-season sales and brochures.

Big Bazaar is also strengthening its team and already has a design team of around 30 people and a category team of 60-odd people based in Mumbai.

Sourcing is done from all over the country. For example, with kidswear coming from Kolkata, bottomwear from Bangalore, ladies ethnic wear from Delhi and Ahmedabad, hosiery from Tiruppur, and some segments are even imported, from China.

The aim

Sheikhawat says Spencer’s does not want to become the biggest retailer, but the best. He hastens to add that Spencer’s is not expensively priced, and can match anybody on the KVIs or known value items. “We are not pursuing size for itself, but want to offer the widest range, the best experience,” he says.

“We expect to break even in 2010-11. We are investing close to Rs 2,500-3,000 crore a year between this year and the next,” Sheikhawat says.

Over the last two years, since he joined in March 2006, Spencer’s has grown from 17 cities to 66 cities, from 52 stores to 400 stores, from 993 employees to 12,600 employees and from Rs 12 crore a month turnover to Rs 100 crore a month today.

So when will Spencer’s drop the food first tag? May be when fashion accounts for 25% of turnover, says an insider.

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