Being Human to concentrate on Tier II, III cities; open 100 stores in 3 years

Being Human, the retail division of Mandhana Industries, currently operates 60 exclusive stores across 40 cities. Going forward, the brand is planning to mark its presence in cities like Raipur, Bikaner, Guwahati and Vapi.
Managing Director, Mandhana Retail Ventures, Manish Mandhana told Indiaretailing Bureau on the sidelines of India Fashion Forum 2017, “I think the real growth in India is coming from Tier II and Tier III cities. That is where the aspirational value of the brand is also very high. We have noticed in all of our stores which are in smaller towns and cities that the per square feet returns are fantastic and the brand has been accepted beautifully well.”
Being Human is deep-rooted in the entire Omnichannel retail as it has its franchisees, prescence in large format stores, online platforms and MBOs in the country.
He further added, “Other fully grown brands in India have 300-400 stores, we are just at 60 as of now and there are still a lot of geographies to cover with all the exclusive stores and the future plan is definitely going to be adding another 100 stores in next 2-3 years and the challenge is to find the right location.”
Location Strategy
The brand, which is looking forward to the EBITDA of 23-24 per cent, chooses its location judiciously. The emphasis is given to the easy accessibility, even the floor of the mall is also taken into consideration.
“We are very particular about the location because that plays a very key role in flourishing the business and brand. So we are always looking at the ground floor of the most of the significant malls in the country, said Manish Mandhana.
He further added, “I think malls is the new destination for all the shoppers to go because under one roof you have a complete experience of taking your family right from the car park to taking the hair conditioning to foodcourts to variety of shopping of variety of articles and also cinemas and other entertainment zones. So it is easier for a shopper, it is more convenient, so these are the new destinations which are really growing.”
Even in the some parts where the retail is not well developed, highstreets still work very well but gradually as modern retail is stepping in and new shopping malls are coming in, it seems the focus is going to be with the malls.
“So going ahead, we will have most of our stores in the malls. We still have 4-5 stores on the highstreets where there is no mall available or where the highstreets still work but the future holds in the malls and that is there we wish to be,” Mandhana told Indiaretailing Bureau.
Testing Foreign Waters
Being Human, the brand which clocked Rs 350 crore sales last fiscal and expect a 25 per cent growth on year-on-year, was launched internationally before being launched in India. And going further, it will be making its presence strong in foreign countries.
“Before India, we launched the brand in France, it is available in about 100 MBOs over there. In the Middle-East, we have about 130 windows across 10 countries. We have our exclusive stores in France which we opened in April last year, we have one store in Mauritius in one of the best mall in the country there and we have three stores in Nepal,” revealed Mandhana.
The brand is also looking forward to expand its reach in other foreign countries like UK, USA, Canada. The brand is exploring the opportunities various prospective partners and expects to be soon available in other parts of the world too.
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