The Hindu Business Line : Depot mulls smaller stores in corporate campuses

At its annual Republic Day sale this year, along with thousands of buckets and white shirts, Big Bazaar sold two blockbuster items: 21,000 Oxford English Dictionaries and 38,000 sets of notebooks across all its stores in the country.

Ms Preeti Vyas, Business Head, Depot, (Pantaloon’s retail format for books, music, stationery and gifts), said being a mass market player separates the retail chain from the other three-four organised players in the industry.

In two years since the launch of its first store, Depot now has 100 stores, including 11 standalone stores and the remaining within Future Group’s other retail formats like Big Bazaar, Pantaloon and Central.

Aggressive pricing

Depot’s USP in the Rs 11,000-crore books, music, stationery and gifts market in the country is aggressive pricing and democratisation of products. The retail format has managed to achieve this through a host of private labels in children’s books, self help and cookery books, explained Ms Vyas.

About Rs 1 crore of Depot’s annual Rs 50 crore turnover this year came from private labels. Depot is also considering acquiring content for its music division to launch private labels in the segment.

In Mumbai, the retail format has piloted a photo store jointly with Hewlett Packard. Called Foto Depot, the 500 sq. ft. format enables customers to print photographs from their cell phones and digital cameras in a few minutes.

Depot is also considering launching smaller stores within corporate campuses. The plan is to have about 200 stores in a year’s time, Ms Vyas said.