The Hindu Business Line : Indian retailers, design firms scouting for talent from Europe

Bangalore, Jan. 2 Shortage of design talent in the country forces Indian retailers and design firms to look at talent from Europe. While the number of designers in India is woefully inadequate, the scene is the reverse in Europe – where there is a huge supply and very little work.

Design is no longer only about fashion designing. With the retail sector set to grow big time in India, the role of retail and product design has become vital. It involves the entire gamut of services from packaging, branding and product designing to visual merchandising. With heightened awareness and sensitivity to good design, adequate skilled manpower is the need of the hour.

Idiom Design and Consulting, the design company from the Future Group, had a few months ago, employed five-six designers on a “time period bound” “contract basis” from France and Poland to work on its various projects. It is open to employing European designers again in future too. Design firms such as JHP, Astound and Fitch have also worked on Indian retail projects. London-based JHP has designed the retail stores of some of Arvind Group’s brands, while British design firm Astound has worked on Reliance Fresh stores. This is only the tip – the reverse outsourcing story is set to grow if the demand-supply situation in India continues.

According to an Indo-Dutch market scan done by a Dutch delegation in August last year, India has about 3,000 practising designers, compared to one lakh designers in the EU. Says Mr Girsh Raj, Founder Member, Idiom Design and Consulting: “Idiom has in the past employed the services of designers from Europe… not for global involvement or understanding but because of lack of design talent in the country. There are just a handful of design schools.

In fact, Idiom alone can absorb all the designers from every reputed design school every year.” The talent crunch is both in terms of numbers and skill, he adds.

Ms Revathi Kant, Business Head – Design, Titan Industries, agrees that there is a serious shortage in India. “While around 1,000 people pass out of the top design institutes every year, the industry’s demand is eight-fold,” she says.

Contrast this to the scene in Europe, where there are more designers than there is work. A scenario that has prompted European designers to look at India for work.

Although there is no great advantage in employing European designers , it definitely makes sense to “try them out” since there is an obvious interest from Europe and also considering that there are not many in India to choose from, says Mr Raj. He says European designers “love the fact that there is so much work in India. Also, there is an emerging market here compared to saturated markets in Europe… besides like in every other industry, they think that sooner or later, there is money to be made for them in India.”

Importance of design

The importance of aesthetics and design is growing in the Indian market today and retailers cannot afford to have a blinkered vision anymore. Ms Sujata Keshavan, Director, Ray + Keshavan, a brand and design consultancy firm, says, “For long we blithely ignored design. We merely copied products. But now involvement in design has become an absolute must for retailers. They can ignore design at their own peril.”

Since European designers have limitations of lack of understanding of the Indian cultural context, besides reluctance to work in the “chaotic” environment that India provides, Indian designers have a real edge. But for now, the numbers just don’t seem to add up!

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