The Hindu Business Line : Nalli gets out of nine yards

FROM traditional silk saris to fancy crepes, chiffons, salwar kameez and now ready-to-wear menswear — the Nalli brand, which is almost synonymous with silk saris has evolved with time. And its owner, Nalli Kuppuswami Chetty, firmly believes that tradition, in order to survive, has to constantly evolve.

"When I took over this business from my father, 95 per cent of our collection consisted of nine yard saris, which has now reversed to just five per cent. A nine yard sari is bought only for occasions such as a wedding today. And from the early nineties, we also started selling churidars as we realised that it had become an integral part of a woman's wardrobe along with saris."

He says that Nalli's decision to retail ready-to-wear garments for both men and women was also based on the realisation that consumers were looking at shopping as a family under one roof. "Gone are the days when a consumer wants to buy a sari in Nalli and walks across to Naidu Hall (another prominent Chennai apparel retailer) for a salwar-kameez," he says. "Evolving according to customer needs and tastes has been our philosophy ever since we started our business in 1928," he adds.

On the retail front, the idea of expansion never struck Chetty till he realised that there was a huge demand for South Indian silk saris in the northern markets and also overseas. "I have always believed that the store owner has to be present physically in the store to oversee the activities, therefore expansion was never on my agenda. When we saw that we had a huge clientele in other cities that associated South Indian saris with Nalli and would come to Chennai only to visit us, we realised that it made sense to expand. But we were extremely careful not to give it to franchisees, and rather have one of our family members to manage the stores."

The first Nalli store outside Chennai was opened in Delhi in 1991, and now the group has two stores in Delhi and one each in Bangalore, Hyderabad and Mumbai. The Nalli chain also encompasses stores in the US, the UK, Canada and Singapore.

Apart from foraying into other cities and countries, the Nalli group has also started opening up more stores in Chennai itself. Branded as Nalli 100, the new stores have a more contemporary layout and have separate floors for silk saris, fancy saris, dress materials and menswear. The first Nalli 100 store came up in Panagal Park (a busy shopping district of Chennai), very close to the old Nalli Chinnaswami Chetty, which is the first store of the group and has been a prominent landmark in the city since 1928. "The idea behind the Nalli 100 branding was to create a differentiation between the two stores," says Chetty. The group has recently come up with two more stores based on the Nalli 100 format.

From silk saris to ready-to-wear

In an attempt to make Nalli a one-stop shopping destination, the group decided to launch its own in-store range of menswear alongside other brands in 2003. "The Nalli brand name signified trust when it came to silk saris, we therefore decided to leverage this trust to branded menswear also," says Chetty.

He says the in-store men's brand comprises almost 20 per cent of its total men's collection. And, the group now is even looking at launching ready-to-wear garments for women and kids later this year. "Our apparel is of premium quality and is at par with most of the prominent brands as far as quality is concerned," says Chetty.

However, a leading Chennai-based retail analyst says that to make an in-store label one needs to have a deep understanding of consumers' minds. "I don't see any demonstrated skills of Nalli as far as ready-to-wear is concerned. Just because Nalli is a success story in saris, it doesn't mean that it will succeed in the ready-to-wear segment also, unless it has a deep insight of consumer expectations and fashion trends."

On the other hand, Suguna Swamy, former Creative Director, Ogilvy & Mather, believes that bunching all apparel, traditional /high-end as well as contemporary/mass market, under the super-premium, classical Nalli brand may not be the right thing to do. "It will debase the equity of Nalli, which is rich, pure, unique and beautiful, like 24-karat gold. Mixing it up with a range of garments, for all people, is like saying `De Beers diamonds... ..and now also amethyst, topaz, garnets and cufflinks'."

While Swamy says that there is no doubt that it is a good business move to expand the offerings, she adds that it would make better sense to separate Nalli sarees as a boutique brand and retail other products. "However the new stores should have a different brand name, perhaps with a value-adding descriptor such as `From the House of Nalli'."

Need to advertise

Trying to straddle tradition and modernity, Nalli, which never really felt the need to advertise earlier, has recently begun to spend substantially on advertising and branding. Chetty says that the decision to do some branding was not because of competition spending huge sums of money on advertising but to convey to the consumers that Nalli was more than just a silk sari brand. "We wanted to tell our consumers that we also have fancy saris and casual wear."

While most of the traditional sari players have spoken about their latest collections through their ad campaigns, Nalli has tried to convey how it has evolved into a progressive brand and has yet maintained its traditional flavour.

Future plans

With large-format lifestyle stores being the most happening trend in the retail world, Chettysays that Nalli would shortly launch it own chain of lifestyle stores. "These stores would have everything ranging from apparel, fashion accessories, cosmetics, home décor products and of course saris." The first store is going to be opened in Chennai, he adds.

"Nalli is definitely a great brand, but it is not necessary that the advantage of being Nalli can be leveraged in a large format lifestyle store. Operating a lifestyle store requires a variety of skills and a brand like Nalli which has mostly dealt in saris has to be aware of it," says this Chennai-based retail analyst

"At the same time Nalli does have the industry's as well as the consumer's trust, which it has built over decades, and this will definitely come to its advantage," he adds.

Will Nalli be able to leverage its success in traditional offerings to large-format retail? One has to wait and watch while Nalli makes the nine-yard dash.

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