For Titan Eyeplus, e-commerce and physical stores co-exist

Titan Eyeplus, the eyewear retail chain from Titan, finds the e-commerce channel as comfortable to do business in as the physical store.

“For us, both the channels co-exist gainfully,” said S Ravi Kant, CEO, Eyewear Division, Titan Company. He opened three stores – one is company-owned and the rest are franchisees – here recently.

Titan Eyeplus already has e-commerce arrangements with the Flipkart and Jabong platforms. “We will soon sign up with Amazon,” Kant told BusinessLine .

While the e-commerce part of the business will grow, there are still customers who would like to come to the stores, he added.

“Kerala is a market where we felt we needed to increase our presence. This year, the State is a focus market for us. We propose to double the number of stores here within a year,”

The stores deals in international brands like Ray Ban, Vogue, Polaroid and Oakley as well as home brands such as Fastrack and Glares by Titan.

Frames are priced within a range from ₹495 up to ₹30,000. Branded lenses from Titan, Essilor, Kodak and Nikon and contact lenses from Bausch&Lomb, Johnson&Johnson and Cibavision are also available.

Titan Eyeplus is now six years into business and is present in 100-odd cities and has close to 300 stores.

It defines its target age group ‘from 6 to 60.’ Explaining, Kant said that these days, the need to correct vision is arising at an early age thanks to huge exposure to multiple screens such as TV, computers, mobile phone and tablets.

“All these finally cause strain on the eyes, which is why you find a lot of children wearing spectacles these days. Our people are specifically trained by Sankara Netralaya to meet the needs of this audience.”

The company has a manufacturing facility in Chikkaballapur, which is connected through SAP with all its dealers.

It is looking to set up a second plant in North India to be closer to its stores but has not decided on a location.

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