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To live up to consumers’ expectations, home solutions store Home Centre is to revamp all its stores across the country in phases.
Launching its first ‘new format’ store in Chennai at the Express Avenue Mall, Mahesh Shah, President, Home Centre, said today’s consumers want to experience every product, seek a lively ambience, ease of navigation and engaging displays showcasing current trends. Towards this end, “we have redesigned our store format with the help of global architecture firm Callison of the US”.
The store, spread over 42,000 sq. ft., stocks products beyond furniture and home furnishings, and is targeted at the upper-middle class and above. This is the second Home Centre store in Chennai and 15th in the country. “Now, we have to upgrade our existing outlets to match this store,” he said.
According to him, the after-sales service is the retail brand’s selling point. It has over 140 carpenters across the country to attend to consumer complaints within 48 hours from when the complaint is registered.
The home solutions division of the Rs 2,500-crore Landmark Group has its in-house engineering team to design furniture. “While we source 90 per cent of the furniture, made to our specifications, from over 70 vendors in China, Vietnam and Malaysia, the remaining is sourced locally. In the case of home decors, 40 per cent is procured locally.” According to Shah, the Home Centre division closed 2011-12 with a turnover of Rs 350 crore, and it hopes to cross Rs 450 crore this year, with three or four more stores proposed to be launched in the next few months. In India, the furniture market is estimated at Rs 1 lakh crore. And, merely six per cent of this is organised.
> ravikumar.ramanujam@thehindu.co.in
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