The Coimbatore-based Jagannath Textile Company Ltd (JTCL), which has positioned its ‘Crusoe' brand of men's innerwear as an adventure brand aimed at the youth, plans to open 100 exclusive brand outlets (EBOs) in the next five years, capturing a market share of 10-15 per cent in the premium segment.

The company is also planning to enter into the manufacture of men's wear such as T-shirts, lounge-wear, and so on.

Speaking to newspersons here on Friday ahead of the opening of the first EBO in the city on Sunday, Mr Ramesh Kumar Tibrewal, Managing Director, said JTCL plans to rollout 10 EBOs to market the ‘Crusoe' brand innerwear during the current fiscal, including in cities such as Bangalore, Hyderabad, Kochi, Kolkata, Pune and Chandigarh.

The plan was to have 100 EBOs across the country in five years.

Consumer taste changing

He said consumer tastes are changingand people are moving from local to national brands and from national to international brands. For any manufacturer to grow, the brands should be positioned at international levels. In fact, even the EBO being launched in Coimbatore has been designed on international lines keeping this in view.

Mr Ramesh Kumar, conceding that many international innerwear and garment brands were produced in India, said it is the consistency in quality which give them the premium-tag. Because of the higher margin on international brands, they are able to absorb cost increase without reducing quality, a benefit not available to Indian brands that do not enjoy high margins.

Market size

Mr Abishek Tibrewal, Chief Marketing Officer, JTCL, said the innerwear segment in India is estimated at about Rs 12,000 crore, of which, the share of men's innerwear market is about Rs 4,000 crore. Of this, the premium category, in which ‘Crusoe' is positioned, is valued at about Rs 800 crore and is one of the fastest growing in the innerwear segment, growing at 30 per cent annually.

He said Jagannath Textile had consciously positioned ‘Crusoe' as a premium product using certain ‘key manufacturing elements' such as skin-friendly chemicals in dyeing, quality colours, anti-bacterial treatment, and so on. The innerwear would come under four product categories.

Mr Abishek said JTCL, which test-marketed ‘Crusoe' in Bangalore in 2009, after stabilising in the Southern markets in the first 18 months, has now expanded its footprint to 21 States and Union Territories.

The turnover has grown from Rs 6 crore in the first year to Rs 11 crore in the second. In the coming quarter, the company plans to launch ‘Crusoe' in the North and make it a pan-India brand. Apart from EBOs, the company will sell the product through multi-brand outlets (MBOs) too.

He said branded products accounted for about 65 per cent of share of the innerwear market and growth of the premium and mid-premium segments was much more than the unbranded and lower-end of the product segments. By 2015, he expected ‘Crusoe' products to gross around Rs 150 crore a year giving it a market share of about 10-15 per cent in the premium category, which he expects by then to grow to about Rs 1,800 crore.

Product types

He said the company was producing 36 types of innerwear now, which include briefs and vests. It would also get into products such as T-shirts, lounge-wear, and so on

Ms K. Ganga Rathna, General Manager, JTCL, said the company, which is into manufacture of yarn, fabrics, home textiles and apparels, will be investing about Rs 5 crore to establish the 10 EBOs during the current fiscal. In due course, the company would expand the product range by launching women's innerwear too.

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