Footwear and apparel-maker Woodland is likely to invest around ₹100 crore this fiscal to set up 40 to 50 company-owned stores. One out of every four new store (25 per cent) will be in tier-2 and tier-3 towns.

Based out of Delhi, Woodland is promoted by the Aero Club Ltd. It has 475 own stores with a 50-50 break-up between tier-1 and other centres.

According to Harkirat Singh, Managing Director, Woodland, the company has seen good success along with increased demand in tier-2 and tier-3 towns over the last 18 months.

“Of the 50-odd stores planned, some 20-25 per cent of them will be in smaller towns. So far we have seen good demand for our products in smaller centres. In tier-1 towns, most stores will be in malls,” he told BusinessLine .

Expansion will mostly be through internal accruals via own stores; apart from having shop-in-shop formats. The company does not operate through franchisees.

With offerings priced between ₹3,000 and ₹5,000; Woodland’s previous foray into the smaller towns was in the 2000s. However, the entry was not very successful then.

The brand competes with the likes of Levi’s and United Colours of Benetton in both apparel and footwear segments. It reported a turnover of approximately ₹1,000 crore in FY-13 and is looking to clock around ₹1,300 crore this fiscal.

While footwear makes up 60-65 per cent of the turnover; another 25–30 per cent is from apparels. Accessories contribute the remaining 10-15 per cent.

Approximately, 80 per cent of manufacturing is done in-house from around 15 facilities located in Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand.

Overseas foray

According to Singh, the company is looking to tap new markets that include the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) nations, Gulf Cooperation Countries (GCC), South-East Asian countries and Eastern European nations. Overseas foray will mostly be through shop-in-shop formats. However, in Dubai, a re-entry might be through its own standalone stores. It had exited the loss-making Dubai market sometime back.

“We are exploring the probability (of re-entering) in Dubai, preferably in the shopping malls,” he added.

The company which began exporting to Hong Kong and China a few years back has two own stores in Hong Kong.

comment COMMENT NOW