Mumbai rains: retailers, malls the worst hit

Retailers and mall operators took the brunt of the incessant rains that brought Mumbai to a stand still. With consumers staying indoors through the day after the Bombay Municipal Corporation issued an alert for high tide, footfalls in malls and shops dipped to a trickle. Most of the corporates and business houses remained shut while others allowed employees to work from home after rains disrupted train services.

Mukesh Kumar, Vice-President, Infinity Mall, said, “Footfalls dropped in the morning but now families are trickling in as most people have taken a holiday from work and are treating it as an excuse to venture out, especially at our Malad mall where it has not rained heavily. However, at the Andheri mall, footfalls fell drastically.”

Urvi Vira, Head, Mall Marketing, Growel101 Mall, said, “The rains in the last two days have impacted footfall. But new movie releases have been the saving grace. Additionally, staffers manning retail outlets also saw less attendance.” Vira said if the trend continued there could be a drastic dip in footfalls.

Nirzar Jain, Vice-President, Oberoi Mall, said while most of his staff managed to come in as they stay near Goregaon, where the mall is situated, in the western suburbs, footfalls have fallen and will continue to do so with the rains getting heavier. Stand alone hi-street stores of international brands such as Celio also witnessed a slowdown in sales. Rajiv Nair, CEO, Celio Future Fashion said, “Rains have been heavier this year compared to last year and last week sales were low. Most shoppers are now waiting for the end-of-season sales to happen in July.”

But not everyone is complaining. Online retailers have seen a spike in sales as consumers prefer buying on e-commerce platforms from the comforts of their homes instead of venturing out for essentials. ShopClues, for example, has seen a 200 per cent rise in the sales of rain gear.

Mukesh Singh, Founder, ZopNow, said: “With the onset of monsoon, ZopNow has seen a rise of 40–50 per cent in the number of orders per day in Mumbai. Customers look for convenience and on-time delivery.”

Timesaverz Founder Debdutta Upadhyaya said monsoons bring in associated issues such as pest infestation, water leakage, overall dampness and polluted water. “Since the last one week, requests for such services have gone up on our platform. Especially today, we were flooded with requests for water-proofing solutions and plumbing orders to solve water-clogging issues. We are getting maximum requests from the low-lying areas of the city in the last 24 hours and we have channelised our service partner network to ensure that service is delivered on time despite the extreme weather conditions.”

With inputs from Purvita Chatterjee, Bindu Menon and Priyanka Pani

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