The Godrej Group has decided to restructure its lifestyle retail chain Godrej Lifespaces to sharpen its focus from a retailer of consumer appliances, home fittings and fixtures and furniture to a pure furniture retail format. As part of the restructuring exercise the chain is also being rebranded as ‘Godrej Interio’.
Interio is also a brand the group uses for its home furniture business and hence the group has decided to extend this to the retail chain as well because it will be sharply re-focussed on the furniture retail business of the group.
The move follows a decision to focus on the furniture business of the group, which has been identified as a key thrust area and a ‘hero’ business. The decision will allow the company to display a wider selection of its furniture particularly its new range of designer home furniture at the Godrej Interio stores because the entire space in the store will be available exclusively for displaying the growing furniture collection.
Confirming this to Financial Chronicle, a member of the Godrej family said, “We have done up the interiors of the retail chain to provide more of a homely feel and in the near future, the rebranding of all the 51 Lifespaces stores will be completed.”
Unlike other home solutions focussed retail formats run by the Future Group and Shoppers Stop, which have recently seen a double-digit decline in same-store sales Godrej’s furniture retail business, has in fact seen a 25-30 per cent rise in same-store sales. Building on the success, the group expects to expand its retail chain network to 200 stores over the next three years using a mix of company-owned and operated outlets to franchisees. At present, all of the chains’ stores are company owned and operated. Godrej says that in difficult times, customers tend to patronise brands, which are known for their reliability and durability.
The group’s wide sales network in B and C class towns too it said, has helped it side step the effect of the slowdown because furniture sales in these towns were impacted less than those in the metros. In addition to its own retail chain, Godrej also sells its furniture range through its wide network of dealers and franchisees. Along with expanding its own retail chain, Godrej & Boyce continues to appoint new franchisees to further grow its sales network pan-India.
In keeping with its focus on ‘Brighter Living’, the group is now trying to connect more closely with its consumers and is engaging in more one-to-one research and customer emotion studies to help uncover what its target consumers want. The input is fed this back into its marketing and new product development initiatives.
Source: Financial Chronicle
