By ANUSHREE BHATTACHARYYA
Indiantelevision.com Team

(15 July 2008 8:30 pm)

NEW DELHI: Kuotons Retail plans to enter the Middle East market by the end of this year with its complete portfolio of products.

"We will enter the Middle East with our brand," says Koutons Retail chairman DPS Kohli.

The company is also aiming to up its turnover from Rs 7.93 billion to Rs 13 billion this year.

While Koutons has mostly been known as men's brand, it was only in April 2008 that the retail chain thought of adding women and kids section to its stores.

Says Kohli, "The USP of our brand is that we provide both fashion and quality to the consumer at an affordable price. And the reason behind being able to give the consumer an affordable price range is that we manage everything from designing to manufacturing to retailing."

Koutons has the ambitious target of adding 500 retail stores this year. In the last four years, Kuotons retail has launched 1300 stores in 465 cities across India.

At a time when the growth process has slowed down for big retail players like Reliance and Spencer, Koutons appears to be confident about reaching its target.

"We would be achieving our target mainly by two ways. Firstly we would be increasing our store size from 11.6 lakh square feet to 16 lakh square feet. Secondly, we would be opening our stores at a ratio of 45 to 50 stores in a month. Since our backhand integration is very strong, due to everything from manufacturing to designing to selling being handled by our in house team, we are able to save the usual 25 per cent margin as well as hidden margins," said Kohli.

In terms of advertising, the apparel brand has been using television extensively apart from print and outdoors.

According to Kohli, "Advertising accounts for 6 to 7 per cent of our expenditure."

Koutons plans to launch 'Family Stores' mainly in the eastern, western and southern states of India including metros, mini-metros, Tier I and Tier II cities.