Kolkata, July 30 (Inditop.com) With organised retail business in India yet to come out of the woods, a move is afoot to synergise the resources of the various retails chains for mutual benefit, a top retailer said here Thursday.
“The situation is now better. But still it is bad,” said Sanjeev Goenka, vice chairman of RPG Enterprises, which owns the Spencer’s Retail Limited, adding retailers are planning to get together to discuss how they could leverage their resources.
“We are trying for a meeting. I see an opportunity for some kind of integration of space. The chains can go into backend sharing,” Goenka told reporters here.
However, he refused to spell out names of the retailers who could take part in the talks. “The idea has been floated.
“But in the end, something may happen. Or something may not happen”.
The Rs.100 billion organised retail business in India has been under strain after the companies underwent frenzied expansion sometime back. The economic slowdown has also hit the sector adversely.
“Some time back, we had seen a mad frenzy in retail. Now the froth is out,” said Goenka, whose retail chain closed down 150 stores last fiscal.
Facing a funds crunch, another retail chain Subhiksha has not paid salaries to its employees for the past three months and also closed down several outlets.
Faced with a Rs.1.15 billion loss in the fourth quarter of 2008-09, Vishal Retail has also decided to shut down as many as 10 unviable outlets across the country over the next few months to cut costs. It has also trimmed its employees from 14,500 to 8,800.
If the retailers do manage to get together, then it will be the first time such a development would take place in this particular business segment in India.
