Metro Shoes Ltd aims to expand its retail footprint and strengthen presence in the ‘affordable’ segment. While nearly Rs 150 crore has been marked for expansion purposes over a three-year period, the company wants to nearly double its retail presence from 200 to 400-plus stores in these three years.

According to Farah Malik Bhanji, Executive Director, Metro Shoes, funding for retail expansion would be through internal accruals.

“We hope to achieve a turnover of Rs 680 crore by March 2013 and Rs 1,000 crore by March 2015. The growth in turnover will be supported by our expansion plans, particularly in the tier II and III towns,” Bhanji said.

Affordable Segment

Metro, currently, operates in the affordable segment through its MSL brand while Metro and Mochi are its upmarket brands. While Metro or Mochi shoes are priced Rs 800 upwards; MSL is priced upwards of Rs 390.

The company plans to increase the number of MSL stores to 40 by the end of this fiscal.

“We observed that there were no major players in the value segment so we decided to tap this market through our MSL brand. We initially rolled out about 36 outlets to test the market before ramping up our presence in the category,” Bhanji told Business Line .

The Indian footwear industry is currently pegged at Rs 22,000 crore in value terms.

Accessories

According to Bhanji, while men’s footwear contributes to 60 per cent of its turnover; women’s footwear category adds to nearly 30-35 per cent. The remaining 5-10 per cent is from kids segment and accessories such as handbags, belts, handkerchiefs and wallets.

“Going forward we hope to see a good growth coming from the accessories such as belts, women’s handbags and kids segments,” she added.

shobha.roy@thehindu.co.in

abhishek.l@thehindu.co.in

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