In a strategic move, consumer durable major Samsung India plans to open as many as 15 new premium experience stores in India in 2023. This comes at a time when the demand for premium products has been booming in post-pandemic period and the company is stepping up its premium stores play to drive adoption of premium products.
Sumit Walia, Senior Director, D2C Business, Samsung India, said, “Nearly two-thirds of the consumers, who come to our brand shops, buy premium products. So this made us rethink our retail experience strategy. We are opening 15 new experience centres across nine cities in 2023. These stores will offer a curated range of premium products and immersive experience zones coupled with our “Learn at Samsung” initiative. We believe this will help us tap into the latent demand for premium products in the country.”
These expierence stores, which will be run by the company’s trade partners, will be launched in New Delhi, Chennai, Mumbai, Kolkata, Hyderabad, Pune, Chandigarh, Ahmedabad and Bengaluru. The company’s products are currently sold in India through a network of 1,700 brand shops and 1,400 partners.
Opera House
The company had been testing the waters with its large format experience store launched in 2018 in Bengaluru called the Samsung Opera House.
“We have now completely re-crafted the Opera House by adding elements of immersive experience zones for connected devices ecosystem and gaming among others. With this renovation, we noticed that nearly 80 per cent of the consumers at the store began shopping for premium products. This was a key insight and that led us to a similar experience centre in New Delhi recently.,” Walia explained.
The consumer durable major said it will closely work with its trade partners to set up these experience centres.
Future expansion
Asked about future expansion plans to tier-2 and tier-3 markets, he said, “Demand for premium products is growing at the same pace in smaller cities and towns as it is in larger cities. Looking at the density of young and Gen Z consumers who are driving premium products demand, we want to first expand our experience stores network in these nine cities.”
These premium stores will also be equipped with digital kiosks that will be connected to the company’s warehouses and will enable consumers to shop a wider range of premium products.