FOREWORD

India has been a nation of Dukandars—around 12 million retailers; more retail shops than the rest of the world put together. Retailing has been in our blood—as a shopkeeper or as a shopper. But things are changing in the country, the way shopping is done, the way retail is getting modernised and organised, and the way people are viewing this industry—as a student, as a shopper or as an academician.

With the interest developing in modern retail, here comes a book one can call a ‘text book in Indian retail’, which has looked at Retailing with Indianness in mind and case studies which are of Indian companies.

There are a lot of schools and colleges where Retailing as a subject has just been introduced. This book shall further help students in learning about retail with an Indian perspective.

I wish Swapna Pradhan, who has earlier worked with me and who believes in detailing, all the best in this endeavour.

KISHORE BIYANI
CEO and MD
Pantaloon Retail (India) Ltd

Kishore Biyani is the CEO and Managing Director of Pantaloon Retail (India) Limited, a $100 million Pantaloon Knowledge Group Company. Pantaloon Retail has four formats of retail operations in India: the departmental store format focussing on fashion retailing under the Pantaloons brand; the showcase seamless mall under the Central brand; the hypermarket discount store format under the Big Bazaar brand; and the food & grocery retail format under the Food Bazaar brand. Mr Biyani is credited with the launching of India’s ready-made trouser in 1987. He is also a recipient of several awards which include: Lycra-Images Fashion Awards—Visionary of the Year-2004; E&Y Entrepreneur of the Year Award-2001; IFA Awards for outstanding performance in the business of fashion-2001; and India Brand Summit Awards for Corporate Excellence-2001. Mr Kishore Biyani, Managing Director of the Company has been awarded the CEO of the Year Award-2001 by the organizing committee of the India Brand Summit. ‘Pantaloon’ was ranked as the No. 1 apparel brand in the Branded Apparels category in the survey conducted by ORG-MARG and The Economic Times Research Bureau. The Pantaloons at Gariahat Road, Kolkata, the Company’s pioneer family store, emerged as Kolkata’s most popular top multi-brand store in a study conducted by Images Panorama and AC Nielsen.