H&M wants to be a pan-India player

Swedish retailer H&M is going strong in India. It already has half-a-dozen stores and is now looking at doubling the count by the end of the year. Its latest store was opened in Mumbai recently. The company’s country manager, Janne Einola looks at India as a great potential market.

The company is looking at opening the first high street store in New Delhi’s Connaught Place. It hopes to be a pan-India player with high fashion quotient and great prices. H&M plans to open 10-15 per cent stores globally and hopes that India can meet the benchmark. H&M has been selling the same products in India as it does across the world. It has a warehouse in India and can replenish goods fast. In fact, India is part of its global supply chain and it sources from here. Globally, it sources 80 per cent of its products from Asia..

It was in 2013 that H&M was given the government nod to invest Rs 700 crore to roll out H&M branded outlets in India. In India, H&M directly competes with the Spanish retailer Zara and US-based Gap. H&M opened its first store in India in Delhi in October 2015 followed by a second store in Delhi again in December. H&M has grown from a single women’s wear shop in Vasteras, Sweden to six independent brands and 3,900 stores in 61 markets around the world with sales of 25 billion dollar in 2015.