Indigo Nation plays with colours and styles for the new season

A premium lifestyle fashion brand for men, Indigo Nation has been a name to reckon with for years now. An extremely successful brand, it has seen phenomenal growth till now and expects to continue the same pace in the future. It hopes to grow by 30 per cent in the coming year.

Men follow the women in fashion

After tank tops became a rage for women, Indigo Nation introduced fashion tank tops for men this season along with knit bottoms such as jogger pants and knitted shorts. So, the collection has solid and printed shorts and elegant Oxford yarn dyed trousers. These are slim fit. Poplin or cotton shirts –ombre striped and amsler checked – are part of the street collection just as polo tees in vibrant colours. For Club collection, there are printed satin, jacquard shirts, stretch shirts with black dart detailing, velvet and bling textured blazers and slim and ultra slim trousers.

Indigo Nation’s 70 per cent business comes from LFS while 20 per cent is from EBOs. The brand is now getting aggressive on the franchisee model, especially in Tier II and III cities.

Brand awareness is slow

There is not enough brand awareness in the market today. and this causes a lot of problem for bigger players. Customers go for unbranded shirts without bothering about the quality. But with social media and spread of internet, brand awareness is growing. People are becoming better informed and slowly turning their focus on branded stuff. The conversion rate would be 3:1. Unbranded apparel would constitute 60 per cent of the market. So, in order to capture that market, organised players have to offer good quality, affordable prices, understand consumer behaviour and form a good loyalty base of 20 per cent customers who provide 80 per cent of the business.

The unbranded market has grown for various reasons. As Datta S Naiknavare, Brand Manager, Indigo Nation explains, “With easy availability of raw material, producing shirts has become easy in the unorganised sector. Also, so many small scale factories have come up who offer shirts at lesser price than branded ones. As a result, customers prefer to buy from them. Their manufacturing costs are low and they focus on MBOs and online sites to market their products.” In order to beat competition, brands like Indigo Nation have to advertise strategically in a market where other local players are also there. Also, in certain parts of India, the brand has incorporated local trends or given special offers during regional festivals. All these measures help the brand to beat competition.

Indigo Nation is a brand from Indus League, a division of Future Lifestyle Fashion. Indigo Nation is pegged as a young, edgy and unconventional brand for the rockstar of the Gen Y. Future Lifestyle Fashion has redefined Indian fashion scenario by launching Indian brands that have an international appeal.