Allen Solly: Popularising ‘Friday Dressing’ across India

Allen Solly one of the four apparel brands from Madura

Fashion and Lifestyle is on an aggressive growth mode. The brand, which is known for its relaxed range caters to young professionals. In fact, its campaigns have been aggressively pushing the tag line of ‘Friday Dressing’ among its target customers. It may be noted that Madura Fashion and Lifestyle is the branded apparel business of Aditya Birla Group. It has four readymade apparel brands— Louis Philippe, Van Heusen, Peter England and Allen Solly. The former three brands sell mainly formal wear and Madura has planned aggressive growth strategy for all three brands. This is in response to growing consumer demand for branded apparel.

In Allen Solly, the company registered sales of Rs 500 crores at retail price for the year ended March 2011. In the next three years, Madura wants to double Allen Solly brand’s revenue with a CAGR of 30 per cent. In the last three years, the brand’s revenue has grown three times with a CAGR of 40 per cent. Allen Solly has created a niche since its launch in 1993 and suits consumers who prefer a clothing range that falls between formal and casual wear. Its women’s range has also got tremendous response and the company expects the growth of women’s wear to outpace men’s wear this year. Allen Solly will also consider extending the brand portfolio to accessories such as shoes and bags by 2012-13.

As a part of retail expansion, the company will add around 40-50 Allen Solly stores in 2011-12 and touch 300 stores by 2012-13. The average store size would be around 1,800 sq. ft. with a capital investment of Rs 40 lakh for each store. The current ratio of company-owned and franchised stores stands at about 70:30. Madura will invest around Rs 10 crores a year to launch new stores. Allen Solly women’s wear is currently available in around 70 stores which would be increased by adding 25 women’s only stores in next two years.