Arvind Mills to open nearly 100 Megamart stores

Bangalore: With an aim to enhance its focus on tier-II cities, Arvind Mills plans to open nearly 100 Megamart stores in the country in the next five years, a company official said today.

Apparel discount chain Megamart, the speciality retail business of Ahmedabad-based Arvind Mills, currently has 54 outlets in 16 cities, with footfalls in excess of 1.5 lakh consumers per month.

"In the next five years, we want to expand from 16 cities to 100 cities, and from 54 stores to 150 stores," Arvind Brands Chief Operating Officer J Suresh said here. "We have a fairly aggressive expansion plans," he said.

Megamart currently has a 150,000 sq ft of retail space, which would be scaled up to 550,000 sq ft in five years, Suresh added.

In the current financial year, which would see it open 10 stores, Megamart plans to spend Rs 30-40 crore on expansion activities.It already has stores in tier-II cities such as Visakhapatnam, Guntur and Warangal in Andhra Pradesh.

"We have been growing at a compounded annual growth rate of 57 per cent in the last four years. "We are selling more than 2.2 million apparels annually."

The scaling up in the number of stores would see it expand into tier-II cities, Suresh said adding the company is keen to leverage Arvind's strength in apparel.