Myntra eyes mall space, may open large stores

Myntra, India’s largest online fashion retailer, is talking to several mall operators in top cities to open multibrand brick-and-mortar outlets, including large department stores, people with knowledge of the development said.

The Walmart-owned company plans to sell women’s fashion, sports and lifestyle products, accessories and cosmetics through these stores under the Myntra brand, competing with Shoppers Stop and Lifestyle among others.


Half a dozen top mall executives ET spoke to, in Delhi-NCR, Mumbai and Bengaluru, said Myntra approached them in the past few months, seeking space ranging from 3,000 sq ft for outlets selling cosmetics products to 20,000-30,000 sq ft for department stores.

The formats will include ‘Myntra Women’, ‘Myntra Sports’ and ‘Myntra Beauty’ and will be franchisee-run, they said.

“We will not be able to comment on this,” a Myntra spokesperson said.

A top executive of a New Delhi mall said the company had been talking to it for space and that he had a couple of meetings with the e-commerce firm’s executives. “They are looking for different store sizes,” he said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

Myntra is looking at stores for its private brand Roadster, beauty, sports and lifestyle as well as the department store formats, the executive said.

“With us, they have been talking for space between 10,000 and 12,000 sq ft and going up to 20,000-30,000 sq ft,” said an executive at a Mumbai mall. “They have got many private labels and their exclusive global brands. In the 10,000-12,000 (sq ft store space) they will do mostly international brands and leading Indian brands with lot of exclusivity. In the larger format, they will have all kinds of brands like a Shoppers (Stop) and Lifestyle kind of format.”

Experts see this as Myntra’s latest, yet most aggressive, stab on its omni-channel strategy by offering shopping through both offline and online channels. Myntra is also focusing on physical stores to gain visibility in malls and high streets and to provide the touch and feel for the choosy Indian consumers, they said.

On the other hand, Myntra is morphing into an owner of global brands by opening brick-and-mortar stores with various international labels, directly competing with Reliance Brands and Arvind Brands to tap the growing, yet fiercely competitive market space.

The Bengaluru-based company has master franchisee deals with Spain’s Mango and Hong Kong’s Esprit to open their physical stores in India. Myntra is also in talks for a similar deal with UK fashion brand Dorothy Perkins, two people familiar with the matter said.

Myntra denied any talks with Dorothy Perkins. The UK company did not respond to an email sent on September 12 seeking comment. Myntra entered the offline retailing business with a store for its private brand Roadster in Bengaluru last year. The company had told ET that it was buoyed by the response to the first Roadster store and was looking to launch 100 offline stores across cities in the next two years — half of these would be Roadster outlets and rest to sell other brands including Mango and Esprit.