FirstCry.com to add 30 more stores by 2014 end

Firstcry.com, online baby products portal is expanding its offline presence in India by increasing the number of stores from 70 to 100 by the end of 2014. The brand is further planning to take the store count to 400 by 2017. Presently, FirstCry has over 70 franchise stores across the country, operating under the brand ‘FirstCry.com’.

Supam Maheshwari, Founder and CEO, FirstCry.com says: “We are extremely delighted to announce our expansion plans by increasing our offline presence. By entering into the untapped markets, where offline presence of baby products is low, we are hopeful about the growth of the company. People engage in both online and offline purchases. To offer solutions in both spaces, we started building both the online platform and offline store in parallel. With this strategic expansion we aim to fill this gap and cater to the fast growing baby and mother care products for the customers.”

FirstCry stores have their presence in various tier I, II and III cities. Currently operating in 45 cities across all the tiers, they plan to expand to another 25 cities by October 2014. The carpet area of stores ranges from 1,000 to 2,000 sq ft. Their requirement in terms of investment is about Rs. 3000 per sq ft.

FirstCry stores display 300 to 400 brands across 15 categories. To ease the buying process they have even come up with kiosk innovation in their stores, which allows the customers to look through products on a 32 inch screen, order online on the spot, and the product is made available at the store within two or three days.