As a part of its strategy to increase ten times more revenue to Rs 60,000 crore, country’s biggest retailer, Future Group is planning to open 10,000 small stores, its founder Kishore Biyani said, without specifying a time-frame.
According to Biyani the company plans to dot the country with small-format ‘Easyday’ branded stores in the range of 2,500 sq ft, and the membership-based format plans to enroll about 20 million members.
The company has 1,700 stores, which include a combination of small and large outlets. The 10,000-store target is 10-times the number of smaller outlets that Future Group runs. The group has an annual turnover of about Rs 30,000 crore.
The retailer is also piloting in three of its ‘Nilgiris’ outlets, a facility where consumers can scan the barcodes of products using a mobile application and the goods will be delivered to their homes.
“It is scan-and-go and it is cashless checkout, as payments are done through wallet and other digital means,” Biyani said in while attending the group’s strategy meeting in New Delhi.
Last year, Future Group had converted the network of stores it had purchased from Bharti Retail and through some other acquisitions and folded them under membership-based Easyday Club, where member pay an annual fee of Rs 999 and get about 10% discount on purchases.
Now, Future Group will expand that membership card to discounts at its other stores including, Central, Big Bazaar, eZone and other formats.
Biyani said the company is also testing where consumers can place an order on Future Group networks through WhatsApp messaging.
