The fashion industry in India is growing fast as more and more international brands have started seeing India as a potential market for their business. Brand awareness has reached a whole new level in the past few years, and the market currently has more than 1000 brands, which range from local to international, reasonably priced to burn your pocket expensive, bringing back the retro design to bizarre setting new trends. One such brand that has gained popularity in the country at a swift pace is Zara India.
The Spanish apparel brand is based in Arteixo, Galicia. The brand is the largest company that is operated by the Inditex group. Inditex group is the world’s largest apparel retailer. Zara is known for its trendy and basic color outfits, as the simplicity in the designs and colors makes the outfits very attractive. Along with clothes, Zara India also makes accessories, shoes, swimwear, beauty, and perfumes. The brand is known for its active participation in the fashion world and its specialization in fast fashion.
Zara and its history
The first Zara store opened in 1975 in Galicia, Spain, and Amancio Ortega is the founder of the brand. The store opened up, and the name of the store was Zorba when it was launched, but there was a bar with the same name in the city, so he decided to change the name and came up with Zara. When the store opened, people noticed that the clothes featured in the store were lookalike products of the highly-priced clothing fashions. Soon, Ortega began expanding his business to react to new trends of the industry quicker and give the latest thing to people.
Since 1980, the company has opened up more stores in Spain, and by 1988, the company moved to international markets as it opened up its first global store in Porto, Portugal. The expansion began, and Zara India initiated in 2010, and since then, it has been a massive part of the fashion industry.
Is Zara India a women’s only brand?
Zara has a wide variety of clothing range, and since 2017, it has been holding 20 collections every year. Zara is a unisex brand that means the company makes clothing, accessories, shoes, and other things for both the genders. Zara even introduced Zara kids to launch the clothing range for kids. Zara has an excellent collection for both men and women at all their stores.
Is Zara a good brand?
Zara has been operating for the past 44 years, and it has been in India for almost a decade now, and the brand value has increased due to the quality it offers. The range of designs is vast, and the pricing is justified because of the quality of the products.
Zara has been operating for 44 years now, and it has been keeping up with the latest trends of the markets, but it has also managed to stick to its fundamental roots and maintain the brand name.
Is Zara India available online?
Zara India opened its online boutique in 2010, the same year its worldwide expansion wave reached India. The online website was launched in Spain, the U.K., Italy, Germany, and France. Slowly the expansion began, and the site was launched in India on 4th October 2017.
The online website contains all the in-store collection, and other new arrival products are present on the site as well. The Global Fashion Business Journal stated that while the textile commerce for the whole world declined by 2.38%, Zara witnessed a rise of 2.17%.
Is Zara India closing its outlets?
Chief Executive Persson stated that the brand has decided to cut down some of its locations by the year 2020. In 2018, there were rumors that Zara is planning to shut its shop in India. However, nothing of such sort took place, and the stores are up and running, but recently, the Spanish fashion brand announced that they witnessed a 13.4% drop in the net profit as the year ended in March 2019. There is no confirmation whether the textile giant will shut its operations in India, but such a massive drop in the price means that there are chances that Zara might shut its operations in the country soon.
Zara India stores
Zara’s owner, Inditex first launched an outlet in Delhi as a part of the joint venture with Conglomerate Tata Group.
Inditex is also continuing with a rapid-paced global expansion for Zara that has helped cushion it from the economic woes being experienced in Spain.
“Zara’s arrival in India – the world’s second-most populous country, with 1.1 billion inhabitants – represents a new milestone in the Inditex Group’s expansion in Asia,”
the group said.
Zara has 11 stores in India, which are located in different cities like Chandigarh, Gurugram, Noida, Delhi, Garvana, Telangana, Jaipur. These are the only locations for the Zara stores across India. Apart from this, you can get Zara clothes on their official website for India.
Profits of Zara
Spanish fashion brand- Zara gave forward a 13.4% of a drop in net profits for the year which ended on 31 March 2019 at INR 71.49 crore, amid increasing competition and a general slowdown in the consumer demand in the market.
Revenues of the fashion clothing and accessories were high 17.7% at ₹1,438 crores.
Inditex SA which is the world’s largest fashion retailer and owns brands such as Zara, Pull & Bear, Massimo Dutti globally is present in India through the two joint ventures with the Tata Group’s retail brandTrent Ltd.
Inditex Trent Retail India which is a joint venture with Trent Ltd. has taken over the Zara business in India.
During a year under review, the Zara recorded revenues of ₹1,437.87 crores and a PAT of ₹71.49 crores.
A year prior to 2017-18, Zara had reported a profit of ₹82.59 crores with the revenues of ₹1221.65 crores.
In FY 2019, Zara added two more stores in India expanding to the 10 cities, including the first store in Kolkata, alongside selling its clothes, shoes, and accessories online as a part sales of which started in the country in late 2017. In FY 2017, Zara faced a 40% drop in the profit in its India business after it took price cuts on the inventory during the fiscal year.
A few new store openings for Zara, which started in India in 2010 and found its popularity among the upmarket, Indian shoppers which will remain calibrated as the company said. An incremental store-opening program for the Zara continues to be calibrated.
In the annual report last year, Trent Ltd. had maintained its position well and strong enough to add a few more stores for Zara in India over the next 3 to 4 years, for which the availability of high-quality real-estate remains a challenge. The primary challenge to fasten the expansion is the availability of higher quality retail areas which can be expected to create and generate reasonable sales.
Zara’s drop in numbers come at a time when its rival Swedish brand H&M has been opening stores at a much faster clip in India. The brand, which entered India in 2015, much after Zara, already has over 40 stores in the country— a number it plans to take to 50 by 2020.
