Aditya Birla group targets youth with new fashion portal

The portal 'abof.com' will sell 55 brands to begin with and will have a virtual 3-D trial room

The Aditya Birla Group on Friday launched a fashion focused e-commerce portal abof.com, to compete with the likes of Jabong and Myntra. The portal will sell apparel, footwear and accessories. It is targeting the 18-25 age group.

Though Birla has a fashion portal called Trendin.com, it mostly sells brands of group company Madura Fashion, which include Louis Philippe and Van Heusen.

Abof.com will sell curated merchandise and price products sharply. It will sell brands from the group and as well external brands.

“We will not go in for the discount game. We believe that if you offer a great product at a great price, you can can stay away from the discount game,” said Prashant Gupta, president and chief executive officer of abof.com.

The portal will also launch an app shortly. The portal will sell 55 brands and 1,000 styles to begin with and launch a new collection every month.

“With abof.com, we aim to offer a wide but curated range of merchandise and a differentiated shopping experience that can compete with the best in the world. We see abof emerging as the most admired player in online fashion within the next three years,” said Kumar Mangalam Birla, chairman of the Aditya Birla Group.

“We want to be the Apple (the US tech company) of the industry. We want to do few things, but do them extremely well,” said Gupta.

Though the site was focused on millennials, it would not retail kidswear, Gupta said.  The site’s landing page would not have banners and catalogues but would be visually rich, like an Instagram page, he said.

To differentiate itself, the portal will deliver on Sundays and is equipped with a 3D virtual trial room, where customers can instantly view themselves in any clothes by providing basic body proportions. The portal has tied up with IBM, Cognizant, Razorfish and Oracle for technology solutions and it has a style quiz to understand the customer’s preference.

The portal has set up a large warehouse in Bengaluru and is looking to set up one more in the national capital region. The group has tied up with three to four firms for last-mile delivery. It will deliver in 400 cities.