With good end-of-season sales, this Christmas brings cheer to retailers

The Christmas season this year appears to have brought much-needed cheer to offline retailers, grappling with the growing clout of online platforms.

Brick-and-mortar stores are seeing 20-25 per cent sales growth during the ongoing sale period, which has been advanced to counter e-tailers.

Some of the country’s leading department store chains such as Shoppers Stop, Lifestyle, and Central are saying they are seeing a good response to their end-of-season sale, which kicked off ahead of Christmas.

“The start of the season has been good and is also getting a boost from the festive and holiday mood,” Uma Talreja, head of marketing at Shoppers Stop, said. “Initial trends show growth in sales with 20-25 per cent rise seen this year over the corresponding period last year,” she said.

Women’s wear and beauty products, in particular, Talreja said, are doing even better at the chain this year, with sales growth at 50 per cent (over last year) for these categories.

Typically, end-of-season sale kicks off around December 25 to take advantage of the week-long holiday period between Christmas and New Year. This year, however, most chains, including Central (from Future Group) and Lifestyle (from the Landmark Group), started their sale days nearly a week in advance, that is, December 19. Raheja-owned Shoppers Stop, on the other hand, began its sale for its loyalty programme customers on December 15, while general shoppers could take advantage of the sale from December 20.

Vasant Kumar, managing director of Lifestyle, said the chain was seeing a 25-30 per cent jump in sales now because consumers were pleasantly surprised to be greeted with interesting offers and merchandise at low rates at their outlets.

Men’s and children’s wear, in particular, were flying off the shelf, he said.

Typically, end-of-season sale is undertaken to clear old stocks before the next season kicks in. It happens twice a year, once in December and then in June.

While the sale would happen in the first or second week of January five to six years ago, it came down to post-Christmas two to three years ago and is now being advanced further. The sale period typically extends for three to four days, depending on the store chain, though some retailers this year are opting to keep the duration (of the sale period) a little longer.

E-tailers too, including players such as Myntra, Jabong, and Amazon Fashion, have kicked off their end-of-season sales, offering as much as an 80 per cent discount on merchandise, including shoes, bags, and clothes. While it is impossible for offline retailers to match the level of discounting undertaken by online platforms, what they are doing is extending shopping hours, making the overall shopping experience pleasant, and offering everything from discounts to combo offers, experts said.

“The strategy of advancing end-of-season sale (by offline retailers) was a good one,” said Arvind Singhal, chairman, Technopak, a Gurugram-based retail consultancy. “The idea is to get consumers excited before the e-tailers step in. Brick-and-mortar stores have been successful in doing that this year,” he said.

Consumers are also relaxed, according to experts, because the issue of spurious products is lower in offline stores and defective products, if spotted, can be tackled quickly. This point is endorsed by Rakesh Biyani, joint managing director, Future Retail. He said, “Fake products have been on the rise in online shopping. There are delays as well when it comes to delivery, which is not the issue with offline players.”

Biyani said his chain was seeing 17-18 per cent sales growth during the ongoing sale period, with online discounting hardly denting sales.

Rajendra Kalkar, president (west) at Phoenix Mills, which runs big malls in Mumbai, said customers were shopping for different products at online and offline stores, giving some breather to the latter.

From clicks to bricks

• Offline retailers are a happy lot owing to the good response to their end-of-season sale this year

• Kicked off ahead of Christmas, retailers say they are seeing sales growth of 20-25% over last year

• Categories such as women’s wear and beauty products have done well at some chains

• Men’s and children’s wear are also flying off the shelf

• Advancing end-of-season sale has helped offline players counter e-tailers, who are offering deep discounts