In addition to leveraging the Tata Group’s own e-commerce platform CliQ, electronics retailer Croma plans to sell across all leading marketplaces such as Flipkart, Amazon and Snapdeal.

“We want to have a storefront model across all the major marketplaces and are currently in talks with them. Since there is larger traffic in marketplaces like Flipkart, Amazon and Paytm, we must be present on these sites,” said Ritesh Ghosal, Chief Marketing Officer, Infinity Retail. Infinity, a subsidiary of Tata Sons, is the promoter of Croma.

A storefront model is where products and prices can be compared on a wider canvas against its competitors. With sales of over ₹4,000 crore, Croma, which has 96 stores, gets 5 per cent of its turnover from online sales.

“We are treating our presence on Tata CliQ as being present in a mall with an additional store. Today we want to be there on any aggregator which catches the largest eyeballs. At the same time we do not expect e-commerce to account for more than 10 per cent of our sales since we must also get revenues from our 100-odd offline stores for which we have to pay rent,” he added. Unlike some of its competitors, Croma has been cautious about a rapid scale-up. Western India is its largest market, with more than 40 stores; the durable retailer is yet to set up a distribution centre in the East.

Croma is now redesigning its smaller format under the sub brand Zip. “We will have Zip stores catering to affluent markets. We already have a couple of outlets at airports. The format may now have an assortment different from the regular formats,” he added.

Croma is also planning to generate additional revenues by taking up exclusive dealerships for high-end durable brands. “Brands like Hitachi TV and Super General AC and washing machines will have Croma as their exclusive channels and we would signing more of such deals for more top-end durable brands,” added Ghosal.

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