Started in late 2006 and headquartered in Mumbai, Reliance Retail's stores are operational across 16 states in India.
The company's exclusive Reliance Retail stores bear the Reliance name within the store brand, such as Reliance Fresh, Reliance Mart, Reliance Jewels, whereas its partnership brands carry a hybrid brand or the international retail brand.
Collectively, the brand has more than 1,100 stores across 96 cities in the country.
Bijou Kurien, President and Chief Executive of Lifestyle at Reliance Retail, said the majority of these retail formats have been set up and run by Reliance Retail, while some of them are run in partnership with international retail brands.
They cover the entire range of categories from food to apparel to home and lifestyle and personal accessories and automobile accessories.
Reliance Retail's current partnerships with international brands includes a joint venture with Marks and Spencer, UK, to retail apparel, accessories, personal care and home care products; a joint venture with Grand Vision, Netherlands, to retail optical products such as prescription eyewear, contact lenses and sunglasses; a joint venture with Office Depot, USA, for supply of office products to businesses in India; a franchise relationship with Hamleys, UK, to set up a chain of iconic toys stores; and a joint venture with Ermenegildo Zegna, Italy, for luxury apparel and accessories.
The company also have an exclusive joint venture with Diesel for apparel and accessories; an exclusive license arrangement with Timberland for distribution and retail of Timberland products; a licence agreement with Quiksilver Holdings for South Asia for Quiksilver and Roxy; an exclusive distribution agreement with Asics for retail and distribution of sports footwear in India; a premium reseller agreement with Apple to retail IT, music and communication products and accessories; and a joint venture with Paul & Shark for luxury apparel and accessories.
All these brands are collectively represented through more than 170 stores across the country.
"Our decision to partner with international retail brands was an intrinsic part of our retail strategy", Kurien said.
"From inception, we have developed and expanded retail formats of our own and complemented them with retail formats and partnerships with international brands.
"The initial experiences with these partnerships have been extremely encouraging and we believe that we are laying the foundations of a robust business which will appeal to the evolving Indian consumers."
The Reliance brand is now one of the most powerful brands in India, and represents India's largest private company.
For the full article, please see the April 2011 issue.
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