Future group to take Nilgiris supermarket store count to 1,000

Kishore Biyani-led Future Group is planning a major expansion of its southern supermarket chain Nilgiris by adding more products and taking the store count to 1,000 in next three years.

The group, which had acquired the Bengaluru-based chain in 2014, is also launching new products in bakery and is strengthening its portfolio.

"We have a target to have at least 1,000 shops in southern India gradually in next three years," Future Group CEO Kishore Biyani told PTI.

He further added: "We are revamping the chains and opening new stores. We are expanding Nilgiris capacity. We are also launching new products as in bakery segment." Nilgiris is operating 160 stores in South India and has sales of around Rs 800 to Rs 900 crore.

He declined to share the number of investment by the company on Nilgiris, but said, "This would be done through franchise system." "We entered dairy and bakery segment through Nilgiris," said Biyani, highlighting the importance of the supermarket chain in the group.

On November 21, 2014, Future Consumer Enterprises had acquired 98 per cent share of Nilgiris from Actis Capital and other promoters and made a fully owned subsidiary.

Nilgiris operates stores in Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Kerala.

Future Group has tied up with mobile payments and commerce platform Paytm to enable Paytm users to shop for Big Bazaar merchandise on the online marketplace and get it delivered to their homes.

"We have done integration with Paytm. Now we have our own wallet and Paytm also" he said.

Biyani further added the group is also working towards omni channel system by integrating the offline and online mode together.

"We have started some online sales in the group. We have started it some brands in fashion segment. We are adding it one by one, where a customer would order in the store and would be delivered at your home or vice versa you can also order from home and would be delivered there," he said.

After fashion, the group has plans to roll out online sales in general merchandise and home segment and lastly in the food segment, Biyani added.

"We are increasing use of technology with commerce. We have increased it on payment side. This is big journey.

At present, we are doing in fashion and add some more segments. We would integrate all one by one," he said. PTI KRH ABK SBT .