Roadster to lead Myntra's private brand push

By

Isabelle Crossley

Published
Oct 18, 2017

As fashion e-tailer Myntra harnesses its private brands to turn profitable, their successful label Roadster is being prepped to lead the way.

Early this year, Ananth Narayanan, the CEO of Myntra, forged a plan that would see Myntra’s private label business, Myntra Fashion Brands, become the driving force behind the business’ push to profitability. Roadster was priced more affordably, stocked more frequently with new designs, and streamlined in terms of its brand aesthetic. Roadster now has an annualised gross sales run rate of 650 crore rupees (approximately 97.7 million dollars) which makes it bigger than any other brand on Myntra’s platform.

Roadster’s revenue has now become comparable with other leading denim brands in India, including established foreign brands such as Levis, Pepe Jeans, and Benetton. The Chief of Myntra Fashion, Manohar Kamath, even predicted that Roadster could become bigger than them in the coming years, despite being a relatively new brand.

Roadster is becoming a big name in India but Myntra cannot rely solely on its accomplishments to turn the whole business profitable. The plan is to build up more brands to reach the same level as Roadster. Narayanan said: “Let us assume that in five years, there will be 15 big brands in India. My vision is that Myntra can own five of them.”

Roadster, which was launched in November 2012 by Gautam Kotamraju, mainly stocks outerwear and denim and retails exclusively on Myntra and Flipkart’s online platforms. The brand is currently running their “Once Upon a Road” campaign where customers are taking it in turn to tweet snippets that Roadster is making into a road trip story which will then be turned into a cartoon.