Asics to expand retail presence 12 new stores by year-end

By

Maverick Martins

Published
Jun 23, 2022

Japanese sportswear brand Asics is planning to strengthen its retail presence in the Indian market with addition of 10 to 12 new stores this year with a focus on tier 2, 3 markets.

The company sees huge potential in these markets which currently contribute around 35 percent to its sales and expects the expansion to help increase the number in the coming months.

Asics has also scaled up its local sourcing from the country and started selling made-in-India products at the stores.

“We have a strong pipeline and plan to open 10-12 stores by the year-end. We have witnessed a strong resurgence in footfalls at the stores in the past few months, which is higher than pre-pandemic levels. Performance footwear and apparel categories are driving our sales. With nearly 35 per cent of sales coming from tier-2 and tier-3 cities, we are also strongly focusing on expanding our retail footprint beyond tier-1 markets,” Rajat Khurana, managing director of Asics India and South Asia told the Businessline.

“We have been quite focused on scaling up local sourcing for footwear and apparel for both Indian and international markets. We have been also exporting products from India to other Asics subsidiaries. We have begun selling a wider apparel range, which is a mix of both made-in-India and imported products, at our stores,” he added.

Asics currently has around 65 exclusive-retail brand outlets operated by the franchisees in different parts of the country and also sells online through e-commerce platforms.