The Fabindia Story

About the company:

John Bissell established Fabindia in 1960 with the primary aim to fuse the best aspects of East & West collaboration. Initially, Fabindia started as a wholesale export company, concentrating on the export of upholstery fabrics, durries and rugs. The first Fabindia retail store opened at Greater Kailash in New Delhi in 1976 in 1999 on John Bissell s death his son William aged 32 formally took over as the Managing Director of Fabindia. The company over time has almost singlehandedly built a network of a rapidly vanishing breed of handloom weavers and artisans, which in turn supply handicrafts which have gradually evolved to a co-ownership relationship. The company generates an annual turnover of Rs 404 Crores.

Target Group:
Fabindia started as a wholesale export company and is still active in the whole sale space, exporting to more than 33 countries. The clients here are wholesalers as well as secondary retailers. The Target Customers in other segments are as follows. Retail: Fabindia India initially focused on providing an Indian experience to foreign customers. In the 80s it realised there is an untapped market among the upper and the upper middle class. With the economic boom in the 90s, the focus had shifted to upwardly mobile consumers who like Indian prints. A majority of its customers are college going youth and young professionals and just married couples in the higher middle class category. Institutional Buyers: Another large customer base which FabIndia taps are the Institutional buyers like heritage hotels and corporate houses. They want to target organization which wants to portray Indian roots and eco-friendly culture.

The Marketing Mix of Fabindia

Product: Fabindias products are its differentiating factor and it has made sure over the years that the quality and the style of the products are maintained. It has a large product range which includes -Garments for men and women, Accessories, Home Linen and Furnishings, Home Products, Floor Coverings, Body Care Products and more recently, Organic Food Products and ethnic Jewellery. All the products have at least one factor which is handmade and thus, supports artisans. This is a very strong customer value leveraged by Fabindia, which is that of traditional, ethnic products which support poor artisans and provide livelihood to a large number of people. The most popular product category is its garments in which its cotton clothes are the hot cakes.

Place: Fabindia with its stores in 5 counties, 63 cities that number to 146 stores include the premium, regular and concept stores. It is trying to increase coverage in order to make sure that the products are available at the largest number of places possible. It also differentiates its stores according to the products stored. For eg. In Bangalore on CMH Road the store is only a Furniture while store just 2 shops after has garments, organic products, Body products and Jewellery. This also ensures convenience for the customers since the products are either available in the same store or in nearby stores. Price: Fabindias Product range enables it to provide a wide range of products in a wide price range. The products range from garments for men and women to upholstery, furniture etc. Obviously these products have different price ranges. Though initially perceived as value for money it has hiked up its prices to capitalise on its brand value. Fabindias expanded range of garments start at Rs. 350 and go on to more than Rs.5000 in order to provide something for all its customers. Promotion: Fabindia has traditionally relied only on word-of-mouth as a marketing tool. It believes that the product speaks for itself and this strategy has up till now worked very well. Thus, Communication for Fabindia is completely customer driven. It believes that the only problem in this strategy is that customers do not know the location of the stores, but once that is overcome, no other strategy is needed. In order to do this, it has started using tools such as Social media and Mobile Marketing and giving Advertorials in newspapers to increase awareness about its store locations. Also, Fabindia uses a lot of in-store posters to create consumer awareness about the products and where they come from, i.e. the rural suppliers etc. Physical Evidence: The layout of the store is casual with sections demarcated informally . The stores in which they have their entire product range the garments are usually kept at the back,in the garments and personal products store sarees are kept at the entrance which is priced at Rs5750. The look and feel the stores have is warm with a wave of ethnicity to it.

Process:

Apart from this Fabindia promotes inclusive capitalism, through its unique COC (community owned companies) model. The COC model consists of companies, which act as value adding intermediaries, between rural producers and Fabindia. These are owned, as the name suggests, by the communities they operate from; a minimum 26% shareholding of these companies is that of craft persons thus creating a sense of empowerment and ownership among them. People: The people at the store level are mostly aware about what they are selling and have a good idea about the patterns available and how to mix and match them.

Why FabInda?
When one goes on to understand why Fabindia from its customers many a reason comes to light with the range of its products and its depth being a significant one. To quote a few of themI like their variety of clothes and the patterns available , I like the designs and the fabric they use. You know what you are looking for when you go to Fabindia like I know if I want a brick red Nehru jacket or kurta ill find it 100 % at Fabindia, I like the cloth they use and the ethnicity thus we get a picture that Fabindia has defined The urban Indian through its products. Another interesting revelation is that while most people knew about the fact that many of their products are handmade they did not care much about it, but for those who cared it was a social statement that they made and they had that social activist kind of mindset

Fabindia-The Brand Analysis:

ROLE What the brand does PERFORMANCE DIFFERENCES How the brand does it (functional) First to develop the model of Community owned companies thus empowering artisans and craftsmen PERSONALITY How the brand Does it .. (emotional) SOURCE OF AUTHORITY Where does the brands authority derive from ? Received Idea Zee FAwards, India's biggest Fashion awards held at Mumbai in 2007. It was also recognized as the Best Retail Brand of the year and the Designer Promoting Indian Craft or Technique. Fabindia is also a Harvard Business School case study because of its COC model which it created. ADVANTAGEOUS Various categories of products available with wide and depth. Understanding of style and pattern of the shop level staff High quality materials used for the products A shift in Fabindias mission is felt by the industry people as it seems to be getting commercial now. VERSATILITY What else could the brand do and to whom?

Positioning of FabIndia

UNIQUE First, Best, Only

First to market and sell the crafts and traditions of India.

The urban Indianess is a paradigm that resonates with Fabindia.

Fabindia could foray into any products or services that would involve utilisation of traditional techniques and skill focusing on their initial clientele i.e. Foreigners and then higher middle and high class groups.

NECESSARY

NEGATIVE ISSUES

Positioning statement: Thus considering the above the positioning statement of Fabindia would be The Urban Indian Lifestyle through Artisanal Empowerment

The Brand through Visuals

Indian

Urban

Empowering

Reformative

Knowledgeable

Artistic

Contemporary

Ethnic