Bangalore, get ready to put on your shopping shoes

Gayatri Ruia, director of business development, Phoneix Marketcity, says that Bangalore will see a retail revolution

There seems to be a mall explosion happening in Bangalore; how do you think shopping malls can stay on top of competition and what will make Phoenix different?
Bangalore may have many malls but very few of them are actually giving the customer and retailer a complete experience, in terms of design, retail depth, circulation, mall management, F&B options. In fact, at Phoenix Marketcity, we have kept the end user in mind and given him a product that will make him keep coming back for more. At the end of the day it is all about the customer experience and irrespective of competition if the customer is happy one is always ahead of competition.

Rumour has it Phoenix is bringing in some of the coolest brands into the city — which ones are they?
Quite a few premium brands will make their way into the city. For instance, fans of ZARA, Bebe, Roxy, Quiksilver, Promod, and Nautica, Steve Madden, Charles & Keith, Timberland, Aldo, Sunglass Hut, Lavie and Aldo Accessories don’t have to go to another city to get what they what.

Do you think international brands that are slightly above the acceptable price range of an average Bangalorean will do well here? There have been instances where luxury brands have failed to make an impact.
It is very important that there is a connect between the brand and the customer. People are now exposed to different brands simply because they travel a lot nowadays. We’ve not kept any of the luxury brands but more of the premium labels that are priced competitively and are doing well in other cities in India.

Do you think the location of a mall impacts the kind of brands that can be brought in — or do you think people would go anywhere if the brand they like is available there, especially in a city like Bangalore?
We truly believe and have successfully seen across our other projects that if the mall is good people will come irrespective of location. If you as a customer are looking for a wide variety of brands across various price points in any category and there is such a place where you can find them all together, you would come irrespective of where you stay or work.

What are some of the challenges you’ve faced when it comes to setting up shop in the city? How did you overcome them?
As developers we have projects across 18 locations across India and have become fairly adept in localising ourselves to the needs of the city — we took into account the traffic situation in Bangalore and designed a mall with 1/2-km internal driveway so that the traffic congestion is avoided. We have also given large outdoor areas with F&B outlets so that the great weather of Bangalore can be experienced.