Bata India likely to turn largest market for parent co in 2018

India is likely to become the most important market for Bata Shoe Organisation (BSO) by 2018, a top company official said today.

The Switzerland-based shoe major, the parent company of Bata India, expects India to be number one in terms of turnover, surpassing Italy, by December 31 this year.

"India is the second most important market. But, it is growing so fast that probably it will be the most important market by end of this year in terms of turnover," BSO Director Christine Bata Schmidt said here.

She was in the city for the launch of a CSR programme.

Schmidt said the company's operating board is meeting on March 22 and 23 in Delhi after a gap of just three years despite BSO's presence in 70 countries, a sign of India's importance for the global shoemaker.

Net Sales of Bata India rose 6.2 per cent to Rs 674 crore in the quarter ended December 2017, as against Rs 634.6 crore during the corresponding quarter a year ago.

India had already become BSO's number-one market in terms of number of pairs sold.

Schmidt said the company will focus on the digital platform in the next few years, but will not go for the discounting model to push sales.

Both brick and mortar stores and digital platform will complement each other, she said.

"The interesting thing about digital is that there are some pure digital players in the market. They have been growing incredibly fast. The question is how sustainable is that?

"There are some really interesting studies being done. It shows, digital sales goes up if companies have a store, and it goes down if they close the store. It is because the brand disappears from the consumers' vision," Schmidt said.

Bata India has about 1,200 stores across the country.

Schmidt will tomorrow pay a visit to the country's oldest manufacturing base for Bata India at Batanagar in south 24 Parganas district.

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)