Apparel Online Bangladesh Magazine November Issue 2018 | Page 19

BUYER BLOG
AOB: What is Bangladesh’s share
in Reliance’s total sourcing?
Mohit: Bangladesh’s share is not
very significant as yet, standing only
at around 15 per cent. Of late the
currency fluctuation with respect to
dollar and the new minimum wage
to be implemented from December
have posed some challenges for us.
However, once the dollar stabilises,
things are bound to improve.
Bangladesh, as a sourcing hub,
is very important for us, as India
cannot match it in terms of volumes.
Besides being duty-free, Bangladesh
has a distinct advantage over other
countries in exporting apparels
made from fabrics, sourced from
overseas. From the manufacturers’
standpoint, there’s that added
advantage of financial incentive from
the Government while catering to a
non-conventional country like India,
as well.
AOB: Which are the main products
that you source from here?
Mohit: The three principal categories
would be shirts, denims and fashion
knits. Most of the items that we
source are fashion-based. Recently, we
have added kurtis in the ethnic section
in womenswear, to source
from Bangladesh.
AOB: What are the key parameters
for Reliance Trends while selecting
a vendor?
Mohit: First and foremost has to be
commitment! Considering our sales
volume, we cannot afford to have
any delays. Once someone starts
working with us, they get attuned
to the timelines. The second most
important factor for us is a vendor’s
financial standing. In Bangladesh, we
face problems related to the same due
to several reasons like existing bank
loans, LCs getting stuck, etc. We are
thus working with a few agencies, in
line with that in India, to come up with
the credit report of the vendors.
The third vital aspect is capacities;
we are not very keen on working with
vendors with less than 600 machines.
We expect that Reliance Trends’
orders should be around 30-40 per
cent of their total capacity with a 20
per cent buffer so that if there’s any
marginal increase in orders, they need
not look for sub-contractors.
As far as compliance is concerned, I
think factors like financial stability,
capacities and the like come up
only when someone is compliant
because otherwise you would not get
orders from global buyers here in
Bangladesh. So despite no hard and
fast rules in terms of compliance, we
as a principle look for the same, which
we are able to gauge to a large extent
from the factors that I have already
mentioned.
AOB: Do you have any design
development set-up here?
Mohit: No, we have our design studio
in London and a design team is in
Bangalore. Tech packs come from
them to the buying teams, which is
then routed to the sourcing teams
like us to procure the orders. Even
though we have our design and
development team, we are always
open to new developments from our
partner factories, especially the
bigger players, which I feel add
value to mutual relationship and
business growth.
AOB: A lot of suppliers in
Bangladesh still seem to have
reservations in terms of prices,
volumes and payments while
working with Indian brands/
retailers. What is your opinion on
these issues?
Mohit: I think the unfortunate
incident involving Liliput has a lot to
do with this mindset. Liliput, however,
is not an exception; there have been
buyers from USA and Europe too
who have done the same. Things are
now changing for sure, more and
more suppliers are gaining back their
confidence in Indian buyers. With
many big names in India sourcing
from Bangladesh, payment issues
and other things are getting
streamlined as well.
To give you an example, in last five
years of our operations in Bangladesh,
Reliance Trends has not faltered even
once in payments so far. Given our
reputation, there’s no way we can
default in payments and I am pretty
sure, the same will be the case
with the other established names
from India.
AOB: Is the Indian retail market
professional enough to handle
international sourcing?
Mohit: From the perspective of
Reliance Trends, I would say,
completely. We are very professional
in our approach, operation and
functioning otherwise, it would not be
possible for us to handle such huge
FA C T S H E E T
The e-commerce
side of the business
is perhaps the
most happening
now in India and
more so after
Walmart’s taking
over of Flipkart,
which has added a
new dimension to
the market.
Apart from
Reliance, Future
Group and Max are
doing exceptionally
well in the store
format. Today
all the big names
are sourcing from
Bangladesh, be
it Future Group,
Reliance, Arvind or
Madura. However
none of them have
their offices here
except us.
volumes. Even in India, Reliance is
working with all the big names like
Gokaldas and Shahi Exports. As a
company, we are very system-driven,
we publish the DPR on a daily basis
for our sourcing from India as well
as Bangladesh.
AOB: What are your views on the
overall retail scenario in India?
Mohit: At present, the Indian retail
landscape is very exciting. Even from
Reliance’s perspective, lot many
developments are going on. In the
last couple of years, we have opened
around 510 stores across the country
and by the end of the year, we would
have a total of 1,000 stores. We are
witnessing exponential growth across
formats. Now with markets opening
up in Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities, the
growth is going to be even faster.
With the deep penetration of Reliance
Jio (reaching even the hinterlands of
the country), we are leveraging it to
expand our presence further as we
are the official vendor of Jio.
Last year, we sold 33,000 pieces
of apparels almost every hour and
things are set to go even higher from
here on… The retail sector overall is
simply booming!
The e-commerce side of the business
is perhaps the most happening now
in India and more so after Walmart’s
taking over of Flipkart, which has
added a new dimension to the
market.
Apart from Reliance, Future Group
and Max are doing exceptionally well
in the store format. Today all the big
names are sourcing from Bangladesh,
be it Future Group, Reliance, Arvind
or Madura. However none of them
have their offices here except ours.
AOB: Now that order volumes are
increasing from India, are there
any logistical issue that you would
like to talk about?
Mohit: From our end, we have pretty
much everything in place and on
time but when it comes to land ports
documentation, it is still a very time-
taking process. From inspection
stage to goods reaching our stores,
it takes around 25-30 days, which is
still on the higher side considering
that Bangladesh is a neighbouring
country. I think both the countries
need to work towards improving
the transportation and import/export
processes to wipe out
these bottlenecks.
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