As the retailing sector in different business segments is taking baby steps in India, it is heartening to see how traditional and regional retailers have understood the efficiency of visual media and taken efforts to get the maximum mileage out of it. Pothys is a good example of such a retailer.
Accordingly, the store was changed to give a feel of walking into a busy fair. The idea was basically to pamper the shopper with a lot of simple yet different freebies. Shoppers who stepped in were greeted with flowers and sweets. “The idea was to let the shopper have some fun, and the word-of-mouth impact the event generated was remarkable. Such ideas eventually become widely practiced once the response levels get noticed. We are doing it for the second time urged by the success of a similar event last year.”
Ramesh, MD, Pothys, said: “We have a floor area of 30,000 sq ft and so do most retail houses in Panagal Park. We always concentrate to pull the crowd into our showroom after which our service will convert the footfalls into buys. The events were one such communication tool that enabled us to increase the footfalls. On a normal day we have an average footfall of 8,000 and on festive seasons about 15,000. About 80% of this gets converted into buys. The event contributed to about 50% increase in footfalls and 20-25% increase in buys.” We wanted to make shopping a relaxing and fun-filled experience for customers. Shopping is usually a serious business for most people as they are anxious to buy the best without straining their purses. Hence, purchasing clothes for Deepavali, Pongal, Christmas and special occasions is invariably a tiresome and worrisome affair.
Pothys, has continuously evolved creative concepts that have attracted many shoppers attention. We are conducting many in-store events for people to enjoy their shopping in Pothys, the events like Go Green, Aadi special offer, ‘April-May Dhool’, because generally summer is a season of average sales.
Pothys Wishing You All Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
How does Pothys bring in innovation during festive seasons, when every other retailer would be advertising? “We created a mascot to announce that we would be giving away free gifts for purchases during the festive season. Now Christmas rolled in, we made some changes to the outfit of the mascot and made him a Santa who retained the look of our original mascot. The mascot was a big hit and was responsible for strong brand recall.”
The primary mode of advertising for the group is television and outdoors. A television commercial used different ethnic colours and imagery to bring in the connect between silks and the different stages in a wedding.
Established in 1930 to sell loom-woven cotton sarees and other attires, Pothys has now evolved as a strong regional retail player in silks and family wear. It has a six-storied showroom in Chennai and bears the tagline 'Aalayam of Silks’. Pothys also has retail showrooms in Srivilliputtur, Madurai, Tirunelveli, Coimbatore and Thiruvananthapuram.