Founded in 1976 by Michel Leclerq, France-based sporting goods retailer Decathlon offers sports apparel and equipment for men, women and kids across various segments, including outdoor, water, fitness, racket, team, cycling, running, walking, roller, and target sports. The global sporting goods company entered India in 2009 as a cash-and-carry retailer and was approved for single-brand retail in 2013. It opened its first store in India in 2009 at Sarjapur in Bengaluru and now it has more than 103 stores across the country and over 1,600 across the globe (as of August 2022).
Later in 2022, Decathlon became the sports partner of Kolkata Thunderbolts for the 2022 season of the Prime Volleyball League.
In keeping with the single-brand foreign direct investment compliances, Decathlon sources 60% of its inventory from the country itself, also supporting the 'Make in India' initiative.
"In case of textile-based products, it is over 70%," Deepak D'Souza, country production director, Decathlon India said in a 2022 media interview.
He added that 35 of its vendors (apparel manufacturers) across India had a workforce of more than 60,000.
"Most of our suppliers and our teams are engaged in capacity management, efficiency/quality improvements, continuous improvements, and advanced manufacturing while implementing best practices that could be benchmarked to the global standards," D'Souza added.
With growth comes challenges and the same happened with Decathlon India. Its growing popularity as the go-to destination for sports related shopping resulted in long queues at the check-out counters, which was frustrating to consumers. It was driving away customers, resulting in loss for the company.
Decathlon Sports India turned to technology to address the issue and regain customers.
Here's how...
The Challenge
This story is from the February 2024 edition of Business Of Fashion.
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