‘There is no better product that gives you value for money than a pair of jeans’
Sanjay Vakharia is the CEO of Spykar Lifestyle Private Ltd. He has been associated with Spykar since its inception in 1992. Vakharia has been primarily responsible for the brand image that Spykar enjoys today. His sharp business acumen saw him rise from the position of Manager Marketing to Marketing Director. He is responsible for the overall Marketing and Brand Communication strategies of Spykar. Prior to joining Spykar, he worked with Magna Publications as the Export Manager (Garments) wherein he was responsible for setting up the marketing network in the US and UK markets.
Interview
It all started in 1992, so the whole journey actually dates back 30 years. We had very humble beginnings; the idea of launching a brand at that point of time was to serve the consumer we saw in ourselves. We wanted to begin by selling a pair of jeans that was interestingly fashioned and not widely available in the market. Essentially, it was something that would interest the youth of the time because we wanted to bring forth to consumers a much younger product than was available in the market. Back then denims were more a commodity, not looked at as a ‘lifestyle’ statement. It was just one more piece of clothing! But that’s where we were different. We wanted to give the Indian consumer a product that was made in India and matched the sensibilities of the country’s youth. Staying focused on our parameters of wanting to serve a young audience and their fashion needs, all within the denim space, is the reason why we are what we are today.
What this essentially did was that the trader, who happened to be the first line of consumers, started looking at Spykar as a serious contender if somebody wanted to serve the Indian youth. And if somebody wanted to serve their fashion needs then it probably became the only contender. If they wanted to do a classic pair of jeans, they may have had a few alternatives, but for a fashion denim Spykar was the only alternative. So, in a lot of ways, these two pillars allowed us to create the positioning for the brand that Spykar is today.
I would say there are 1,000 or more entry barriers to get into the category that we serve. We are now nearly 60 seasons old and I haven’t seen too much competition come in; whoever has come in has withered away. The product that we have has a huge amount of workmanship, a lot of detailing, a lot of love and passion that is built in, passion especially for the whole category of denims. And it’s very difficult for people to replicate this; if it’s just one more business proposition, it’s very difficult to sustain the same passion. You need to be as passionate as we are to do what we are doing because that has given us a unique position in the country as well as a clearly segmented consumer base.
The young and restless generation constitutes our customer base. Our collections and brand essence revolves around the needs for he country’s youth.
From the perspective of how we look at consumers, we have a different audience that we look at from a marketing perspective and there’s a separate audience that we look to serve. What we were to a young audience in the 15 to 25 year age group, those products, those styles and those categories still exist with us. But we have expanded our lines to also serve people who are moving away from that age group to the 30-40 year age bracket. In fact, there are consumers who entered the brand and have grown older and more mature, and they would love to stay with the brand.
What is constant is the level of fashion that we do for those products. So, yes, from that perspective, we have broadened the whole product offering but from a communication perspective, it’s still narrowly focused on an audience that is much younger, is more of a fashion seeker, more experimental and wants to try out new things – that’s the audience that we cater to. There is a large product line that Spykar has been doing which also speaks to the same audience.
The fact that we are now operating out of malls and places where families congregate allows consumers of different ages to enter the store. We do not want to say no to them, hence, there is always a range that may meet their sensibilities but is not really spoken about. So, from that perspective, our audience has widened from the 15 to 25 age group to the 30-40 age bracket.
Pastels play a crucial role during the transition period for Spykar. The fresh, vibrant colours this summer are inspired by wild nature and beaches. The pastel bright and light breezy fabrics lend a relaxed vibe to the season with playful all-over and various size placement prints. Layer checks in pastels over printed tees and shorts for a beach ready look.
Easy volume t-shirts in light and mid weight fabrics provide versatile smart casual fashion. Easy-fit tank tops are one of the key products this season. Graphics on pastel grounds are designed for perfect beach holidays this high-summer.
The spring-summer is retro and 80s inspired. Fabric plays a very crucial role as the styling gets minimal this season. Along with textures and different kinds of structured weaves, yarn dyed checks are also one of the major key trends. Washes like Ice wash, bleached blue wash, ombrés add fluidity and summer lightness to the SS21 collection. This season denim takes indigo to a whole new level through a gamut of washes and techniques A portion of trend.
Checks are a summer staple and are perfect for colour blocking and adding patterns to your outfit. Types of checks this season include window pane, tartans, micro, gingham and buffalo checks. This summer has bright and deep colours in lightweight summer fabrics. Indigo is one of the core colours for the season. The spring summer Spykar collection looks like a good mix of bright and light shades . The pallet consists of various shades of red, blue, green and shades of tangerines. Khaki, brown and olives adds to the earthy shades.
I think, as consumers, we are very harsh on Indian brands; it runs in our system. I would say that for myself, too; as a consumer of a different product category, I have not been as benevolent to an Indian brand in that product category. But, we understood and acknowledged this a long time back. We knew that being an Indian brand it was going to be all the more difficult for us to charge a higher price for our product, to escape with a lesser margin to a retailer. And so we aligned ourselves with this handicap of ours; the only way we could mitigate this was by putting a lot more into the product. So, if you see a Spykar product, you will see that we have built more value into the product compared to what we’re charging for it. It’s a situation where I have to offer something more to the consumer so that he buys my product instead of those one or two international denim brands. That has been the way we brought up our business.
Our business ethics have always been at the forefront, they have always been transparent and honest, and that has earned us immense amount of goodwill from the trade. We all understand that 50% of our business’ solutions lie in the relationship that we have with the trade, and the trade is strongly behind the brand Spykar because they see us as honest and sincere business people who are very passionate about the brand. It’s not very easy to do fashion for 30 years consistently and not falter; we must have faltered but we could overcome that and come back stronger the next season.
On the consumer side a dramatic change has happened in terms of how Indians look at Indians now. It’s not what it used to be 10 years ago. I feel that IT as a sector, the government and a lot of other good that has happened in the country has given India a sense of self esteem. Our problem was more in the way we looked at ourselves than how others looked at us. This now allows Indian people to accept Indian brands more wholesomely than before. We are also gaining from this change in attitude of Indian consumers. As a brand that is from India, we are coming out of our shadows. We used to keep the consumer second guessing as to where we were from; we used international locales, our product was very classy and upmarket for an Indian brand. Nowhere did we say that we are not Indian or that we are Indian; we kept it ambiguous. But, we did a fine job that led people to believe it was a good brand. We have now come out into the open and said that we are Indian because now Indians respect Indians. Today, it is that point of time in our lives where it is just great to be an Indian and the consumers are rewarding us for doing a great job.
The last couple of years, even the COVID years, have been good for us. Whatever we’ve done, whether it’s expanding the product categories or getting into new geographies, have all worked in our favour and consumers have accepted us wholeheartedly.
It has been a very interesting journey for us. What is important is that we have not been too focused on the destination at any given time; every single day has been extremely enjoyable. Today, we may be one of the largest Indian denim brands that the country has. And when I speak about being the largest Indian brand, it’s a brand that has been made in India and serves Indians by and large.
Today, we are very widely available; our stores are in 150+ towns. We serve consumers through our distribution channel through nearly 500+ towns. And there are lakhs of pin codes that we serve through e-commerce. The brand and the product don’t change for anybody and we have kept that constant for the entire country. We believe that if you’re doing a product which has consumers out there, they will come seeking you. And that is something that has happened for Spykar. We have operated across the length and breadth of the country successfully. It’s been an amazing journey till now; obviously, there have been ups and downs but by far, it’s been a very interesting journey.
Keeping in mind the current situation we fund ourselves in, we had expanded our line quite elaborately into home wear or lounge wear. we also launched our innerwear line "underjeans" we aim to grow these segments in the current year as well. besides this, spykar.com is also growing. more and more emphasis is going to make brand.com grow.
The Online Retail business has definitely boomed a lot in the last couple of years for us. we have grown 4X to 5X times on a year on year basis. The changes in technology and growth which was forecasted in the next 5 years have happened in the last 1 year. Since Spykar has always been at forefront in adaptation to technology & partnerships, Online retails business has sustained the current scenario and grown in this time.
There have been a few cycles where denims went out of demand and were replaced by cargo pants, chinos, etc. In the recent past, too, they lost their importance to the emergence of athleisure. But, I think India is a very value-centric market in that sense and there is no better product that gives you value for money than a pair of jeans. You will only dump it if you want to dump it; it’s not going to die its own death. From that perspective, it’s the best friend that a person can have.
So, denim wear may have seen a blip but it has come back to normal. Athleisure, too, has become a stable piece of wardrobe that everybody has. E-commerce, when it entered the space, was pitted against the offline channel for some time but today the two co-exist and e-commerce has become one more way of reaching your consumer whether to deliver something to them or allow them to discover something. In the same manner, athleisure and denim will co-exist.
- Denims are produced in Govt approved facility which is in industrial area provided by government. it is arid land and was not used for agriculture.
- Less water washes. Low MLR: very low material to liquid ratio being used.
- use of laser machines, ozone wash technology and cloud wash being used actively.
- No fossil fuel and wood used in the facility.
- 4 IR-dryers being used in the factory , which uses only electricity. Solar power is used in the factory.
- There is no use of pumic stone while washing, hence we are not disturbing the pumic belt anywhere in the world.
- Zero liquid Discharge: there is a fully functional water treatment plant. there is no discharge of polluted water to any natural water source. the water is re-treated/ purified and re-used for washing.
The fact is that the product is totally a comfort clothing. The nature of times led the growth. Casual wear become the only preferred clothing, as no one was stepping out socialising was at its minimum and vanity had vaned in favour of safety.
