During FY17, The company's revenue increased by 24 per cent to Rs 1001.72 crore, EBITDA by 33 per cent to Rs 82.58 crore and PAT by 43 per cent to Rs 39.53 crore, YoY.

The company now runs 143 stores under the V-Mart brand across Delhi, UP, Uttarakhand, Haryana, Rajasthan, Punjab, Bihar, Jharkhand, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, West Bengal and J&K.

Lalit Agarwal, CMD, V-Mart Retail Ltd, contributed to the company's growth in 2016-17 to greater focus on customers' expectations, increase the same store sales growth to 13 per cent YoY, opening of 21 new stores during the year, the smart ATM initiative launched by the company to help customers get cash from V-Mart stores during demonetisation which helped gain significant new customers for the company and gaining operating efficiencies through automation in supply chain.

"Focus on customers' expectations, technology adoption and store expansion have been key to our high performance," said Agarwal.

For 2017-18, the company aims to further seek improvements in per square feet sales, opening of new stores, launching of new collections for festivities, target marketing for the key customer segments in rural and urban areas and improving fashion offerings at even better price points as company’s key drivers for growth.

V-Mart would strongly focus on enhancing customer shopping experience in FY18, making it a distinguishing factor. The company's newly launched customer loyalty program – Value Club is further being expanded to offer significantly better value to the customer base.

The company feels that the upcoming changes in trade laws around GST are an area of concern and may prove to be inflationary to the value conscious customers in the transition phase. However, the company is confident of the move to the new tax regime and it hopes that this should boost the economy and better the confidence level amongst the business and consumers alike thereby increasing consumption. (KD)

Fibre2Fashion News Desk – India