Conceptualised with the idea of offering Sone Ki Chidiya stickers to the customers with one time shopping worth Rs 1,000, Kishore Biyani-led Future Group seems quite happy with the customers' response and the sales growth the brand is experiencing due to its ongoing countrywide retail show 'The Great Indian Shopping Festival'.

Meanwhile, underneath the much discussed sales figures, the company sees the festival as also contributing towards generating popularity of the brand – especially for the stand--alone and comparatively smaller format stores.

“One good thing for us is that our smaller format stores and stand-alone concepts are receiving greater benefits out of the festival; something which is tough to achieve on their own,” said Damodar Mall, group customer director, Future Group.

Elaborating further, Mall added, “Across the board, we have been getting immense response from the customers and during the last 10 days, over a lakh people have got their passbook and have been using the concept – the concept Future Group has exclusively launched for the festival.”

Speaking about the sales growth during the last 10 days, Mall said, “Our growth, during the last 10-15 days, has seen much higher rate than our usual growth rate over the years. We expect further growth as we are approaching towards longer week-ends due to festivities like Christmas and New Year.”

When asked specifically about the growth of its apparel and lifestyle retail chain Pantaloons, Mall said, “Pantaloons is growing at 15-20 per cent higher over the last year growth. In this particular season, the rate is much higher than the usual average.”

However, he did not disclose details of the sales figures but said: “We will share the details only when the festival is over.”

The Great Indian Shopping Festival is running across almost all Future Group stores including Big Bazaar, Food Bazaar, Pantaloons, Central, HomeTown, eZone, Depot, LootMart, Brand Factory, Scullers, Urbana, Indigo Nation, One Mobile, Staples, Etam, Lee Cooper Sports Bar, Copper Chimney and F123.

— Sarimul Islam Choudhury