Nitin Chordia is a retail consultant based in Chennai, India with 13 years of experience in retail in India and other countries. He has a master's degree in retail management from the University of Surrey. He has helped many companies establish retail businesses in India through tasks like market research, business planning, and category management. However, in his view the Indian gourmet retail market currently underserves consumers due to a lack of differentiation, education, and availability of brands. Both retailers and importers focus more on their own needs than consumers. Global brands have also not treated India as a priority market. He believes 2014 will be a breakthrough year where retailers, brands, and consumers will all benefit from improvements and new developments

1. +
L Nitin Chordia

2. +
My Introduction
 L Nitin Chordia is a Retail Business Sparring Partner / Consultant based out of
Chennai, India
 13 years of experience in the Retail Industry in India and US/UK geographies
 Nitin has earned a M.Sc Retail Management degree from University of Surrey,
UK and is currently pursuing the Certified Professional Strategic Advisor
(CPSA) with the Category Management Association, USA
 Lead the implementation of India’s 1st Gourmet Food store chain
 Responsibilities included: Evaluation, Selection, Negotiation, Global Sourcing, Imports,
Supply Chain, Category Management, Merchandising and Planogramming of Global
Gourmet Food Products/Brands
 Associated with Kurt Salmon Associates, (KSA Technopak, India) and
Cognizant Business Consulting in the past helping their clients establish retail
businesses and solve complex retail business problems - more recently using
technology

3. +
My Background
 Worked as Sparring partner for a large German Food brand in India
 Has been invited to the UK by DEFRA, Foods from Britain twice to represent
the Indian Market opportunity to UK Food/Beverage Brands
 Has assisted numerous global Gourmet brands understand the Indian Market
Opportunity and set expectations with them of the Indian Market
 Has extensive experience in building Retail Business Plans, P&L, Cash Flow
statements, 5 year forecast along with Format/Category Definition,
Merchandising and Store site selection
 Has helped many Gourmet Food brands establish successful collaborations
with Indian Importers/Distributors and has deep insights into their strengths &
weaknesses

4. +
My Background (cont…)
 Extensive experience in Market Research/Analysis and Pricing Calculations
/Benchmarking for Imported Gourmet Foods in India
 Deep understanding of purchase habits of the Indian Gourmet Consumer
 In-depth knowledge of import policies for food products into India
 Exhaustive experience in the Brand Positioning, Competitive Positioning,
Category Management, Merchandising planning and Product Introductions
process of retailers
 Extensive experience in Retail Operations and authoring Standard Operating
Procedures (SPOP’s)
 Advised very large retail store chains (in excess of 7000 stores) with their Point
of Sale, Electronic Signage, Omnichannel, eCommerce, Mobile Commerce and
Social Media Strategy (No ERP Exposure)

5. +
Indian Gourmet Retailing Structure
Consumer
Importers
Retailer Brands
Legislation
Industry

6. + My Observations (the current state of the
‘Poor’ Indian Gourmet Retail Consumer)
 The aspiring Indian Gourmet Consumer stands underexposed to a well
deserved ‘true’ and differentiated Gourmet Retail experience and many
relevant gourmet brands.
 In fact, many regular grocery brands are wrongly positioned as gourmet brands and
many brands do not give the consumers a reason to buy! There is no clear
understanding of the consumers segmentation (or micro segments) and what is more
prominent is the lack of education while shopping. The consumer has not yet even
decided his loyalties, hence, is influenced with each undifferentiated new format
introduction/product in the market.
 The Indian Gourmet Retailer has NOT been able to differentiate, Offer the right
products, Apply a Category Management Approach to their offering, Educate
the consumer, provide the right retail experience to the Consumer AND the
right retail platform for the brand to introduce their products to consumers
 Even at this nascent stage, retailers are already under margin pressures and are forced
to rethink their gourmet offering and are tempted to dilute it to cover more masses.
Increased dependence on importers (and their intuition) further limit their upside.
Retailers are required to focus on their own needs (P&L, Break evens etc) rather than
the needs of the Consumer and Brands leading to an easily duplicable and
undifferentiated consumer experience and business model.
Copyrights L Nitin Chordia, 2013 – Cannot be reproduced without Permission

7. + My Observations (the current state of the
‘Poor’ Indian Gourmet Retail Consumer)
 Many global Gourmet Brands have not seriously invested into / focused on the
Indian market and do not treat India as an export ‘destination’ and priority
market yet
 Some brands have had past experiences where they were not easily able to understand
the Indian climate/consumer. This lack of involvement and lack of support to the trade
in India, in spite of the India growth story being widely publicized, results in the lack of
availability and education to the Indian consumer.
 India is one of the few growing economies where the Importers of gourmet
brands are also the brand representatives and many have all along been hitting
and missing with product introductions. They face the regular challenge of the
product being available via alternate channels and regulations are becoming
more intense.
 Many importers assemble a container load of products and ship the consignment, NOT
with the intention to import the brand again. On the other other hand, importers have
also given up exclusive distribution of brands after investing many years into developing
the brand in the Indian market BUT not meeting with the desired success. Importers
struggle with the lack of knowledge of the consumption/shopping behavior of the end
consumer and are required to focus their energies to satisfy the trade rather than
thinking of the end consumer. Further, Importers have not been successful in
communicating the brand promise & story to the end consumer.
Copyrights L Nitin Chordia, 2013 – Cannot be reproduced without Permission

8. + My Observations (the current state of the
‘Poor’ Indian Gourmet Retail Consumer)
 Most recent changes in food Legislation also impacts the imports of food
products for the Gourmet industry making it increasingly challenging. It
increases the time taken for the introduction of a new product and is prohibitive
to product trials.
 This has a negative impact on sustainable availability of gourmet products in the market.
The consumer choice and adoption suffers as a result.
 While the gourmet retailing Industry is just entering its growth stage, the online
channel is already a disrupting threat to the industry with easier reach to end
consumers, easier shopping and better prices. Loyalty does not exist. Period.
The industry has not yet started addressing sustainability and social sourcing at
the large scale.
 Retailers have NOT been able to match their own offline experience with their online
experience (hence letting other pure online players establish quite easily). Many
products sold at retailers are are available online quite easily. The industry has not been
able to completely enforce the retailers to implant the social or community differentiation
in their offering with focus on sustainability and the environment. The consumer is not
entitled to a omni-channel retail experience.
Copyrights L Nitin Chordia, 2013 – Cannot be reproduced without Permission

9. + My Belief
 2014 will be the defining year for Gourmet Retailing in India.
 Global Gourmet brands will start looking at India as a more serious investment market
 Retailers will start investing efforts towards improving their supply chain, sourcing, Loyalty
Program, Instore Experience, Implementing a category management approach towards
merchandising and feedback mechanism to further their understanding of shopper
behavior and increase collaboration with brands directly to build their understanding of
categories.
 Retailers would invest seriously into their private label and omni channel program in order
to sustain/increase their margins and differentiate from competition
 Existing retailers would look at consolidating stores in current markets and actively look at
newer untapped markets to expand. Retailers will focus on increasing profits/productivity
per sqft rather than focus on sales per sqft.
 The gourmet food retailing scene will attract more interest from international
brands/retailers (based on relaxation of FDI rules in multibrand retail as of 2nd August
2013) and considering that the Indian retailers have not managed to create too many entry
barriers, the consumer could benefit from some very interesting developments and fast
paced activity in the Gourmet Retailing space in 2014.
Copyrights L Nitin Chordia, 2013 – Cannot be reproduced without Permission

10. +
Thank You!
Making Collaboration Work!
nitin.chordia@gmail.com
+91 96000 NITIN (64846)
http://in.linkedin.com/in/sparringpartner