With an emphasis on openings in Bangalore, Delhi, and Mumbai, Lululemon Athletica, a designer, distributor, and retailer of athletic apparel, footwear, and accessories, intends to independently join the Indian market. The brand, well-known for its yoga pants, hopes to capitalise on the nation’s expanding need for athletic and fitness apparel.
A global team of Lululemon was reportedly in India recently to scout for locations where it could open stores, said people familiar with the matter. “They will most likely enter on their own and are not keen on partnerships with Indian companies,” one of the officials said.
The Canadian company used data science, machine learning, and full-stack cloud engineering to support merchandising planning and product and location information management when it built its first IT hub outside of North America in Bengaluru three years ago.
The company operates in more than 25 countries, and its 2023 annual report states that it had substantial net sales growth in all of those regions—12 per cent in the Americas, 67 per cent in China Mainland, and 43 per cent in the rest of the world.
Last year, it added 56 new company-operated stores, increasing square footage by 15 per cent. At the same time, net sales from company-operated stores climbed by 21 per cent overall and by 17 per cent in e-commerce. India, home to 1.4 billion people, is among the biggest and fastest-growing marketplaces for businesses.
