We have a strong belief in the fashion opportunity in India.
With rising per capita income, discretionary spends on multiple categories including fashion have been increasing. High penetration of media, along with globalization of trends, has made fashion one of the fastest growing consumption categories – this is seen across both women’s and men’s wear.
Fashion retail in India has been traditionally driven by prices, however, the mass premium and premium segments, with price points of INR 2,000 and above, have been growing steadily in the top 50mn+ population.
There is a significant opportunity for businesses building in the men’s wear space.
Men’s wear, as a category, comes with several benefits, e.g., high loyalty and stic- kiness, and the “core” nature of SKUs leading to better potential inventory turns. These benefits get further multiplied for bottom wear.
Till now, bottom wear was being treated as an afterthought by brands with incum- bents adding it to complete the offering, rather than focusing and innovating on the category. Fit and Variety are generally compromised, with each brand offering limited SKUs in standard sizes.
Currently, we see three kinds of incumbents in the market playing in this category:
- Legacy Brands – These brands have been around for at least two decades and do not resonate with the new age buyer. They are also offline retail-heavy with little product innovation.
- Global Brands – For these brands, India is not a market for focus yet, and hence fits and styles are dictated by the parent. There are fewer SKUs and price points available.
- New Age D2C Brands – With respect to bottom wear, these brands behave very similar to legacy brands, with bottom wear offerings primarily to complete the collection, leading to lower innovation on the product.
We believe that there is a clear white space to build an apparel brand with a bottom wear-first approach, which provides a wide variety of options (fabrics, target occasions, sizes) under one roof. With comfort as the core proposition, there is an opportunity to build a high customer loyalty and encourage purchase behaviour where people come and buy multiple units once they find their fit (something which we see in the men’s innerwear category).
The Pant Project is addressing this core need of the new-age customers.
Dhruv and Udit (brothers) have capitalized on this opportunity to build a differentiated brand, by providing superior options to customers. With their deep domain expertise in fabric sourcing and garment manufacturing, they have been ahead of the curve in offering innovative and better fabrics. Using their modular manufacturing approach, they are able to provide a wide variety of options to customers while keeping the inventory lean.
Dhruv and Udit are the third generation of the family that owns and runs the Banswara Syntex Group, a leading garment exporter to top global brands (and listed on the BSE).
- Dhruv brings over 10 years of experience in finance as well as garment supply chain, having worked at Banswara Syntex, Gentera and Oliver Wyman. He leads sourcing, operations and finance at the Pant Project
- Udit has spent several years in the fashion domain, studied with leading fashion institutions including Instituto Marangoni; He has also served as the creative director at Banswara Syntex. Udit leads product innovation, marketing and design at the Pant Project.
The founders’ understanding of and response to the customers’ needs are impressive. The range at the Pant Project spans from the most common (but much more comfort- able) black/blue power stretch to specialized SKUs addressing unique needs of the Indian customer, e.g., spill-proof pants for the Mumbai monsoons. At the same time, they are aware of the increasing preference of Indian men to see new styles, and have continued to innovate on styles, e.g., 5-pocket cargo denims (popular in the West), Jeanos (jeans + chinos), etc. Having spent several years working with the top Italian fashion houses, Udit has a strong pulse of the global fashion and what might click for the Indian customer. Together, they have developed an efficient engine to keep launching new products that embody style as well as fabric innovation.
The Pant Project is seeing great customer delight
The Pant Project has achieved excellent traction and a loyal customer base over the last 3 years across online channels – and all this while being largely bootstrapped. They have experimented across channels to build a “core” customer segment that values comfort, variety, and style. At price points that are upwards of INR 2000, the Pant Project has been able to achieve a sticky customer base which purchases as high as 3-4 pieces per order, and comes back within 6 months for a second purchase. The customer delight can be seen in the voice of customer across top e-commerce platforms, highlighting comfort and versatility of the collection.
We are excited to partner with Dhruv and Udit on their journey towards a home-grown Indian brand that stands for comfort and style. With their unparalleled appeal to the new-age customers, we are confident that the Pant Project will occupy a significant share of their minds (and their wardrobes).
To know more about the Pant Project, please visit www.thepantproject.com.
If you are a founder building in the consumer space, please write to mandar@sorininvestments.com and ashima@sorininvestments.com.