KOLKATA: Bharti Retail, the
wholly-owned retail arm of Sunil Mittal’s Bharti Enterprises, is planning
to shore up revenue from private labels at its stores to match the global
industry benchmark.

While private labels now account for about 16
per cent of revenue, the company plans to ramp this up to near 40 per cent over
the next three years. This was indicated by Bharti Enterprises vice-chairman
& managing director Rajan Bharti Mittal.

He was talking to
reporters on the sidelines of a Ficci meeting in Kolkata on Friday. Iconic US
retailer Wal-Mart Stores—Bharti Retail’s JV partner for the cash
& carry venture—is also exploring opportunities to source and sell
Bharti’s private label brands across Wal-Mart retail outlets globally.

Incidentally, Bharti Retail has already introduced two of
Wal-Mart’s top-selling private labels, George (apparel) and Great Value
(staples), in its stores.

Bharti Retail operates some 70 outlets
across two formats—neighbourhood stores called ‘Easyday’ and
compact hypermarket outlets called “Easyday Market’. The joint
venture—Bharti Wal-Mart Pvt Ltd—runs a wholesale cash and carry
outlet, ‘Best Price Modern Wholesale’, at Amritsar.

Mr
Mittal said all private labels sold in Easyday stores and Best Price Modern
Wholesale is sourced out of India.

“As we develop our retail
business and partnership with Wal-Mart, there are opportunities to increase the
number of Wal-Mart private labels in our stores and sell some of our private
labels to Wal-Mart for their global operations. We are looking at such
cross-pollination of business,” he said.

Mr Mittal said
Wal-Mart sources products from India worth nearly $1 billion for its global
operations. “However, more than 90 per cent of the products which will be
sold through the Best Price Modern Wholesale outlets will be sourced from
India,” he said.

Bharti Retail is also in track with its
expansion plans to set up 200 Easyday stores by December 2010. Next year, it
plans to roll out stores in Rajasthan, the National Capital Region, Uttar
Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh.

“We plan to enter expand into
either south or west India in 2010 in line with our plan to generate Rs
1,000-crore revenue from the retail business by fiscal 2011,” said Mr
Mittal.