Brightly-lit and splashed in day-glo colors, new supermarkets sprout each month in India's capital in a sign of rapid economic change that appears to be leading shoppers to shun small, traditional and family-run shops.
By the time New Delhi hosts the 2010 Commonwealth Games, a retail consultancy estimates, there will be one supermarket every kilometer in the sprawling city of 14 million -- compared to about five supermarkets in 2004.
Kriti Pallav, a married working woman, said she switched from her local grocer to the new Big Apple supermarket chain because the outlets were air-conditioned and open until late.
PHOTO: AFP
"This shopping experience is new and welcome. I don't have to haggle for prices here as I have to with the local vendor. The quality is good and overall there is great hygiene in the store," she said as she waited to pay through a computerized system.
Big Apple, owned by Express Retail Services, has opened 22 outlets in New Delhi in the past two years and says it plans a five-fold increase by the end of this year, offering everything from groceries to cosmetics.
"We have 22 operational stores in Delhi at the moment but plan to open 100 outlets this year for which we have earmarked an investment of around 1 billion rupees [US$25 million]," Express Retail managing director Munish Hemrajani said.
The trend is not confined to New Delhi.
The retail consulting and research agency KSA-Technopak predicted in a report last month that by 2010 annual retail sales by chain stores will reach US$21.5 billion, from US$7.5 billion now.
But there are also pockets of unhappiness about the impact that the advent of modern supermarket shopping is having on traditional shopping habits.
Earlier this month, thousands of irate street vendors attacked stores set up by Indian giant Reliance Industries in eastern India, saying the new nationwide chain threatened their livelihoods.
Some 5,000 vegetable sellers vandalized three Reliance Fresh stores in Ranchi in the first violence against the firm's plans to build a local version of US retail giant Wal-Mart, police said.
In nearby Marxist-ruled West Bengal a powerful communist leader last week threatened similar protests against Reliance.
The small stores are facing an aggressive push by newer stores like Big Apple to cut them out by buying directly from farmers.
Companies such as Reliance have the advantage of being able to negotiate bulk deals and then offer low prices to lure people away from the small shops as, Hemrajani said, bargains were the only way to break the public's affinity for the estimated 15 million small retailers in New Delhi.
Extended hours for stores like Big Apple are hard for family-run shops, he said, adding that 7am to 11pm opening hours meant that "more than 50 percent of our daily sales" take place after smaller outlets had closed.
US-based Wal-Mart is expected to open mega stores in India by the middle of next year after reaching a deal with India's Bharti group.
Bharti, the country's largest publicly-listed phone company, has a wholly owned front-end retailing venture, Bharti Retail that plans to spend US$2.5 billion by 2015 to set up hypermarkets, supermarkets and other stores across India.
French retail giant Carrefour has put on hold plans to invest in India due to concerns over political opposition to multinational retailers entering the market. The world's second-largest retailer, Carrefour wants to see how Wal-Mart fares before it steps in.
India does not allow foreign direct investment in the retail sector except for single-brand stores, so foreign companies must sign franchise deals with local companies to gain access.
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