Welspun to push innovation, own textile brands;eyes $2.5 bn sales

Mumbai: Welspun India, the largest supplier of home textiles in the US and also the world's third largest manufacturer of such items, is targeting USD 2.5 billion revenues by 2020, up 150 percent from present sales, by increasing sale of its own brands and innovative products.

The city-based Welspun India, which enjoys 5 percent of USD 17-billion US home textiles market making it the single largest player in the world's largest home textile market, nets one-third or USD 1 billion of its USD 3 billion group revenue from the textiles business now.

Welspun expects the US to continue to be its largest market from where it nets over 65 percent of its sales now, as it plans to increase its focus there by introducing more innovative products as well as shifting focus to own brands.

"Over the years, we've been successful in changing the contours of the US home textiles market with our innovative products and added customer focus. When we entered the US, Indian companies were fringe players, way behind Chinese companies. But that no longer is the case.

"Today, Indian companies together dominate the US market with 11 percent of total USD 17 billion home textiles market," Dipali Goenka, Welspun Global Brands managing director, told PTI in an interaction at its US headquarters in downtown New York during the recent MarketWeek.

The 46-year-old Harvard-educated Goenka further said, "As we increase our focus in the US market, with a direct online presence with an e-commerce portal, we have set a revenue target of USD 2.5 billion by the turn of the decade from USD 1 billion last fiscal.

"We also expect 25 percent of sales to come from Welspun-branded products by then, which is only around 11 percent now."

Accordingly, Welspun will begin selling all its current products-- terry and bath towels, beddings, rugs and branded and non-branded hospitality items and other utility textiles-under its own labels. Currently almost all its products are sold to retailers like Walmart, JC Penny and Macy's, who brand them as their own.

On innovation, Goenka said around 31 percent sales come from innovative, patented products like HyGro cotton, and though its sells in 50 countries, all its manufacturing is based at its two Gujarat plants at Anjar and Vapi.

The company aims this to net 40 percent sales to from innovative products by 2020,she said, adding it has 12 patents pending with US authorities.