Comprehensive retail offerings

Retailer: The brand Total is a concept. What’s unique about it? 

Dinesh Malpani (DM): Total epitomises a community centre that combines value retail format in a mall. It houses brands, food operators and services. The brands include every category, from a hyper market to small format. In the food category we have fine dining as well as QSRs (Quick Service Restaurants).  Services include salon, ATM, currency exchange and car washing centres.

The USP of Total, which in average occupies an area of 1.8 -2 lakh sq ft, is its comprehensive assortment that is planned according to the demands of the catchment area.

Retailer: How do you ensure that the retail environment you create makes shopping a fun experience? What sort of initiatives you take to increase footfalls?

DM: Customers’ convenience is always under our consideration. Our food offerings include regional cuisines as simple as dal, rice and chapatti, which are as good as any home-made food. So a woman visiting Total can pamper herself in a salon, while her car gets washed. She buys food before leaving, picks up her kid from the school and heads back to home. Total relieves her from the hassle of cooking back home. Such is our holistic services.  Total has 40-50 per cent more shopping units than any other shopping destinations.  Total is the only shopping destination that operates till 12’0 clock in the midnight.

Retailer: How do you strategise your promotional activities? Do you organise any special events?

DM: Total is widely advertised in the print media. In fact we’re the largest advertiser in the print media in Bangalore. We advertise in national news papers as well as in all the well-known regional news papers. 

Retailer:  Tell us something about your operational and undergoing projects?

DM: We have been here in the market for the last three years and presently have four Total community centres in Bangalore. They cater to 9-10 lakh customers in a month. In another 5 years we would like to see ourselves present in other localities in Karnataka apart from Bangalore, and also in other south Indian states like Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala. We’ll soon start our new projects which we’ll announce formally in the end of September.

Retailer: How do you plan your tenant mix?  What is your strategy to retain them? How do you ensure seamless operation of Total?

DM: We select the tenants that make relevance to the catchment. 20-25 per cent of the space allotted for the food operators, 10 per cent for the services and balance area is for the brands. Tenants are provided with all sorts of facilities. We have revenue sharing contracts with 15-20 per cent of our tenants.  Besides their own promotional strategy, we conduct lots of promotions for them. We celebrate festivals of India and our anniversary. Every month we allot gifts of Rs 10 lakh and conduct lucky draw. The plan for CSR (Corporate Social Responsibilities) is on the anvil.

The management of Total is done in-house. We take care of security and house keeping.  Being a retailer we’re expert in this field.