Calling Card

Sun, Oct 25 02:24 AM

It's rare that Bollywood can resist Manish Malhotra's gossamer chiffons and risqué cholis. And when he announces that his showstoppers at the HDIL India Couture Week would be sweethearts Saif Ali Khan and Kareena Kapoor acting out a prelude to their own nuptials, it is little wonder that the show is a jam-packed affair. Malhotra's show was not the only instance when Bollywood A-listers thronged the stands or walked the ramp at the just-concluded Couture Week in Mumbai. Director Karan Johar and actor Salman Khan launched their labels, Suzanne Khan, Zayed Khan, Shruti Hassan were among the showstoppers. But amidst all the hoopla, the focus of what is supposed to be a trade event, seemed slightly obscure.

"It's crazy," says Pradeep Hirani of Kimaya, one of the largest domestic buyers, "There's too much going on, and not all of it is good. Visibility does matter, so does glamour, but in the end, it's business, which justifies the purpose. Things are quite chaotic and does not justify the amount being spent to organise them," he sighs.

Hirani has a point. From a fledgling India Fashion Week in 2001, India has now grown to have as many as six fashion weeks — the Wills Lifestyle India Fashion Week (WIFW) and the Van Heusen India Men's Week in Delhi, the Lakme Fashion Week (LFW) and India Couture Week in Mumbai, the Kolkata Fashion Week and the nascent Bangalore Fashion Week. Every year, a contingent of buyers from Anthropologie and Brown, Harrods and Neiman Marcus descend in batches during the major weeks, but the quantum of sales remains pretty average, sometimes up to five looks per fashion week. Most of the business comes in from domestic buyers such as Ensemble, Kimaya etc. The economic slowdown has added to the woes and the hype created over Indian fashion over the last couple of years has waned considerably. Apart from Manish Arora, India's other more successful overseas exports, Rajesh Pratap Singh and Sabyasachi Mukherjee did not show at either Paris or the New York fashion weeks because of the cautious approach of the international buyers to foreign labels. Anyway, much of the business for Indian designers comes from the bustling wedding market.

So does having so many fashion weeks actually make sense? "The couture week is more of a branding exercise. It's targetted at individual customers, mostly NRIs and celebrities, but serious business does happen at WIFW more than anywhere else," demurs Sunil Sethi, President, Fashion Design Council of India, which organises both the WIFW and the Couture Week. As a case in point he cites how the ongoing WIFW is focussing on Japanese buyers. "Every year the focus is on a nascent market. We already have a strong presence in the Middle-East, so the buyers who come in have dedicated designers to follow. Breaking into new markets take time, buyers usually follow a designer over a few seasons before placing orders," he says.

Organisers of India's other biggest fashion platform, the LFW, are more candid. "Most of the buyers from Europe contribute to less than 1% of the businesss. They are mostly here on a junket. Even the ones who buy are niche boutiques and hardly the mainstream ones. The domestic segment offers 90% of the business opportunity, while the Middle-East accounts for the rest of the 10%. Under such circumstances, it's unfair if we have fashion weeks that follow the international schedule, or pay more attention to these people. From the coming season, we are scheduling the fashion weeks around festivals, the peak buying cycle in India. That's the time when the designers can ensure delivery of that collection, almost immediately. Besides, despite the autumn-winter and spring-summer distinction we allow the designers to showcase whatever collection they choose to, based on their client demand. The whole format now revolves around the domestic buyers," says Anil Chopra, advisor to the LFW.  

The reason why this format works, adds Chopra, is because it ensures that the designers can maximise their profit by working to their strength. The shows for the spring-summer 2010 edition in September were priced approximately between Rs 50,000 for Gen Next designers to over Rs 4 lakh for a prime time single designer show slot. "The international bubble has burst. It's time to get back to business," he says. 

Designer Ravi Bajaj, who participated at the inaugural Van Heusen India Men's Fashion Week last month for the first time, had a different explanation. "With the influx of foreign brands, it's going to be very difficult to bridge the difference in the economy of scales between Indian and foreign designers. What will help Indian designers survive is working with techniques peculiar to indigenous design and most importantly, strategic tie-ups with corporates. Which is why when a brand like Van Heusen from the Madura Garments stable comes in to the fashion week platform, participation makes sense. They are the biggest garment manufacturers in the country and an association with them will help," he says.

For the designers themselves, sometimes there's an advantage in participating at newly-conceived fashion weeks. For instance, the inaugural Kolkata Fashion Week (KFW) in April this year had ensured some high-profile names—Ritu Kumar, Narendra Kumar Ahmad, Wendell Rodricks, Gauri and Nainika Karan simply by virtue of the fact that the designers did not have to invest anything to participate. Every little detail, from the ramp to the models to choreographers was taken care of. "It makes sense then to take part because markets such as Kolkata and Chennai are important to us and we would like to explore it at no extra risk," opines Delhi designer Nainika Karan, ahead of their participation at KFW. "It's natural for people to have apprehensions over something new, which is why we introduced those incentives for our first edition. From the second season on, we have introduced competitive participation fees for most designers except for a select few," says Yudhajit Dutta, Director, Mindscape group of companies and the man behind the KFW. While ramp rates began at a little over a lakh, a stall costs lesser. Dutta also brought together about 12 buyers, mostly from the region, which meant that the designers from other parts of India did modest business in east India. "We did not have an exhaustive list of international buyers. The few who had agreed to come, backtracked later, because of the swine flu threat, but domestic business was satisfactory," he adds.

Of course, meticulous planning is not part of all fashion weeks. "At the Bangalore Fashion Week, we were shocked at the shoddy arrangements. Forget buyers, we even had models changed a couple of hours before the show. The clothes ripped, there was utter chaos, and everyone, including the organisers, were clueless," recalls designer Jai, of the duo Parvesh and Jai. In a lot of ways though, fashion in India is moving back to the time when the entertainment value was premium and the emphasis was on the showstoppers and theatrics on the ramp. "There are two sides to it. One, so many fashion weeks mean that there is a greater awareness about it at a mass level, which at some point will culminate into better business opportunities, maybe in another 15 years or so. Two, most out of the plethora will not survive. The ones who will, will emerge as the best that the industry has to offer at a global level," says Hirani.

The question is, will the wait be worth it?

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