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Libas is preparing for a major retail expansion, with plans to add 250–300 stores over the next two to three years and achieve annual growth of 30%. The company expects to invest around ₹200 crore in its offline expansion, prioritising Tier-1 cities and metros before extending its presence into other markets.
To finance its growth plans, the brand is exploring funding options, including private equity investment and a potential initial public offering (IPO).
Beyond apparel, Libas plans to broaden its portfolio by entering categories such as artificial jewellery and perfumes, with the aim of developing into a complete lifestyle brand.
The company is also strengthening its international online presence in key markets while exploring opportunities in new regions, including Southeast Asia.
Libas currently operates 50–60 stores across 15–16 Tier-1 and metropolitan cities. Its expansion strategy focuses on building a stronger presence in established urban markets before penetrating deeper into individual states and emerging markets.
"We started with online business in 2022, and then ventured into Libas offline stores in 2021. At present, we have around 50-60 Libas offline stores, mostly in tier-one cities. Currently, we are in 15-16 cities; we are planning to scale up our offline presence to 250-300 stores in 2-3 years.
"We are mostly looking at strengthening our presence in tier I and metro cities, after which we'll pick up one or two states to go deeper," Zivore Apparel founder and CEO Sidhant Keshwani informs.
Keshwani said the company is currently strengthening its presence across Uttar Pradesh, expanding into more markets within the state. "We already have Libas showrooms in Gorakhpur, Agra, and we are opening a store in Saharanpur in UP. We are also planning for other states like Punjab, Tamil Nadu, and Karnataka for similar expansion. Currently, we are focusing on expanding mostly in the North and the South," he said, adding that the company is planning an investment of around Rs 200 crore for the expansion of offline stores.
He said the company is planning to adopt the Company-Owned, Company-Operated (COCO) model for its offline stores. “In the future, we are exploring the franchising model as well. But as of now, the vision is to have COCO stores unless something changes,” he added.
On funding the expansion, he said, “We are still evaluating whether to raise this fund through a private equity round or to do an IPO. So, we are exploring a few models to infuse capital. It's a mix of equity and debt that is going to help us scale up this expansion.”
Keshwani also outlined the company’s ambition to develop Libas into a complete lifestyle brand by introducing new product categories.
“We want to launch multiple categories. We have recently launched artificial jewellery under Libas. We launched perfumes about three to four months back. So, over the next 2-3 years, the idea is how we can pivot into a complete lifestyle brand with an online, offline, complete omnichannel presence,” he added.
Discussing the brand’s international business, Keshwani said Libas currently serves markets such as the US, UK, UAE and Australia through online channels. The company has also launched an e-commerce website to support its international operations.
“Currently, we are scaling up our international business as these four countries have a large Indian diaspora, who are all digitally native, plus logistics are easy to manage... we are also exploring countries in Southeast Asia like Singapore and Malaysia.
“We feel countries in Asia have huge potential to grow. Even the entire Middle East has huge potential for our business. Our overseas business will be only through e-commerce as of now,” he said.
Source: PTI
