India’s open footwear (flip-flops, thong sandals, slippers, flats, and so forth.,) segment is estimated to be worth more than Rs 6,000 crore and developing at a CAGR of 15%+. Yet for lots of years this category has either been dominated by mass players such as Relaxo and Liberty or higher-finish international brands such as Skechers and Crocs. A homegrown, youth-centric open footwear retail and manufacturing brand referred to as Solethreads is now developing a niche for itself with its variety of quirky and chic in-trend flip-flops.
Founded in November 2018, the brand is the brainchild of co-founders Sumant Kakaria and Gaurav Chopra, who bring with them an knowledge of more than 13 years in the retail sector. The duo has considering that been joined by Vikram Iyer as co-founder and chief business enterprise officer and Aprajit Kathuria as co-founder and chief marketing and advertising officer.
“Solethreads takes pride in being the harbinger of innovation and latest technology in footwear designing,” says co-founder and CEO Sumant Kakaria. The brand has Phylon molded technologies (ultra-light and shock absorbent), Squishy technologies (super soft and comfy) and its patented Synturf technologies (grass flip-flops) below its umbrella. It has more than 30 style patents currently and has some new-age innovation in the pipeline, each in the solution such as DIY styles, as properly as its business enterprise model such as personalised footwear. The organization has an in-residence designing and R&D group that focuses on innovation and international trend spotting that connect with the youth.
“Being a tech-savvy brand, Solethreads has also partnered with tech solution partners that have helped us achieve our current scale and prepare for future growth,” says Kakaria. These incorporate Glaucus for wise inventory management, Paxcom for e-commerce analytics and channel intelligence, Shoptimize for AI-primarily based functionality marketing and advertising and Vinculum for omni-channel integration.
As a digital-forward brand, it has strategic alignments with major platforms Amazon, Myntra and Flipkart, says Kakaria. “We have seen tremendous response across all our pilots and channels. On Amazon, the brand crossed Rs 50,00,000 GMV within four months of launch. The fact that we reached `1 crore revenue within eight 8 months of launch while being bootstrapped, speaks volumes about the overall potential, as well as the team’s capability to build a very robust business model,” he adds.
It has not too long ago revamped its personal D2C (direct to client) web site. “On our own website, we touched a revenue of `50,000 per day, within 10 days of launching our D2C marketing campaigns, which is a very strong validation of our product-market mix,” says Kakaria. “Our design aesthetic and product innovation is ensuring that customers are turning to us for out-of-home use, and occasion led buying is something we are looking to build further.”
According to him, in the offline retail space, Solethreads has performed a thriving pilot launch with a major Indian footwear retailer and is gearing up to expand across the latter’s network of shops. “We believe that there is exponential growth to be had in this category both online and offline, and hence we have geared our go-to-market strategy and team accordingly,” he explains.
Solethreads aims to come to be a Rs 300-crore rapidly style ‘open footwear’ brand in the subsequent 3 years with powerful on the internet and offline presence. “We are bullish on going global based on our recent pilot tests across various international platforms,” he adds.