Thomas Pink Opens First Store in India

Thomas Pink opened it's first store in India last month reports WWD. It may seem like an odd pairing considering the Indian male has grown up with shades of browns and Pink is anything but browns.

But the opening of the LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton-owned Thomas Pink store brought another moment of reckoning for the Indian man plus a chance to be quirky and innovative. Thomas Pink constitutes about 43% of the $58 billion textile and apparel market in India and has been growing each year, according to consulting firm Technopak. The market size is expected to more than double in the next 10 years.

"The brand will sit in the Indian wardrobes easily," said Darshan Mehta, president and chief executive officer of Reliance Brands Ltd., the brand's local partner. He said the new store was launched a little more than nine months after the announcement was made last March. The British retailer has more than 100 stores worldwide and flagships on London's Jermyn Street, Madison Avenue in New York and Rue François 1er in Paris.

Reliance Brands has been growing its retail outlets in India with brand partnerships including Brooks Brothers, Diesel, Ermenegildo Zegna, Hamleys, Iconix, Kenneth Cole, Steve Madden and Stuart Weitzman.

The 1,000-square-foot store is not Thomas Pink's flagship but the first step on a new journey. Two more stores are in the pipeline: one in Gurgaon in the New Delhi Capital region and the other at Palladium Mall in Mumbai.