Zara's Indian partner to launch fast fashion at half the price

The Tata Group has operated Zara stores in India as a partner of Zara's parent company, Inditex, for nearly a decade. The Indian multinational conglomerate operates a large portfolio of brands across lifestyle, technology, finance and food, and is now reportedly building its own apparel empire that will offer clothing at half the price of Zara's cost.

Business Times reported that Tata Group's retail arm, Trent Ltd., plans to open 40 stores of its flagship chain, Westside, across India each year, as well as hundreds of its mass market Zudio outlets. The company's chairman, Noel Tata told Business Standard that the company's target audience for this will be trend-conscious, globalized consumers.

Trent has a local supply chain that can deliver styles to customers in just 12 days. Sources report that the company is hiring employees to forecast trends to complement this supply chain and ultimately introduce 300 new styles to stores each week.

“The middle class is growing, incomes have grown, Indians are traveling more and they have more money to spend,” Tata told Business Standard. “Now that we’ve built this capability and this model that’s working so well, it’s time to grow faster.”