Nexus Malls has over 125% of sales as compared to the same period in 2019: Nishank Joshi

Nexus Malls is the Indian retail portfolio arm of world’s leading investment firm, The Blackstone Group. Nexus Malls marked its foray into Indian Retailing in 2016 with an aim to transform the shopping experience of the Indian consumers. Growing at great pace since inception, Nexus Malls now boasts of a portfolio of 5.3 million square feet of Grade A retail space in the country. Nexus Malls have thereby established themselves as one of the leaders in the retail real estate industry in India.

Nexus Malls today operates across 9 major malls in the country spread across the cities of Mumbai, Pune, Amritsar, Chandigarh, Ahmedabad, Bhubaneswar and Indore. The company also holds the distinction of owning India’s largest Transit Oriented Development - Seawoods Grand Central in Navi Mumbai.

Set up with transformation being its core agenda, Nexus Malls seeks to implement the best practices and state-of-the-art technology in India by bringing in professional and broader mall management in the country.  It also aims to aid its retail partners to compete effectively and cater to the omnipresent needs of the consumers in India.

In conversation with Adgully, Nishank Joshi, CMO, Nexus Malls, speaks at length about their rebranding exercise, their expansion plans, how they are geared up for this festive season to delight the customers across the country, and more.

With the fear of Covid disappearing and traffic across the country increasing, how are you gearing up for this festive season? 

The last 18 months, during the course of the pandemic have been the busiest for us. At Nexus Malls, we have utilized this time to ensure that we undertook all the tasks which were permissible and ensured we were ready as soon as the restrictions were off and people were allowed at the malls. As a result, our sales recoveries were amongst the fastest across the country. Not just that, the measures which we took to ensure the safety and hygiene of our premises was also very well covered by media and received by our customers. Currently, we have over 125% of sales as compared to the same period in 2019.  

We even acquired the eight Forum Malls from The Prestige Group in Southern India, which helped us expand our footprint nationally. This June, we rebranded all the 17 malls across our portfolio and called them Nexus, which was not the case earlier. As a part of the rebranding exercise, we committed ourselves to delivering ‘Ab Har Din Kuch Naya’ and we are working towards ensuring that we live up to this promise leading in to the festive season as well. Over the next 100 days, we will ensure the customers experience something new, every time that they visit our malls. From festive décor, to concerts and stand-up’s, we will also have a lot of unique activations where customers can engage with us and participate in our campaigns. Most of these activations will be the first of its kind in their respective cities. Additionally, there will be assured gifts for everyone who shops with us during the course of the 100 days.  

How do you differentiate your mall vis-à-vis the rest of them? Can you elaborate on the core positioning of the brand Nexus Malls?

At Nexus Malls, we take great pride in the innovations and unique experiences which we curate. Over the last three years, we have ensured that we became the talk of the town whether it is the décor, activations or even the assured prizes which the customers are taking back with them, when they shop with us. We are probably the only mall company in India that gives away assured prizes across the year.   

Malls have now grown beyond being places where people come only to shop. People have started coming to malls for new experiences and hence, we are committed to delivering ‘Har Din Kuch Naya’ experience for our customers across the 13 cities where are present. Across our entire portfolio, we now have the same mall music playing, we use the same fragrance and our team wears the same uniform across all 17 malls and 13 cities. During the course of the pandemic, we were the first mall company in India to join hands with an independent auditor to Bureau Veritas, to ensure that our premises were safe and hygienic for customers.

We are also the first mall company in India, who signed a Bollywood A-lister as a brand ambassador. There are several other firsts, which we have to our credit, which makes us unique and different from other malls in India.

Technology has brought in a shift to engage with your audiences. How are you leveraging AI and AL to engage with your audiences?

Tri-city’s most preferred shopping destination recently rebranded itself as Nexus Elante, after the rebranding exercise. Nexus Elante launched Nexus One, a mobile app that has a host of features and gratification for all those who download the app. the app will give all the details and will show you the navigation for the same. Also, one of the most common problems faced by shoppers is locating your parking, the app gives you an option to mark your parking and navigate from wherever you want to. This does not end here; features also include Brand lists, Exclusive offers, Food Ordering, and Pre-booking and parking slots, etc.

Tell us more about your rebranding exercise. What was the objective and how is it going to help the brand?

Nexus Malls, India’s largest mall platform with 130 million footfalls across 13 major cities has unveiled its new corporate identity and has rebranded the malls in its portfolio. This is one of the biggest transformations in the history of organized retail in India & is testimony to the brand’s commitment to staying customer-centric. With a view to bringing synergies across all functions and developing stronger ties among stakeholders, Nexus Malls rebranded its malls under its portfolio, integrating one common brand identity that will now resonate across the country. The company has revamped its visual identity to create wider awareness across the retail ecosystem. The vivid colors introduced as part of the brand new pneumonic signify emotions of joy, excitement, life, courage, freshness, luxury, magic, and above all, happiness. The new identity brings to life our promise of ‘Har Din Kuch Naya‘, a promise where we will bring something new, unique, and personal every day to our 130+ million consumers.

How do you plan to promote your mall to attract traffic? Have you designed any loyalty program to intensely engage with your customers?

Nexus Elante launched Nexus One, a mobile app that has a host of features and gratification for all those who download the app. the app will give all the details and will show you the navigation for the same. Also, one of the most common problems faced by shoppers is locating your parking, the app gives you an option to mark your parking and navigate from wherever you want to. This does not end here, features also include Brand lists, Exclusive offers, Food Ordering, and Pre-booking parking slots, etc.

What kind of media strategy have you planned to raise awareness for your brand?  

Our brand mix is stronger and more relevant to the cities we are present in. As a result, we have new brands and fresh offerings for all the fashion lovers. For the kids, who had been confined to their homes with no school and colleges operating, we hosted some unique activations across our malls by bringing alive the beasts of the past like the Dragons, Dinosaurs and Polar bears. Workshops to engage with the kids and give them a much-needed break and interaction within the safety of our sanitized premises. We have also started movie promotions, concerts; stand up comedies and a lot more youth focused activities to ensure that our target groups have a one more incentive to come back to the malls. As a result, we are seen better traction and higher conversions than we used to before. We have also been actively investing in print and digital media, to ensure the awareness is high and we are top of mind when it comes to shopping in the cities where we are present.