Lladro Commercial, the global leader in the porcelain art segment today signed a joint venture (JV) agreement with SPA Agencies for a retail venture here.With this, Spain-based Lladro becomes one of the first international brands to invest in India through the 49% FDI in retail route. Lladro will hold a 26% stake in the JV company, Lladro India, with a provision to raise it to 49% by 2009. Lladro and SPA will jointly invest $10 million into the venture initially, which will be used predominantly in the development and upgradation of the retail and support infrastructure. Amar Agrawal, MD of SPA Agencies, said: "We plan to open a store a month and take our existing store count in India (six at present) to nine by March 2007." The company hopes to close this year at Rs 10 crore and is aiming for sales of Rs 22-25 crore in 2007 once it has a more widespread retail presence. Alain Voit, CEO of Lladro Commercial, said: "The new store in Mumbai is among the first of our remodelled stores globally and we will also be expanding our presence into other areas of the home decor market." The company has launched its bath collection and soon introduce a home lighting range which would be a mix of porcelain and fibre optics.While currently India is not a very big market for Lladro, Voit said it was among the fastest growing and would soon be among the top ten markets globally. At present, the average ticket size for the brand in India is Rs 60,000-70,000.
