Lawreshwar to open five retail stores

Jaipur-based Lawreshwar Polymers Ltd (LPL) has drawn out an Rs 18 crore-expansion plan.

The company, which is engaged in footwear business besides expanding capacity, plans to open five retail showrooms in Jaipur, Mumbai, Gurgaon and Bangalore.

"We are going in for expansion and we are also planning footwear showrooms in different parts of the country," Rajkumar Agarwal, managing director of the company told Business Standard.

He said they would open two retail showrooms in Jaipur, one each in Mumbai, Gurgaon and Bangalore.

He claimed that the company with a track record of consistent profitability for last five years is one of the established and growing company in the footwear sector in northern India with a turnover of over Rs 1,356 lakh for the eight months period ended November 30 last year.

The expansion plan of the company is aimed to boost the current operations and enhance growth possibilities, he added Naresh Agarwal, executive director of the company said the company started its commercial production in May 1995 with an installed capacity of 45 lakh pairs per annum of Hawaii Chappals.

Within a short duration of one year company took up expansion "� cum diversification programme for the manufacturing of lightweight Hawaii Chappals, canvas shoes, PVC shoes, synthetic leather chappals, and fancy chappals etc.

Later, company started manufacturing EVA Injected Footwear. The company was the first one in the state of Rajasthan to install "EVA Injection Moulding Machine," Agarwal said

"The motto and vision of the company is to manufacture reasonably priced footwear's for the common masses", Naresh Agarwal said. Within a decade, the company's has been able to make the brand name 'Lehar' popular among masses, he said.

Talking about products of the company, Rajkumar Agarwal said that the company manufactures Eva footwear. The market for Hawaii Chappals is being gradually replaced by polymer based footwear (Eva injection footwear). Due to increased demand of Eva Footwear, company's capacity utilisation in the segment was 127 per cent during 2004-05, while capacity utilisation of Hawaii Chappals is reducing. In view of this, company is undertaking capacity expansion for Eva footwear.

According to the survey conducted by the Delhi Footwear Market News and Footwear, the demand of Eva injection products would increase as the population increases, because in India, no other durable footwear at such low cost is available.

Now a days 70% demand of rubber based is replaced by Eva footwear. The company is also diversifying into PU sole footwear, which has a consistent and growing demand.

"PU is thermoplastic elastomer with properties of rubber and plastic, therefore it imparts flexibility, good abrasion resistance & also weather resistance to the sole of footwear, and where as the soles of other polymers are not having balance physical properties as PU," Rajkumar Agarwal said.