Mephisto, a France-based manufacturer of men’s and women’s sport and leisure footwear, is in the process of entering the Indian footwear market within two months from now, according to the euro 400-million (approximately Rs 2,900 crore) company’s secretary-general, Rolf Konrad.
“We are currently scouting for an exclusive distributor for the Indian subcontinent. Hopefully, we should find them this month, and set our foot in the region by April this year,” he told Business standard on the sidelines of the 14th World Congress of International Society of Prosthetics and Orthotics (ISPO) 2013, which kicked-off in Hyderabad on Monday.
Almost five-decade-old, family-run company currently manufactures 20,000 pairs of shoes and sandals per day across 600 different models under the Mephisto, Sano, Mobils and Allrounder brands, at its facility in France.
The company has subsidiaries based in the US, Canada, Japan and Portugal, and finds buyers through an inter-cultural marketing strategy in 86 countries with an export rate of 85 per cent.
Stating that the company sees India as its future market, which according to Assocham is growing at a compound annual growth rate of 15 per cent and is expected to reach Rs 38,700 crore by 2015 from Rs 22,000 crore now, Konrad said Mephisto had drawn a 20-year strategy for the region, including a manufacturing plant in a couple of years.
