Home shopping scales new heights

Home shopping scales new heights
September 8th, 2007 · No Comments

Two new stores widen consumers’ choices in picking the finest for their personal and office spaces as well as travels

FROM fashion, WingTai Asia Group subsidiary Wing Tai Branded Lifestyle has expanded into a retail segment that one would have expected it to move into much earlier.

As a leading Singaporean property developer, one would have thought that Wing Tai’s retail arm might have added furniture and home decor stores to its retail offerings long ago.

But better late than never, as they say. And now that Wing Tai Branded Lifestyle has stepped into this space, it’s not pulling any punches.

Zone Singapore is a one-stop store for home, bathroom, kitchen and office ware - the first franchise store in Asia for a Danish brand founded by Poul Jepsen.

Making its debut at Raffles City, the 2,500 sq ft store is set up to furnish all areas and rooms of a house. The 2,000-plus products are categorised into PersonalZone (bath accessories), LivingZone (living area), FoodZone (kitchen) and WorkZone (office).

Zone has teams of designers in Denmark, Hong Kong and China that conceptualise Scandinavian-style products.

The focus is on classic functionality and quality, says Mr Jepsen, who was in Singapore for the launch of the Raffles City store this week. ‘But we also want to reach out to the younger crowd, so there’s a variety of new materials used, like rubber and silicone.’

Mr Jepsen founded the brand in 1991, having grown up as part of a family with a homeware business.

Helen Khoo, executive director of Wing Tai Branded Lifestyle, says that Zone is an extension of the group’s lifestyle activities. ‘Shopping for the home has also become like buying fashion. Home furnishing is an expression of the owner’s personality. We had to look for the right partner to bring in - and Zone was just what we were looking for.’

Zone is run on a franchise basis, a proven and systematic retail model. ‘We’re not wasting a lot of time and effort reinventing the wheel,’ says Ms Khoo. ‘We just need to understand local consumers’ needs.’

Zone is distributed in the United States and some European countries and has standalone stores in Cyprus, Greece, Sweden, Bahrain, Dubai, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and Hong Kong.

The company aims to have 100 stores by 2011.

In Singapore, Wing Tai Branded Lifestyle plans to set up three to five stores over the next two years, plus at least one in Kuala Lumpur by next year.

With products ranging from a slim satin-steel sugar dispenser at $12.50 to a saucepan with lid at $702 and a sevencm satin-steel York candlestick holder at $22 to a coconut designer vase at $162 as well as cotton washcloths at $8.50 to five-litre stainless steel pedal bins at $192, Zone is pretty much the equivalent of a high street fashion brand for homeware.

‘The choice of Zone as a partner reflects WingTai’s retail outlook,’ says Ms Khoo.

‘We started with mass brands that are affordable and accessible, like G2000, before we moved up the market to UK high street brands. Now, we’re concentrating on the mid to mid-high range of brands. We’re moving in sync with our property arm,’ which is now building luxury properties.

Mr Jepsen chose Wing Tai Branded Lifestyle as its local partner because of its retail experience.

‘We also prefer to partner with fashion retailers because they understand the way we display our products,’ he says.

‘Like fashion, we’ll have new products in the shop every month to create the demand among consumers.’

Zone is located at Raffles City, #03-25.



Source: Business Times 8 Sept 07