Vishal Kapoor

 

     Chief Design Officer (group) +Concept Business Head

      Future Group India Ltd.

      July 2002 to date

 

     Concept Business Head: brand fbb

    (Re-imagining business to Drive growth & profitability for the organization & a great brand experience for the customers)

 

• Closely working with the group Director in establishing a vision for the brand fbb.

• Designing & chartering the growth strategy for the business building sales and brand equity.

• Reimagining the branding strategies and customer touch point experience enhancement.

• Reimagining brand’s service experience and its alignment of thought & strategies with the people office.

• Organization redesign in sync with the brand’s aspirations and future vision.

• Ensuring a confident year or year topline and margin growth while reducing      operative expenses.

• Key contribution in the turn around of hypermarket business with the greater contribution of fashion divisions ‘ sales & overall healthier margins.

 

       Key achievement:

 

Delivered 30% + growth on year on year basis with the predicted closure at 3.3 million USD.

Enhancement of brands net margin structure to a healthy 40%

Reduction in operational costs through organizational restructuring & people alignment to the existing & future context of the brand

Created a more agile team culture where inclusivity of communication flow & reduction of “psychology of hierarchy” is the key drive.

Bring in design & it’s thinking into managing customer experiences and driving brands communication strategies.

Aligning brand associations through globally renowned beauty pageant events like the “Miss India “ and celebrity endorsement ,ATL and BTL with the marketing Head to bring up the fashion aspiration quotient.

 

Apart from the brand fbb , I have also successfully launched and incubated groups’ another fashion concept “I am in” a youthful , aspirational fashion concept for the   fully aware and style conscious youth of India , who is more confident in his/her own choice of style curation  and is brand agnostic. Post successful incubation the brand was handed over to the CEO for operations.

 

      Chief Design Officer (group)  *

       (Designing experiences through people, materials & processes=customer delight)

 

• Driving creative strategies for the group’s various formats from a thought level along with the group Directors and making them realize to tangible and non tangible experiences to its customers along with the groups concept CEO’s.

• Ensuring a balance of creative thinking democratization and centralization of groups design thoughts and principles.

•  Responsible for result and growth of a talented and experienced pool of creative individuals from various backgrounds like store design, architecture, interiors, graphics & communication design, visual merchandisers, space planners, procurement specialists, project management and site engineers all accountable for the design and build aspect of the group.

• Successfully expanded more than 2 million square feet of retail space in the financial year across groups various brands and concepts.

• Driving design literacy with the objective of making design thinking as a mindset and not a isolated function, through formals and informal interactions, workshops, audio video decks, and online tools.

• Re-imagining the groups’ concept and brands retail identity with both external design consultants & internal creative teams.

 

Key achievement:

 

Being from a Design Thinking background, my biggest challenge and contribution has been to shape the mindset of key business leaders and heads of divisions to look beyond conventional business thinking, processes and tools and help in formulating their minds to a explorative thinking and thereby infusing  innovation in the culture and building creative confidence.

Converting Design Thinking as one of the key business drivers of sustainable grwoth .

Creating thought leadership by Design.

 

       Assistant Manager – Design & Planning

       Shoppers Stop Ltd 

       May 1999- June 2002

 

• Developed and articulated retail design and visual merchandise processes and deliverances creating better synergies between business and retail design.(ISO certification)

• Mentoring & recruiting creative talent & creating their KPI’s & KRA’s.

• Developed retail design and brand experience parameters and also successfully operationalized.

• Co-created and evolved the brand and product communication strategies.

• Initiated the first business integrated merchandise presentation strategies with active lead in its prototyping in flagship stores across categories.

• Created comprehensive design proposals (environment+communication+product presentation) for in house brands and led its prototyping in flagship stores.

• Creation and allocation of design budget both at corporate and operational levels.

• Was a key team member in introducing the space planning thinking and working into the organization’s retail practice helping the in successful analysis of retail productivity (gmrof & gmroi )

 

        Design Manager

        Lee cooper India (Indus clothing ltd),

       February 1998 to May 1999

 

• Responsible for developing new look across all Lee Cooper outlets (stand alones, multi brands and shop in shops) integrated with the corporate office in UK, ensuring consistent brand experience for the customer.

• Creating a standard product presentation guideline across brand platforms and ensuring its adherence across variant formats.

• Managing successfully the translation of visual identity of the brand and ensuring strict adherence to guidelines set by the principle.

• Overseeing the creatve development of Lee Cooper India brand providing art and creative direction leading retail branding across multiple platforms of brand expression. Collaborating with marketing to enhance the brands equity and positioning through ATL and BTL activities across retail touch points.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        Design &Merchandising Manager

       Wasans’ India Pvt. Ltd.                                                                                                     

       December 1996 to January 1998

 

• Coordinating and integrating design and styling in the garments and footwear range leading to sampling and showcasing for foreign and domestic buyers.

• Coordinating product design activities from the buyer’s perspective to the sampling and production units.

• Providing design inputs in brand communication and accountable for in store graphics & POP’s across all multi brand stores.

 

      Design coordinator

      Uni Style Image Pvt. Ltd.,

      December 1995 to August 1996

 

Joined as a design trainee focusing along with my certification from Nation Institute of Fashion Technology with key focus on production, quality and merchandising departments.

 

 

* portfolio attached