Reasonable demand has returned in Malls that we have opened: Rashmi Sen, Phoenix Mills

Rashmi Sen, Group COO, The Phoenix Mills, talks about the demand and purchasing scenario in the malls and expected time by which malls in Maharashtra will be opened during a candid chat with Swati Khandelwal, Zee Business. Edited Excerpts: 

Q: Tell us about the kind of demand that you are seeing after the reopening of the mall and are people reaching malls in the same strength and purchasing from malls or there is some reluctance in buying?

A: We are seeing a reasonable amount of demand that has started coming up in the malls that we have opened. Currently, four of our malls are operational of which two are located in Lucknow, namely Phoenix United, which is operational in the city for last 10 years; and the second is the new mall, Phoenix Palassio, that we have opened now and is a one million square feet mall and its architecture is very grand and palatial and we are also calling it as Palace Mall, actually. The other two malls are located in Bangalore and Bareilly.

These four malls are operational at present, where we have seen that the customer sentiment has started coming back and we are seeing a reasonable amount of demand that is coming back in each of these malls. 

Q: What is your view on Maharashtra and how long do you expect that the malls in the state will be opened here as well as in other states? How it has hit your business and how will you summarize this year for the company?

A: Shopping Centres Association of India (SCAI) has been working closely with all the shopping malls in Maharashtra. There are around 100 malls in Maharashtra. It is a difficult time for all the malls in Maharashtra as none of the malls has been opened in Maharashtra but we are confident as the cases are now stabilizing due to the efforts of the state government in Bombay. We are very confident that from the first week of August we will see all the malls opening in Maharashtra as well. In fact, the recent survey that SCAI has done and has put a value of total loss of 5 million jobs that we are expecting to be in Maharashtra if the malls in the state are not opened in August.

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I think the situation is delicate in Maharashtra but having said that as I said you earlier that the industry is confident that the Maharashtra malls will open in the first week of August and slowly become operating and get stabilized.