Rachit Agarwala & Mayank Agarwala, Founders, Simaaya, Kolkata

Fusion of Simple and Maya

Simaaya- a showroom sprawling over 4000 sq ft in Kolkata, stocks high fashion designer clothes, sarees, suits, party-outfits, traditional and ethnic wear and exquisitely crafted bags for the women of today. Rachit Agarwala and Mayank Agarwala, owners of the store share their journey and future plans with YourStory

Idea

Being from a business family, job was never on our cards. Initially, we wanted to start a restaurant but found out that people from all over India come down to Kolkata to do their wedding shopping. So we got this idea of opening up a store for the women of today. Nobody in our family had entered into fashion retailing. But our dad, who is always open to new ideas and progressive in nature, inspired us and guided us a lot in this new venture. He is our role model.

Challenges, struggles In the starting years it was difficult to get big designers to Kolkata. The designers were apprehensive about coming to an unknown brand in Kolkata, but we overcame that and convinced them to showcase their collections in our store.

Turning point 

Turning point in our business was the launch of our Bridal collection store SIYAA on 17^th April 2007; we even introduced Sherwanis for men in this section. We got very good response from our customers.

Business model - the differentiators 

At Simaaya and Siyaa, we provide excellent stuff at reasonable prices, which is our USP. Later, we also plan to start a Fashion Designing Institute. The existing institutes do not provide the practical knowledge of designing to the students.

Vision

We wish to see Simaaya and Siyaa among the top 50 fashion retailing brands in India. We are currently looking for good locations to branch out all across India.