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Zee to take on Big Mac with idlis

Purvita Chatterjee

MUMBAI, Sept. 2

MR Subhash Chandra of the Zee Group plans to take the field with idlis and sambhar to match McDonald's burgers through its family entertainment centres, to begin with.

E-City Entertainment (I) Pvt Ltd, part of the Essel Group of Industries, promoted by Mr Subhash Chandra, plans to market its `Indiyum' brand of ready-to-eat foods in India and abroad.

E-City which has forayed into family entertainment is setting up a chain of entertainment centres called Fun Republic.

With an estimated investment of around Rs 450 crore in the first phase, the project involves setting up the Fun Republic brand of family entertainment centres across the country.

The `Indiyum' brand of ready-to eat foods both is currently available only in its family entertainment centres. E-City plans to retail Indiyum brands to India and abroad, particularly the NRI community.

Confirming its plans to enter the ready to eat segment, Mr Prakash Mirpuri, Team Manager - Corporate Partnerships & Communications, E-City Entertainment says, ``We will be doing the reverse of what Mc Donald's has been doing in India. The idea is to targ et NRIs living abroad with a variety of Indian food items.'' Covering cuisines from all parts of India, the range will comprise of idlis and dosas, chole bhature and pav bhaji.

Adds Mirpuri, ``We intend treating this brand as a separate profit centre in our business''. This would be in addition to its existing theme restaurants-Starz-which also serve a variety of ethnic cuisines including the ``Indiyum'' brand of ready to eat f ood.

While Starz serves Asean cuisine, it is `De Thali' which offers North Indian Thalis. At the same time there would be other food brands within its food courts like Dominoes, Sukh Sagar, Vadilal and Colours of Spice with whom the company would have a reven ue sharing arrangement but `Indiyum' is expected to be its own ready to eat brand which will cross the boundaries of it entertainment centres to be made available both within and outside the country.

Other brands within its premises would comprise Xenon (its cinema screens with the latest movies), Hours (its department stores offering mainly garments and accessories), Sonic State (its interactive music retailing store) Bingo (the games alley sportinm g a four lane bowling alley) and Champs (its interactive play area for kids).

Besides, the company has also decided to pair up with Pepsi and HLL and treat them as corporate partners for a host of activities at their centre. As Mirpuri explains, ``we want to go beyond sponsorships and promotions and use properties of each of these corporates so that both the parties profit from such partnerships''.

So while Fun Republic could use the property of Pepsi's `Hai Koi Jawab' to rope in celebrities who feature in it to actually visit its centre, it would also use the Levers brand of beverages like Brew, Lipton and Taj Mahal to retail at its site.

Adds Mirpuri, ``Since we are going to be in non-competing categories, the idea is obviously to maximise value for both. Considering the large number of footfalls at our centres, such corporates will have a captive target audience for their brands''.

While the first Fun republic has already been inaugurated in Ahmedabad, another 14 centres are planned in across cities such as Mumbai, Chandigarh, Delhi, Jaipur, Hyderabad, Bangalore, pune, Baroda, Kolkata and Chennai by 2003. This indoor entertainment centre is expected to be the first of its kind with a host of facilities under one roof.

Elucidates Mirpuri, ``The indoors entertainment industry is still nascent in India. Most of the existing outfits are governed by real estate holding companies. We are not into franchisee operations and intend doing everything ourselves and thereby develo p our own brands''.

Beginning its operations last month at Ahmedabad, E- City Entertainment, expects a turnover of Rs 40 crore by second year and to break even after 3-5 years.