The UK-based retail chain major Marks & Spencer has made India its source for a fourth of its shoe stocks.
This requirement of footwear is now being sourced through Graziella Shoes, a 50:50 joint venture between Tata International and Pucci Dante of Italy.
According to Tata International, Graziella's main customers are Clarks and Marks & Spencer. Nearly 25 per cent of the global purchase of men's shoes of Marks & Spencer is now sourced from Graziella.
Its manufacturing unit located in the Chennai export processing zone caters mainly to the UK market.
Graziella registered a net profit of Rs 82 lakh (8.2 million) on a turnover of Rs 70.39 crore (Rs 703.9 million) in 2002-03.
Last year the joint venture reported a turnover of Rs 67.29 crore (Rs 672.9 million). The leather division of Tata International achieved a turnover of Rs 391 crore (Rs 3.91 billion) in 2002-03, lower than the previous year's turnover of Rs 421 crore (Rs 4.21 billion).
With an annual turnover of Rs 2,770 crore (Rs 27.70 billion), Tata International is the international business arm of the Rs 45,000 crore (Rs 450 billion) Tata group.
The company has been exporting high-quality and fashionable leather products across the world for the last 25 years.
Tata International in recent years entered the domestic footwear market under the brand name Stryde.
In the Rs 8,000 crore (Rs 80 billion) per year shoe market (60 pairs are sold every year), branded shoes have just 20 per cent of the market share while the remaining 80 per cent are catered to by the non-branded segment.
There are half a dozen players competing in the 20 per cent branded shoes segment, including Bata, Lee Cooper, Red Tape among others.
Tata International, the closely held company of the Tatas, has several divisions such as engineering, steel, minerals, bulk commodities and chemicals.
It has set its sight on becoming a global trading giant with a target of increasing its turnover to $1 billion by April 2004, company officials had told Business Standard.