Legacy. Reinvention. Retail Mastery the Regal Shoes story with Nazim Virji

Nazim: Over the last decade or so, we've been putting in a lot of efforts to go from 
what was originally a five-star story to becoming a national brand. Women's 
product is not made in very large quantities for a single style. While we don't invest in manufacturing 
facilities, we do invest in opening stores and each store has an investment 
of about somewhere between 1.2 to 1.5 uh crores. on the GST rate reduction. It's 
uh been reported very widely that you know it's gone from 12% to 5%. While that is true uh footwear is divided into 
multiple segments uh for GST. [Music] 

Vivek (Host): Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of Bazaar & Beyond, where we deep dive into the world of finance, investing, and more to help you make smart investment decisions. I’m your host, Vivek Anant. Today’s episode features an insightful guest, Nazim Virji—the thirdgeneration leader of Regal Shoes, an iconic familyrun enterprise that has shaped how generations of Indians shop for footwear. From preserving a legacy born in the heart of Mumbai to navigating GST reforms and an everevolving retail landscape, Nazim brings a rare vantage point on what it takes to build, reinvent, and champion a true Indian brand. Regal Shoes is not just a business story; it’s a story about Indian tradition, ambition, and the ability to keep pace with changing times. 

Vivek: Nazim, thank you for joining us. I want to start with your journey. 

Vivek: Could you explain to our viewers what Regal Shoes is and how it has become what it is today where it started, how many years ago, and what plans you put in place to arrive at today’s situation? 

Nazim (Guest): Firstly, thanks for having me. Regal goes back more than seven decades. It’s the story of my grandfather. He lived in a small chawl in Bhendi Bazaar in Mumbai and came from very limited means. He and some friends spent a lot of time in Colaba, where there were a few footwear stores, and they started working in some of those shops. Over time, they built a little capital. My greatgrandfather also ran a leather trading business, so there were some savings from there too. Together with a few partners, they decided to open a small footwear store in Colaba the first Regal which opened in 1954. Back then, it was a very big decision putting all your eggs in one basket with a lot of pressure to perform because there were no second chances. 

Nazim: They worked very hard for a long time. That one store kept getting larger—they took the shops behind and next to it to expand and the business kept increasing. Even then, my grandfather had a reputation for a keen eye for product and strong operations. He was very disciplined: at the store dot at 9:30 a.m. to open, there till close at night. Retail is tough—12 hours, 7 days a week and it takes a long time to build customer trust. Over the years, that Regal store gained a lot of popularity. By the 1970s 15 to 20 years into the journey that corner started being known as the Regal Shoes Corner. Of course, Regal Cinema was down the road, but we have old newspaper ads where other brands described their locations as “opposite Regal Shoes” or “two shops down from Regal Shoes.” He built the business one day at a time, one shoe at a time. 

Nazim: In the late ’70s my father joined the business. He started a shop on Bandra’s Linking Road, which is today our flagship store. We still run that store. It began as a small 300squarefoot location. Again, he built it step by step. Back then, Linking Road was like a desert. He would tell me he’d see some people only between 11 a.m. and 12 noon and then again post 6 p.m.; in the middle you might see one or two customers all day. There must have been five to seven shops on the entire road. Slowly, because of consistent effort work, product, operations the market evolved around that Regal store. He expanded the same way old businesses did: one small store, then buy the store next door, then the one behind, expand, and over time become what today would be called an anchor store for that market. Over time, a Metro Shoes came, a Lords came, and over the years many brands followed—Nike, Adidas; Foot Locker has just opened on Linking Road. The market developed into what it is today. 

Nazim: It’s a simple way of going about things: go to work every day, do your best, and expand over time—nothing happens overnight. My father expanded to about five shops by the early 2000s three in Mumbai and a couple outside (Ahmedabad and Pune). Around 2005 he moved on into social work, which interested him, and that’s when my brother joined, and a couple of years later I joined. We had both studied abroad MBAs and undergrad and came in with ambition to take the business to the next level. But it took time to understand the nittygritties of the Indian footwear market. It was largely unorganized then. Over time, as it became more organized and we gained a stronger grip, we decided to expand into a national chain. Over the last decade or so, we’ve worked to go from a fivestore story to a national brand. Today, we’re in about 16 cities with our own stores. We also do a shopinshop format through largeformat stores like Lifestyle and Shoppers Stop, and we run about 150 shopinshops. In recent years, the digital age has caught up we have our own website and work through channels like Myntra, Amazon, Nykaa, and Ajio, which are doing very well for us. It’s been a long story in the making—slow and steady—and our ethos remains the same: work every day to give the best products and quality to customers, and stay away from background noise about scaling too fast just to show topline growth. We stay rooted in building a strong, stable, profitable business. 

Vivek: Growth strategy do you work with clusters where shoes are made by local manufacturers? Do you work with factories, individuals, companies? It sounds assetlight. Why wouldn’t you scale faster if it’s assetlight? I’m asking because investors often look at highthroughput, assetlight businesses, but you’re mostly managing brickandmortar stores. Why take so much time? It must be a thoughtthrough strategy. Please explain. 

Nazim: It’s not as assetlight as you might think. There’s a lot of investment in opening stores. For every store, there’s a deposit (since it’s typically a lease or license model), capex for furniture and fixtures, and a lot of money into stock. Regarding manufacturers: we work with different kinds. Fifteen to twenty years back, it was different; today it’s different. Earlier, much manufacturing was done in small workshops (300 to 500sqft karigars’ units) in and around Mumbai—Nagpada, Dharavi, Bhiwandi. A lot of that was handmade, with limited machinery—artisan work—so large quantities were a challenge. We also worked with factories in Agra and Chennai for largervolume men’s product. Men’s footwear is more technical in finish and lasts, so factories handled that. Over time, many small workshops moved to Bhiwandi, took larger spaces, and became larger facilities, now doing a hybrid of machinery and handmade work. Our women’s product is primarily made in these environments because it needs more variety: not large quantities per style, but many new styles monthly. Men’s styles have higher quantities and fewer variations, so that’s more factoryled. 

Nazim: While we don’t invest in manufacturing facilities, we do invest in opening stores, and each store needs about ₹1.2 to ₹1.5 crore before the first invoice is raised. That’s a barrier to entry in brickandmortar. It can be quite profitable if done right, but returns take time—two to three years to recover the capital, depending on interest rates, etc. So there are limitations. Yes, once the model is right, there’s scope to expand fast, but that requires an influx of capital; purely organic growth with your own funds is not easy beyond a point. 

Vivek: Thanks—that helps explain how the shoe business works and Regal’s evolution. Let’s switch to something current: the GST rate cut. Footwear below ₹2,500 moved to 5% GST (it was 12% earlier for some bands). What impact have you seen on walkins, footfalls, and customer queries? 

Nazim: The GST rate cut is timely—a Diwali gift from the government. It directly benefits the customer’s pocket, and all the brands we work with, including our private labels, are immediately passing on the benefit. But let me clarify the reduction. It’s widely reported as 12% to 5%. While that’s true in effect, footwear had multiple segments: up to ₹1,000 (12% GST earlier) and above ₹1,000 (18% earlier). Now all footwear up to a selling price of ₹2,500 is at 5%. That’s an effective discount of around 6–12% on products up to ₹1,000 and a little over 11% on products from ₹1,000 to ₹2,500—the midpremium segment. 

Nazim: Footwear price bands in India: ₹0–₹500 (mass), ₹500–₹1,000 (economy), ₹1,000–₹3,000 (midpremium), ₹3,000–₹5,000 (premium), and ₹5,000+ (luxury, very niche). The band below ₹1,000 is largely unorganized (though organized players like DMart and some department stores participate). The ₹1,000–₹3,000 range is where organized and unorganized both compete. The ₹2,000 price point is a sweet spot. Cross ₹2,000 and the number of customers drops; go below, and the pyramid broadens. 

Nazim: A way to understand this is to look at brand distribution: brands sell to large format stores (Lifestyle, Shoppers Stop), multibrand outlets (Regal, Metro), and local footwear stores through regional distributors. Those smaller local stores, while one or two stores each, are numerous in every city (hundreds in large cities, 50–60 in smaller towns), often within a 2–5 km radius. They almost never buy products to be sold above ₹2,000—about 95–99% of what they sell is below ₹2,000. The organized sector struggled in that segment because of the 18% GST. The reduction allows organized players to bring pricing of quality footwear closer to ₹2,000. So what was sold between ₹2,000 and ₹3,000 earlier can now be priced closer to ₹2,000—a very competitive zone. I expect brands to make a big push to capture that customer. Over time, customers will notice better quality and designs available at the price they’re willing to spend. 

Nazim: It will also benefit the unorganized sector. Many unorganized players aren’t happy remaining unorganized; this might encourage them to formalize since the cost of being organized isn’t as high now. They might prefer to formalize and expand rather than stay at one–three shops. So this can open the market further: customers get better products at similar price points; and those willing to spend a little more also get a discount—Indians love discounts in any form. 

Vivek: Do you foresee a lot of discounting in shoe retail because of this? The PM mentioned it in the Independence Day speech, the GST Council announced it on 3rd September, and it took some time to implement. For many, the feeling is of waiting for prices to drop before shopping—footfalls, purchasing decisions, etc. 

Nazim: You have to hand it to the government—they know what they’re doing and when the season starts. The new GST rate became effective 22 September, which is the start of Navratri—basically the beginning of the shopping season: Navratri, Dussehra, Diwali, then wedding season and New Year. It’s the strongest part of the year for fashion and festive footwear. They timed it right before that. People don’t shop much in Shradh (inauspicious period), which is a lull. So we didn’t see much impact during Shradh; only urgent shoppers come then, and a small discount doesn’t change their needdriven purchase. 

Nazim: Come 22 September, when the reduction took effect, all brands and retailers went on discount immediately. You would have seen GSTreduction banners on websites and in stores, shelftalkers—lots of communication. As for uptake from the 22nd till now, it’s too few days to give data—it’s too early. The right assessment would be after a couple of months. We definitely expect a spike this season. In the short run, a discount lifts numbers; you’ll see the uptick at month/quarter end. The longterm benefit is more impactful: overall pricing will come down as brands reduce marked prices, not just run shortterm discounts. So something marked ₹2,500 may now be marked ₹2,000; ₹3,000 may be marked ₹2,500. That will shift pricing strategies and consumer shopping patterns. As a consumer, I’d prefer a wellmade, wellorganized footwear store over a local store if pricing is similar. That can create a ripple effect over the next few years. 

Vivek: How do you identify and match everchanging consumer tastes? Specifically, how do you capture granular details—what to stock, where to place products in the store, which styles go to which stores—and disseminate this across India? 

Nazim: We use BI tools to generate the right analyses: category responses, performance across segments, etc. Our primary vertical is our own stores, which carry 600–800 styles at any time—a lot of SKUs. You’re right: decisions about category display, store zoning, and what to highlight require data. We look at historical data (typically the last 1–3 years) to know which categories sell most coming into any month/season. For the festive season, women’s ethnic collections lead; for men, items worn with kurtapyjamas—patanis, sherwani pairs—and for weddings, suits—oxfords, patents, etc. It’s very categorydriven. 

Nazim: We also plan for microsegments. Entering April/endMarch, with summer and college season, sliders and colorful casuals for youth sell more; mall/weekend wear goes up. We constantly look at what happened historically for the upcoming period and plan store highlights accordingly. It’s very datadriven—almost never guesswork. We plan 3–6 months ahead: to have inventory today, we’d have ordered it 3–4 months ago, and finalized designs 1–2 months before that. It’s a continuous process. We release about 50 new styles every month—requires lots of planning. An inhouse design team of 8–10, led by my brother (a fashion design graduate), studies what works in India and abroad to see where iterations are possible. Designing is often iteration, not always pure invention; fashion is cyclical (think bellbottoms in the ’70s and then 20 years before/after). The detailing is where the art is. 

Nazim: We also work with brands like Skechers (we used to work with Clarks), Puma, Florsheim—each brings their studies. Our core categories are formal, semiformal, and casual; Skechers brings athleisure/sports expertise. They know flipflops sell more in summer, walking shoes more in October–December, etc. They study data across their EBOs and MBOs (maybe 2,000 stores), while we study about 200 stores for our categories. There’s a lot of backandforth. Channel partners (Myntra, Amazon, Lifestyle, Shoppers Stop) also give feedback—e.g., Myntra might say loafers/driving shoes are seeing traction in monthly reviews. We go back, examine our collection, talk to manufacturers who can produce that product, ensure it meets our quality standards, and build it. It’s a lot of giveandtake—not just our data but partnershared data. 

Vivek: Can you share an insight from the shop floor or your store visits—something that changed how you thought about the business? 

Nazim: Honestly, all the magic happens on the shop floor. Everything I know about my business, I learned there. Backend is numbers—reports, financials, sales data. The shop floor is where the movie is playing—front of camera. Stand there as an observer (not management) and watch shoppers walk in and out—each comes with a story. In the next couple of months, at our Dadar store, you’ll almost daily see a groomtobe with his inlaws buying his reception shoes—tradition in that area—often with a friend helping pick the pair. In a mall, you’ll see a 23yearold woman with her mother saying, “This is my favorite shop; I want to buy you a pair now that I’m earning.” Those stories live on the floor. 

Nazim: My favorite scene on Sundays: a father walks in with family—kids, wife, maybe his mother—combining weekly outing with shopping. He’s buying office shoes or a pair for an upcoming wedding, and he’ll ask, “Kya yeh tikau hai? Paani mein chalega? Polish kaise karna hai?” (“Is it durable? Will it withstand water? How to polish?”). Meanwhile, his son or daughter is pointing at a phone saying, “Dad, this influencer is wearing this shoe—you have to buy that style.” It says a lot about India: we’re fashionconscious but also qualityconscious. Indians don’t shop in silos; they shop with friends/family. If they come alone, they’ll take a photo or videocall someone. Simultaneously, they check online for prices and competitor offerings, and what influencers are wearing. If you’re not connected to that reality—how customers behave, interact with products and salespeople—you can’t survive. 

Vivek: Since you and your brother took over, especially post 2008–09 and the Flipkart era, consumer tastes and shopping habits changed sharply. How did you adapt and stay relevant? 

Nazim: I wouldn’t call it turmoil; I’d call it segment and market expansion. Growing up, how many shoes did your father have? 

Vivek: He was in the army—probably three or four. 

Nazim: And colors? 

Vivek: Black, brown, and one sports shoe. 

Nazim: Exactly—the standard. Sometimes only black; I’ve seen people run in black formal shoes. In men’s specifically (which has evolved drastically), the “black and brown” has become black, brown, tan, maroon, blue, red—even a yellow pair of Onitsuka Tigers. The market has expanded. Someone who bought one pair every four years now buys four pairs a year. Our job is to keep up. Fifteen years ago, black was the primary men’s category. We studied celebrity dressing, parties, media photos, and saw a growing segment: tan footwear—worn with dark blue or grey suits. We weren’t sure about investing because it wasn’t part of our usual repertoire. But that season we bet on a tan collection, pushed it in marketing, and for the first time in as long as we could look back, a category outsold black—the tan collection. Customers were thrilled to have the new segment and lapped it up. It opened our minds: men are buying more and diversifying their wardrobes. Today a man’s wardrobe has blacks (oxfords, brogues), tans, browns, a big sneaker collection, and sportswear. Women always had more shoes—more color and openness to try different footwear—but that has also expanded: more indulgence in higher heels, bolder fits, and if an influencer wears something, trying it becomes a nobrainer. 

Vivek: How did you transform a thirdgeneration family business for the digital era? You mentioned your digital channel brings ~10% of business. It’s a long process; you think of it as expanding the market. How did you adapt, especially with influencers driving sales? 

Nazim: We weren’t the first movers; we probably got a jumpstart around COVID. We already had our website and were working with Myntra and Amazon, but we hadn’t dived in fully. Then COVID hit—shops shut overnight—and we had to figure out how to run a business without stores for an indefinite period. We used that time to build our online operations: integrating inventory across stores and warehouses for online channels; setting up logistics for pickups/deliveries across locations; getting packaging right so products arrive properly; and finding the right tech partners to make it seamless. That was 2020–2021. 

Nazim: Post that, we looked for partners to maximize the business. Tech keeps evolving. Four years ago, WhatsApp marketing wasn’t such a big deal; now it’s the goto. You visit a website and, as soon as you leave, you get a WhatsApp message. Whether you entered your number or not, partners are tracking (there are legalities to consider). Partners provide solutions to keep reaching customers in many ways, staying topofmind. In digital, being topofmind is crucial. We deploy marketing dollars across WhatsApp, email (SMS doesn’t work as well anymore), etc. Even with orders on Myntra and Amazon, we try to include communication that leads customers to our website, improving margins over time. It’s constantly evolving—you must keep finding tech partners that push you to the top of your game. Building all of it inhouse is hard, as we learned. 

Vivek: A couple of final questions on competition. For us, as a stock broker, the listed players are of interest. Could you describe the competitive landscape—for you and the industry—and growth expectations? Also, any IPO plans? If so, what metrics matter before you go public? 

Nazim: In our industry, the two largest listed players we’ve studied closely since we joined are Metro and Bata. Metro listed less than two years ago and is doing very well in the market. For us, they’re beacons—market leaders. While Regal isn’t a new business, my brother and I have been at it for ~15 years, and we look at them to understand what the India story can be. There’s a lot of scope for us to grow. We study their numbers across small cities—tier 1, 2, 3—and the differences among these segments. What we’ve realized: there’s just as much scope in tier 2 and tier 3 as in tier 1. If you look closely at their growth, much comes from these areas—markets a bit untapped. If you examine persquarefoot revenues, numbers from these towns and cities often match tier 1 and 2. It’s surprising, but there’s a lot of disposable income across the country. You see it in online orders from towns you may never have heard of. 

Nazim: Players like Metro and Bata give us confidence that what we’re doing now is maybe a tenth—or a hundredth—of where we can reach. Metro has 850+ stores; Bata 1,500+ across the country. That suggests scope to grow 30x from where we are. Going forward, yes, we’d look at an IPO in the next seven years—probably five. There are markers we need to hit before we go. But the road is clear. And like in any family, we hope the good elders—Metro and Bata, as market leaders—will be ready to hand over the torch when we’re there to take it. We expect that in the next few years we’ll be knocking at their doors for that number one position. 

Vivek: Last question: recommendations for our viewers—a book, podcast, or movie that enriched your life and you’d share with others? 

Nazim: I could give the wellrehearsed footwearguy answer: Shoe Dog by Nike’s founder—an excellent book about how he went from distributing Onitsuka Tigers to building Nike. It’s a story of grit, determination, and relentless sales drive. But my actual favorite is the movie Moneyball. If you haven’t seen it, it’s lovely. Brad Pitt plays the manager of an underdog baseball team in the U.S. with very limited funding compared to giants like the New York Yankees. Baseball was (and is) very traditional—player selection was traditional. He shifted to pure numbers—evaluating players on performance, not looks, crowd appeal, or ticket pull. He cut the background noise and focused on what mattered. The team broke the record for most consecutive wins in a season—on a fraction (a sixth or seventh) of other teams’ budgets. The film shows what’s possible by focusing on essentials and ignoring distractions. In business, that’s critical: there’s a lot of data, advice, and feedback, but you must strip away what’s not required and focus on what matters; results follow over time. 

Vivek: It’s based on Michael Lewis’s book, right? 

Nazim: Yes. 

Vivek: Viewers, you should read as many Michael Lewis books as you can—he’s a great business writer who finds stories and characters where you wouldn’t expect them. That aligns with what you said about business. 

Vivek: Nazim, thanks a lot for taking the time. It was a real pleasure having this conversation. 

Nazim: Thank you for having me. This was lovely. 

Vivek: Bazaar & Beyond—Founder Edition. Stay safe and invest wisely. Investments in securities markets are subject to market risks. Read all related documents carefully before investing.