The facade of Vachi on Sarat Bose Road

For the past nine years a quiet couple from Calcutta travel to Delhi, show at the fashion week there and come back with orders.

In between the two seasonal shows, the big fat Marwari wedding seasons keep them busy. Vachi, their flagship store at 19A Sarat Bose Road bears a minimal look all year round. But designer-couple Swapan & Seema Suhasaria are about to change all that.

Starting September 2, Vachi will make a jump from being a single-label brand to a 25-label designer store including names like Ranna Gill, Rohit Gandhi & Rahul Khanna, Namrata Joshipura, Manish Gupta, Shyam Narayan Prasad and Nakul Sen.

“We have 2,000sqft space on the ground level in prime property area (opposite Nepal Sweets). Turning our flagship store to a multi-designer store makes business sense. Not only will we increase our sales with more variety, we will also draw more footfalls and promote fashion in general,” says Swapan.

Bhavna sports a Ranna Gill look

This is not the first time Vachi is experimenting with its portfolio. Around 2004-05 they began stocking a few labels like Krishna Mehta, Poonam Bhagat, Agnimitra Paul and other “local names” only to discontinue these after a while and concentrate on promoting design graduates.

For this latest reinvention some major rehauling of the store has taken place. Black mirrors, silver accents and a touch of grey have come together to give the sprawling store an “European, Armani-like” facelift. “We have increased the hanging space to accommodate 25 designers. Everyone used to complain that our store looks empty. We liked the bare look and thankfully it still doesn’t look cluttered,” explains Swapan.

Accessories are another focus of the new, improved Vachi. They used to stock the odd bag here and there but now with so many accessory labels like Amethyst, Icy and Me, Art and Apparels and Tad under their umbrella, the shop windows will tell a different story.

The Suhasarias are confident about their location and not deterred by their proximity to designer den 85 Lansdowne. “We have made sure that our designer mix doesn’t clash with theirs. And anyway, Calcutta is a shopping destination and the market is big enough,” smiles Swapan. The grit in him is inherited from his mother Gita Suhasaria, 69, who started the legendary Rose Beauty boutique back in the 1970s, still known for its bandhni, saris and lehngas.

The three pillars that will now determine the success of Vachi are the make or break factors of any product — pricing, merchandising and the sales team. Swapan is confident about all three. He says, “The pricing is competitive. A Ranna Gill outfit will cost you the same here as it would in Delhi or Mumbai and the merchandise is hand-picked by Seema and me. This time around we had the time but maybe we will hire a merchandiser soon and our sales team is old and knows the clientele.”

Depending on how things go in the next six months, Vachi may double its retail space by including the 2,000sqft basement area.

The one thing the two are sure about is not letting the brand Swapan & Seema Suhasaria get lost in the long designer list. “We will ensure that does not happen,” Swapan smiles.