Godrej forays into mattress market

Chennai, Feb 26: Godrej, a household name in electronics, home appliances and consumer goods, today announced its foray into the more lucrative mattress segment, with a goal of capturing 50 per cent of organised market share in the next three years.

Talking to newspersons here, Godrej Mattress Business Head J B Khodaiji said with the growing IT industry and the boom in the housing sector, the purchasing power had been increased and people were looking for more comforts. Keeping this in mind, the Godrej decided to foray into this segment by launching a wide range of mattresses that would redefine the way one sleeps on rubberised coir, spring and latex mattresses.

He said the matteresses were being manufactured at its five locations in India and the price ranged from Rs 100 per sq ft to Rs 1,000 per sq ft of mattresses, to make sure that consumer gets correct mattresses at every price.

Observing that the current market size was about Rs 5,500 crore, the Indian consumption, despite statistics revealing that 70 per cent of the population could not afford one, could be on par with the consumption in the US.

''There is so much potential but there are only two national players, apart from a slew of regional players. We wanted to exploit this to our advantage and create a niche market by capturing 50 per cent share in the two to three years,'' he added.

He said the company was also looking at exports to middle east countries soon. ''We will be exporting about five to ten per cent of our total production,'' he added.

Among the products launched included India's first rubberised coir mattress, euro top spring mattress, anti-microbial-treated mattress and five zone latex mattress.

UNI