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T Mitra Adi Perkasa (MAPI), the Indonesian fashion and lifestyle retailer with the country’s most extensive brand portfolio, has introduced its first Asian fashion-wear brand to the local market to further tap into the burgeoning young, middle-class market.

Agus Gozali, the president director of PT Prima Mode Indonesia (PMI), said the retailer had brought the Philippine-based brand, Penshoppe, for the Indonesian consumer.

PT PMI, a subsidiary of MAPI, will oversee Penshoppe.

“Asian brands are not inferior to European brands,” he said.

He added that Asian brands increasingly met standards “to become some of the best global brands”.

Penshoppe itself has more than 300 stores in the Philippines as well as Saudi Arabia.

MAPI spokeswoman Fetty Kwartati added that Penshoppe targeted middle-class consumers between the ages of 16 and 27, a market far from saturation despite the many MAPI brands targeting this segment.

“This target market is one that has such breadth that one more brand will not saturate it,” she said.

A study by Visa found that total annual disposable income among tony Indonesian urbanites aged between 18 and 28 stood at US$38.2 billion.

Besides Penshoppe, MAPI owns licenses for youth-oriented brands, such as Pull & Bear, which are Western-based. The retailer oversees around 115 fashion and food and beverage brands.

Fetty added that Penshoppe would run on a similar concept to Marks & Spencer stores by providing not only clothes and accessories, but also toiletries.

“However, the toiletries will become available further down the road,” she said, adding that the floor area in Penshoppe stores would be large, measuring around 200–400 square meters.

She added that the retailer had chosen the Philippine brand because, besides having expanded to other countries, the brand’s concept and pricing suited the preferences of the target market. The prices of the items, she said, averaged around Rp 1 million (US$103.63).

“These prices are fit for malls and will help us reach out to middle-class consumers,” she said.

She added that the retailer had opened two Penshoppe stores (at Alam Sutera and Central Park shopping malls), and aimed to have 10 more stores open by the end of the year, including Pekanbaru in Riau, Sumatra.

She said MAPI had partly funded the opening of the two initial stores with capital expenditure reserves from its 2012 expenditure allocation of Rp 600 billion.

Fetty added that the retailer had not set hard sales or revenue targets for Penshoppe, given that this was the brand’s first year in operation.

In the first nine months of 2012, MAPI earned net revenues of Rp 5.4 trillion, up by 29 percent compared to earnings in the same period the previous year.

The increase in revenues pulled up net profits by 24 percent to Rp 282 billion and operating profits by 22 percent to Rp 509 billion.

The retailer, which runs at least 1,383 retail stores across the country, had their corporate rating from credit rating agency PT Pemeringkat Efek Indonesia (Pefindo) upgraded from A+ to AA-.

Fetty, however, added that US and European brands would continue to dominate in terms of numbers.

“There will not be that many Asian brands,” she said.

However, Asian brands and retailers have begun making inroads into Indonesia. The Central Retail Corporation (CRC), a member of the Thailand-based Central Group of Companies, has announced plans to open their Central Department Store in 2014. Malaysian retailer, Parkson, has also made its entry into the country.

—JP/ Mariel Grazella