While the real estate sector in Mumbai is currently witnessing a slump, the interior design segment is still able to hold its ground. Mumbai Live spoke to Shezan Bhojani, CEO & Co-founder of Design Cafe to understand how the post-COVID-19 times look for the segment.
Talking about the same, Bhojani said, “Mumbai and MMRDA regions remain the largest interior design and real estate market in the country with interior design being at an estimated size of Rs 5500 crore per year”.
He further feels that with this pandemic, the market dynamics will shift from the unorganized segment to organized. So what this means that from unorganised carpenters and contractors the business would shift to more organized players.
Even without the impact of coronavirus, about 80 per cent of the market was dominated by individual architects and local contractors and that trend is expected to grow going forward.
However, due to the outbreak, a lot of people had to delay their plans to give their homes a makeover. At the same time, there are also customers who are now looking at getting their work done faster as they want to make up for all the time that they lost due to the lockdown.
Talking about the consumer behaviour, Bhojani added that, “We are observing clients being more budget-sensitive than earlier - they have earmarked a budget for their project and they are keen to stick to the same. Some clients are keen to explore lower price options for their home interiors”.
With the uncertainty trickling in the market, dynamics have also changed. While a lot of people want to put off unnecessary expenses others want to keep their budgets under a tight check.
While the economies are getting into the unlock phase it may take time for things to get back to normal and while that happens there may be a shift from unorganised to organised segment,