Mukesh Ambani's Reliance will battle Tata Starbucks with India’s first Pret A Manger sandwich & coffee outlet

Billionaire Mukesh Ambani-backed Reliance Brands is all set to take on Tata Starbucks with the launch of the first store of British sandwich and coffee chain ‘Pret A Manger’ in India on Friday, amid businesses increasingly betting on the coffee culture among youngsters in a tea-drinking nation. 

The first store opened in Maker Maxity at Mumbai's Bandra-Kurla complex (also popularly known as BKC). A total of 10 ‘Pret A Manger’ stores are planned in India in the first year of the franchisee partnership between Reliance Brands Limited, a subsidiary of Reliance Retail, and the British chain which was announced last year.  

Reliance Brands MD Darshan Mehta said the company was thrilled to be opening the first Pret shop in India. 

"Freshness of ingredients, authenticity of recipes, and curiosity in processes define the new Indian consumer. Our partnership with Pret A Manger aims to tap into this curiosity with an offering that we can proudly say - ensures traceability of coffee beans as much as a zero additive approach to food," Mehta said. 

Last year, Mehta had said the brand will focus on airports in India. Up to 100 Pret A Manger stores will open in India over the next five years, according to the agreement. 

Meanwhile, Tata Starbucks, the most dominant player in the space, has 275 stores across 30 cities. The 50:50 JV between Tata Consumer Products and American coffee chain Starbucks launched 50 new stores in FY22, the highest ever in a year for the company. 

“In the long-term, this will be competition to Tata Starbucks. The high pricing of Starbucks could come under risk,” said Abneesh Roy, Executive Director, Nuvama Institutional Equities.  

Pret A Manger’s CEO Pano Christou said that coming to India had been a goal for a long time, and the opening of the first shop in Mumbai was a landmark moment in the company's international expansion plans.  “We have been working closely with the RBL (Reliance Brands) team to create an offer for Indian consumers that reflects the Pret brand, while also adapting to local preferences and food habits,” he said.  

Several coffee brands and chains have started operations in India recently. Canadian coffee and baked goods chain Tim Hortons opened two stores in Delhi-NCR in August 2022, with plans to open a total of 120 stores in India over the next three years at a total investment of Rs 240 crore. Its CEO Navin Gurnaney, who is former Starbucks India CEO, had told another publication that the Indian coffee market is expected to reach over $4.2 billion in size by 2025, with out-of-home consumption accounting for about 20 per cent. 

The D2C boom in India has also had a lot of private equity-funded coffee and coffee-related startups like Blue Tokai, Sleepy Owl, SLAY Coffee, Rage Coffee, Third Wave Coffee, Beanly and Country Bean have come to the fore. They sell everything ranging from ground coffee powder, roasted coffee beans, cold coffee, pour-over coffee, hot brew bags and Nespresso pods. Meanwhile, brands like iD have launched ready-to-use coffee decoctions as well.   

Coffee-drinking culture is not new in the country. But it has largely been limited to the southern part of the country, which is where most of the production happens. India guzzled 1,143.61 million kilograms (mkg) of tea and roughly 10 mkg of coffee in FY22, according to data from the Tea and Coffee boards of India. 

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