The Founder & Brand Lead of Urban Jungle notes that consumers have evolved to see luggage as a statement piece, much like fashion
Emphasising that new-age consumers want their luggage to feel like an extension of their personality, not just a utility purchase, Tanisha Jatia, Founder & Brand Lead, Urban Jungle, stated that they are building Urban Jungle for scale, not just size.
In conversation with BW Retail World, Jatia noted that the next few years for the brand is about deepening its presence across categories, creating a strong offline footprint and strengthening its direct channel as the brand’s storytelling hub. The brand has committed an investment of approximately Rs 20 crore to open 15 exclusive brand outlets (EBOs) across metro cities over the next year.
She added that quick-commerce has emerged as an exciting new channel for the brand, already contributing about 5 per cent of total revenue and growing 50 to 60 per cent month-on-month.
When you look at India’s luggage/travel gear market, what white-spaces or consumer pain points did you see that legacy brands weren’t addressing?
When we looked at India’s luggage and travel gear landscape, it was clear that the market was dominated by legacy players focused largely on functionality and price, but not on emotion, design, or identity. The luggage industry, now a Rs 170 billion market growing at 12 per cent compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) to Rs 267 billion by 2028, is undergoing a major shift from utility to lifestyle creating opportunities for design-driven disruptors like Urban Jungle.
We saw a visible white space in how new-age consumers, particularly those between 20 and 35, were engaging with travel. They wanted their luggage to feel like an extension of their personality, not just a utility purchase. For years, India’s luggage narrative revolved around durability and discounts. Yet today’s traveller wants colour, character, and consideration. Most existing brands still operate within predictable colours – black, navy, and grey, while consumers have evolved to see luggage as a statement piece, much like fashion. The category is evolving so fast that to stay ahead, we operate more like a design-tech house than a conventional luggage company.
Your first exclusive store opened in Pune, with over 15 more planned across metros. How do you decide which cities, malls or micro-locations to pick? And what’s the payback period per store?
Pune was a deliberate first choice because it mirrors our core consumer – urban, mobile, aspirational, and experience-led. The shopper there engages deeply with design-forward retail and Phoenix Market City allowed us to deliver our full brand experience in a vibrant, high-influence environment.
Our second store, recently opened at Oberoi Sky City Mall in Borivali, Mumbai, reflects the same philosophy. It is a destination where brands and culture intersect, a perfect fit for Urban Jungle’s immersive retail experience in one of Mumbai’s most dynamic suburban hubs. We have committed an investment of approximately Rs 20 crore to open 15 exclusive brand outlets (EBOs) across metro cities over the next year. Our offline expansion complements our strong D2C foundation and growing shop-in-shop network of 134 outlets and 120 premium dealers nationwide.
With an omnichannel model, how do you manage inventory visibility, channel conflict and pricing parity while protecting lifetime value and gross margin?
At Urban Jungle, we operate a unified inventory management system that provides real-time visibility across our D2C platform, marketplaces and exclusive brand outlets. This ensures efficiency, reduces overstocking, and allows us to respond quickly to demand trends.
Pricing parity is rigorously enforced across all our channel partners to preserve brand perception, protect margins and ensure a seamless consumer experience. Our average online order value currently stands at around Rs 5,500, while offline it’s approximately Rs 6,500 showing how experiential retail directly enhances basket size and lifetime value. Additionally, quick-commerce has emerged as an exciting new channel for us, already contributing about 5 per cent of total revenue and growing 50 to 60 per cent month-on-month.
Looking past the next 12 months, what are your long-term financial targets? Which business levers (category expansion, store productivity, international expansion) will drive that outcome?
We are building Urban Jungle for scale, not just size. The next few years are about deepening our presence across categories, creating a strong offline footprint, and strengthening our direct channel as the brand’s storytelling hub. We have recently crossed the Rs 100 crore annual recurring revenue (ARR) mark a strong validation of the brand’s growing resonance and business momentum. Our focus is on sustainable, margin-accretive growth driven by design differentiation, thoughtful pricing, and an obsession with product quality.
As we grow, the levers will evolve, today it is innovation and brand love; tomorrow it will be retail productivity and operational efficiency. The ambition is simple: to make Urban Jungle the most loved travel brand for young Indian travellers, while capturing a meaningful share of India’s Rs 267 billion luggage opportunity.
The luggage category used to be about durability and discounts,now it is about design, colour, and content. What are the biggest behavioural shifts you have observed and how do you predict these will evolve in the next three years?
We are seeing customers choose luggage the way they choose sneakers based on personality, not practicality alone. Looking ahead, that mindset will only deepen. At Urban Jungle, we are constantly building for that shift, creating luggage that is sleek, expressive, and travel-smart. Winning the Travel Sentry Design Excellence Award earlier this year for our caliber luggage collection was a huge validation of that vision that great design and great function can, and should, coexist.
As you expand your product categories beyond trolleys, what criteria do you use to decide which adjacent categories to enter? Where might you draw the line to avoid overextension?
Every new category we enter has to solve a real travel problem and add genuine value to how people move. Our approach is simple, if it makes travel smoother, smarter or more stylish, it belongs in our world. That is how we built innovations like our Lumolite range, one of the lightest luggage collections in its class given pain points of new airline weight restrictions, or our USB-charging backpacks designed for life on the go.
