He added that they will not increase their prices along with the expected hike in GST rate. The Group of Ministers (GoM) recently proposed increasing the GST rate on shoes costing more than R15,000 from 18% to 28%.

“If the proposal is implemented, we will take some hit and not pass on all the price increases to consumers. Our lowest price is R4,999 and goes up to R21,999,” he said.

On demand from tier 2 and tier 3 cities, Khurana said he could never have imagined 9 years ago such strong demand beyond metro cities. Around 60% of ASICS stores opened in the last year are in Tier 2 and 3 cities.

Khurana also said that performance-oriented running shoes are growing faster than the industry and account for 55% of their total sales. The company recently reintroduced the SportStyle Skyhand OG sneakers after a 30-year hiatus to increase its presence in the sneaker segment.