After tweaking its menu to suit the Indian palate, fast-food brand Subway plans to expand its presence across IT parks, highways, hospitals and food courts.

“At least 30 per cent of our new stores will be in non-traditional formats, such as highways and IT parks. The rent in such locations is much less compared with high streets or malls,” said Gurpreet Gulri, Country Head, Subway franchise India.

The Indian arm of the Connecticut-based chain, known for its submarines and sandwiches, started operations in India in 2001. It has 411 stores at present in the country.

Gulri said the company follows a franchise business model and the restaurants are completely owned by local franchisees. “We plan to have about 650 outlets by 2015,” he said, adding that low start-up costs make the model profitable.

According to a NRAI-Technopak report, the quick service restaurant franchise (QSR) market is pegged at Rs 5,500 crore in 2013 and is estimated to touch Rs 16,785 crore by 2018.

On adapting itself to Indian taste buds, Gulri said the company had tweaked its menu to include vegetarian fare and also menu sans onion and garlic. “We are currently working on developing an Indian bread also,” he added.

He said the new restaurants will be in various formats, from kiosks to dine-ins, in sizes ranging from 250 sq ft to 2,000 sq ft. “We are exploiting all formats to stay profitable,” he said, without divulging either the investment figures or revenue from its India operations.

Subway has also started attracting youngsters and health-conscious customers. “Everything is sourced locally, which brings the best flavour and also helps us reduce import costs,” Gulri said.



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