Mahindra First Choice Services (MFCS) has announced plans to expand its footprint in the states of West Bengal and Odisha. MFCS’s growth plans for the state envisage 30 new workshops by March 2016.

The company foresees great potential for its multi-brand car servicing business in West Bengal and Odisha and invites applications from existing OEM dealers, independent car workshops, and other automobile-related businesses as well as from those currently engaged in non-auto businesses in various cities and towns, for franchisee partnerships.

According to YVS Vijay Kumar, CEO, Mahindra First Choice Services, “We are delighted to further expand our network in West Bengal and Odisha, which are strategic markets for MFCS. Our business model for franchisees, especially our spare parts management model, has received a strong response and we are in the process of expanding this model across the country. With the increase in our network strength, we are confident of leveraging economies of scale to deliver higher value to our franchise partners as well as customers. We are looking for the right partners with strong entrepreneurial ability. They may not necessarily be associated with the auto industry but should have a passion for automobiles. Our partners need to have the ability to couple their understanding of local trends with robust MFCS systems to help provide a delightful service experience to car owners.”

MFCS provides franchise partners with a high level of support, helping them design workshop layouts and ensuring optimum utilisation of land and resources. The Mahindra Group subsidiary also helps them select the right manpower and workshop staff, who are trained at the company’s ‘Yellow Spanner Academy’ and technical training centres in Noida and Bangalore.

Over the past year, MFCS has expanded its network rapidly through Franchisee Owned Franchisee Operated (FOFO) workshops. As of September 31, the company had 81 workshops in 13 states. In the last one year, MFCS appointed more than 190 franchisees, of which 59 workshops are already up and the balance are scheduled to commence operations in the next 3-4 months.

MFCS expands its network in clusters with each cluster comprising a geographical region of around 250-300km radius. Each cluster has a ‘cluster warehouse’ which supplies spares to all the workshops in that particular cluster. Currently, the company operates clusters in Chennai, Coimbatore, Madurai, Kochi, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Vijayawada, Mumbai, Pune, Nagpur and NCR.