India's Retail Sector Boosts Focus on Female Workforce

By: WE Staff | Friday, 26 December 2025

• The retail industry in India is witnessing growing attention towards recruiting female workers
• The retailers intend to hire more females in the coming years
• Female involvement is considered crucial for customer service and retaining staff

India's retail industry is increasingly looking towards women as an important talent source, and retailers are planning to increase their female workforce in the years to come.

Women are being considered for retail positions in store-level, middle management, and supervisory roles, since their inclusion is believed to have an important effect on customer service and business growth.

As retailers increase their brick-and-mortar presence, it is predicted that women's responsibilities will extend from sales and visual merchandising to operations and people management. Despite this trend, the representation of women remains diverse across categories and geographies.

TeamLease Services, an HR consulting firm, observed that the proportion of women differs widely in different retail segments.

Even though women account for almost two-thirds of the people employed in lifestyle, fashion, beauty, and cosmetics retailing, their proportion in the electronics and consumer durables segment is meager, with only 5-7 percent of women in the same field with similar jobs and the same wages.

The disparity is highest in the FMCG field sales jobs because of the need to travel, pressure to perform, and the absence of facilities.

Increased female engagement has been associated with focused investments at work. Industries such as electronics manufacturing services and garment manufacturing provide women with an opportunity to be hired through programs such as the provision of hostels, safe means of transport, female-managed accommodations, and training programs. According to TeamLease, while getting women to join may be difficult, they tend to stay in their jobs.

According to a report by V5 Global, there has been a 23 percent increase in women in the workforce triggered by flexible working patterns, gig economies, and customer service roles in fashion, beauty, and e-commerce.

The retail industry in India is expected to expand from 1.18 trillion in 2025 to almost 2 trillion in 2030, with organized retail contributing over 35 percent to it.

Several companies discussed how they are trying to create a balanced workforce. Essensai067, a Bengaluru-based organization, has a balanced gender split in terms of workforce, while Archies said that women comprise almost half of its Offline Retail Force, which will be expanded in viewing and zone positions.

Kolhapur-headquartered Ghodawat Retail revealed that women make up around 30 percent of employees nationwide, although there is a higher quotient in Maharashtra, which is expected to increase through local recruitment.

EV solutions company Motovolt stated that women constitute slightly more than 10 percent of their employee base, although there is a higher representation in manufacturing, which is expected to increase as it expands operations.

Jewelry retailer Solitario is trying to reach a balance regarding gender equality among its entire staff at the corporate office, while healthcare retail chain ‘MY LYF CARE’ said women constitute about half of their total staff in stores, which is expected to increase over the next few years.