The general perception is that the Spanish fashion giant is a womenswear brand but, almost every urban man knows of and buys from Zara. And their reasons are quite straightforward: great variety and durability that is almost absent with other big names in the industry.

Every metro city around the country is marked with a Zara store. They are almost always packed with teenagers and twentysomethings scurrying through the every-15-days collection, meaning the collections change every fifteen days so that people get a chance to be on par with international style standards. That’s how much of a popularity the brand has gained over its existence in the Indian market.

Just this May, Zara opened its biggest store yet in Mumbai by restoring a 110-year old heritage building and making the space a two-storeyed shopping experience. Its vast at 51,300 square feet was a joint restoration venture between local architects and Zara’s in-house talent, as well.

Aligning itself with the fall/winter cycle, the brand officially launched its online shopping portal on October 4 which has us wondering, why Zara ever make that move.

We ask because every time someone visits an offline store, the experience of actually touching, trying and eventually buying a Zara product makes it the kind of shopping experience you’d always like to be a part of. So why take that joy away from its customers who don’t mind spending on cab money, an expensive Starbucks coffee and basically embracing the entire store when they step into it?