Go Colors hits a dead end as leggings log out of fashion

An ongoing shift in India's women's bottom-wear market is starting to bite a Chennai-based retailer that bet and rose on a fashion trend now firmly past its prime.

- Vaeshnavi Kasthuril

An ongoing shift in India's women's bottom-wear market is starting to bite a Chennai-based retailer that bet and rose on a fashion trend now firmly past its prime.

Over a decade, Go Colors built a legacy around leggings as a stand-in for the Indian churidar and a bridge to western wear as an alternative to jeans. But as garment silhouettes widen and tastes evolve, leggings are no longer the star they once were. The change in the fortunes of India's only listed bottom wear-focused companies shows the perils of building a business on one trend, even a long-lasting one.

"Churidars, leggings historically, before covid, were 50%, 55% of the business. And post-covid, it has slowly settled at about 35% because the other categories, the trousers category, have done fairly well and have picked up in volumes," Gautam Saraogi, the Go Colours CEO told analysts during the September FY26 post-earnings interaction.