MUMBAI: Fashion retailer Hennes & Mauritz’s yearly India sales crossed Rs 1,000 crore sales mark three years after entering the country but growth at 29% was significantly slower than preceding years when it doubled business each year. For the year to end of November, sales climbed to Rs 1109 crore from Rs 860 crore a year ago, the world’s second-largest clothing firm said in a statement issued on Thursday. During the year, the retailer expanded stores aggressively – it opened 12 doors last year – and kept prices lower than rivals. H&M, which follows a December-November financial year, entered India in October 2015. It has opened, on average, a store every month, taking the tally to 39 now. Earlier, the company had said it would open 50 stores in India with an investment of Rs 700 crore by 2020.The retailer also entered the Indian online market last year. In its three years of operations, H&M has surpassed several brands by sales, including Levi Strauss and Benetton, which have been in the country for two decades now, and Marks & Spencer, which started a decade ago. However, Spanish chain Zara, which opened its first store in India in 2010, is still the biggest international apparel brand in the country with sales of Rs 1221 crore during 2017-18. The clothing chain, that runs nearly 5000 stores worldwide, reported a 5% increase in yearly sales globally. In India, its sales rose 43% to Rs306 crore during quarter ended November, double than a year ago period when it grew 20%. “Against a backdrop of rapid changes in the fashion industry, in 2018 we accelerated our transformation to future proof our business, ending a challenging year for the H&M Group and the sector with strong signals that we are on track,” Karl-Johan Persson, global CEO at H&M said in the statement. The Stockholm-based brand stocks fast fashion items created in-house and teams up with designers for one-time collections. It keeps a large inventory of basic, everyday items sourced from places including India and Bangladesh that carry a lower price tag than most of its rivals. This contrasts the Zara model, which is based on imitating the latest fashion, making affordable versions and stocking them for just a few days.