New Delhi: Telecom operator Aircel on Tuesday opened 200 branded outlets, named XPRESS Stores, in a bid to expand its retail footprint across the country and plans to scale up the number to 500 by mid-2015.

"We are delighted to expand our national retail footprint by opening 200 Aircel XPRESS Stores across the country. We plan to elevate the number of such stores to 500 by first half of 2015," Aircel's National Head for Operations and Customer Support, Vipul Saurabh said in a statement.

Aircel's XPRESS Stores are franchisees of the company and will be operated by the franchisee holder. The stores exclusively provide Aircel's products and services, new connections, recharges and top-ups, resolution of customer queries, assistance and support to all new and existing customers.

Aircel had 71.15 million subscribers at the end of April, as per data released by industry body Cellular Operators Association of India.

The company has also tied up with directory service ASKME under which its customers can access contact information of services and utilities like taxi, restaurant, carpenter etc on an exclusive toll free number.

Also, if a registered service or utility provider in ASKME database is an Aircel customer, then he will not have to make any upfront payment for registration but pay only on getting business leads. --PTI