Titan polishes its diamond play as gold stays volatile
Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. Titan Co., the country’s largest jewellery retailer by revenue, plans to drive adoption and consumption of natural and lab-grown diamond jewellery as prices remain volatile for the precious stones and gold. Titan’s jewellery division needs to grow all of its arms to “really drive adoption and consumption of diamond jewellery and overall growth of the portfolio, consumer confidence and love for the brands," chief executive officer (CEO) Arun Narayan told Mint on Friday.
Apart from India, the company has 30 stores in the Middle East, Singapore, and North America, and plans to grow in these markets, he said. Only about 12% of the jewellery sold in India is diamond and the majority of the purchases still focus on gold, showing a clear scope for growth. “Women are clearly seeing lab-grown (diamonds) as something which is an indulgence, something they can buy frequently without any guilt, and they're seeing natural diamonds as something very special which is reserved and kept for special occasions to mark certain milestones, " he said.
Tanishq has been launching Diamond Expertise Centres in its showrooms to authenticate diamonds, hoping to mirror the market trust that its gold karatmeters once established. The management plans to increase the number of such centres to 200 by March, from 50 currently. Meeting at the flagship store in Andheri, which is situated opposite the newly launched lab-grown diamond (LGD) outlet, Narayan said Indian consumers look at LGDs as an “and" or additional choice, not “either-or, like in the US".
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