Tanishq plans to boost digital presence with CaratLane

Tanishq, the jewellery brand under Titan, plans to leverage the digital presence of online jewellery retailer CaratLane to increase its digital presence to woo tech-savvy buyers, especially in the low-ticket purchases. This comes in the backdrop of Titan embracing an omnichannel approach to revive growth and stay in tune with changing business scenario. 

In July, Titan had bought a majority stake of about 62% in CaratLane for Rs 357 crore. “The assimilation (between the two firms) is happening. We bought it because we believed the exclusive potential in the online jewellery space,” said C K Venkatraman, chief executive officer of Tanishq. 

CaratLane will continue to remain an independently-run company and discussions on possible synergies on what items are to be sold online are currently underway. He added that CaratLane is in the right price-points for online sales with an average price point in the range of Rs 20,000-25,000.  

Going ahead, Tanishq is not shying away to provide an online-to-offline experience for its customers. It wants to utilise the ease of shopping online by providing online assistance to customers. For instance, a customer might be able to ‘add to cart’ a few shortlisted designs online and book an appointment at the nearby store to shop at convenience in the future. 

Despite growth of e-retail in general, Venkatraman said online sales of jewellery will not see a huge spike because of high-value purchases. Since the average price points in jewellery sales are usually above Rs 50,000, customers usually prefer the ‘try and buy’ experience. “However, online sales will be driven mainly by gifting purchases which are often in the low-value ranges, between Rs 15,000- Rs 40,000,” he explained. 

According to a 2015 report by US-based full-service e-commerce and web development company Connecting Dots, online jewellery sales across the globe are just 4% to 5% of the whole market and is estimated that by 2020 the online sales of jewellery will touch only around 10%, globally.

Currently, online jewellery sales in India contributes only 0.5% to the market size. However, increasing online purchases coupled with rising influence of digital media will result in a market size worth $3 billion by 2019, about 20% of the global market size estimated at $18 billion. Add to this the increasing push on cashless transactions by the Centre.  

During the quarter ended September, Tanishq grew 39% piggybacking on more diamond studded jewellery sales. CaratLane reported a revenue of Rs 141 crore during the financial year ended March 31, a growth from Rs 127 crore during the corresponding period in the previous financial year. 

Titan stock closed at Rs 326, up by 0.21%, in the BSE on Friday.