Titan's jewellery business picks up amid fall in gold prices: CEO

CEO said buying for investment had peaked in the past one year

Titan’s jewellery stores are seeing customers in large numbers after the recent fall in gold prices, owing to which buyers have advanced their purchases for weddings. 

 

“We are seeing purchases for weddings being advanced — the weddings that are slated for later this quarter and even early next quarter. Whenever gold rates cool a bit, people are back. And whenever they spike, people wait to see how things are developing. Somewhere, people are sensing that they (gold prices) could go up,” said Arun Narayan, chief executive officer, jewellery business, Titan.

 

He said buying for investment, such as coins, had peaked for the company in the past one year. 

 

“In October-December, there was a bit of a lull (in demand) for a bit of a wait-and-watch approach consumers were adopting.”

 

The company is in the process of rolling out “Diamond Expertise Centres” across its Tanishq stores. There a customer can check for the authenticity of the stone. It expects to immediately roll out the service across 50 stores in the next 10 days and then scale it up to 200 stores by the end of March. 

 

“It’s a large initiative to give confidence to customers and give transparency as well,” Narayan said, adding, it would be taken to its stores outside India. It has one such centre in Dubai and will take it to its other stores. 

 

He said there was a lot of investment in developing the equipment because all of that was being developed in-house through “our own research and development”. However, he did not say how much.

 

The large investment is to tell “you which is a natural diamond and which is lab-grown”.