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Kalyan Jewellers to launch flagship showroom in Chennai

By Bhawana Anand | April 09, 2015

The brand is looking at this network expansion to drive growth; eyes Rs.13,000 crore in FY 15-16

Kalyan Jewellers, a jewellery brand manufacturer and distributor, announced its foray into the Chennai market. The company is investing close to Rs 200 crore for its first showroom in Sir Theyagaraya Road in T Nagar, the hub for jewellery.  This is the largest investment by any jeweller in a single showroom across the country.  The bespoke showroom is spread across 40,000 sq. feet and will display 600 kg of jewellery and offer a wide variety of more than 5,00,000 contemporary and traditional designs. Customers can access a private lounge through prior appointment for an exclusive experience. A designated children's play area inside the showroom creates an inclusive and comfortable shopping environment for families.

The showroom will be inaugurated on April 17 by the Kalyan brand ambassadors including Mr. mitabh Bachchan, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Prabhu Ganesan, Nagarjuna Akkineni, Shivaraj Kumar, Manju Warrier and Vikram Prabhu. With the launch of the Chennai showroom, Tamil Nadu will be one of the largest markets, outside of Kerala, for Kalyan Jewellers with a cumulative investment of Rs. 600 crore across 16 showrooms in the state. The company will open four more showrooms, with 15,000 sq. feet each, in Chrompet, Adyar, Vellacherry and Anna Nagar, of which two will be during the course of this financial year and two in the early part of next year. A total of Rs.300 crore will be invested in these four showrooms.

T.S.Kalyanaraman, Chairman & Managing Director of Kalyan Jewellers said, "This is a golden moment as the Chennai showroom is the 50th for the company in the South. We wanted to ensure that we made an emphatic entry into Chennai and offer a superior value proposition, in terms of quality, design, service and make it a unique and memorable shopping experience for jewellery connoisseurs. We had to work on optimizing our supply chain efficiency to ensure that we provide a differentiated and compelling proposition. As a brand, we are known for bringing transparency and trust into the business of jewellery and we will do the same here in Chennai.''

Kalyan Jewellers has been aggressively expanding its distribution network after the recent equity infusion of Rs. 1,200 crore by Warburg Pincus. The company has been consolidating its national presence and expanding in West Asia. "We are investing Rs. 800 crore in the next fiscal to open 22 showrooms in India and West Asia. We are targeting 30% growth in topline to Rs. 13,000 crore and enhancing the distribution network by 30% in the year. The company is also in the process of converting its 570 çustomer service centres into mini''My Kalyan'' stores which will focus on selling affordable diamonds to capitalise on the potential of this category. We are also ramping up our manufacturing operations and plan to have India's biggest production house by 2017,” said Rajesh Kalyanaraman, Executive Director.

Kalyan has presence across South India, Maharashtra, Gujarat, National Capital Region (NCR) and Punjab, and has a network of 65 exclusive showrooms in India and 12 exclusive outlets in West Asia — including nine in the United Arab Emirates and three in Kuwait. Kalyan Jewellers has identified Chennai, Kolkata and Bhubaneswar as the new markets for expansion in India in this financial year. The company is launching in Qatar with six showrooms. Kalyan is also consolidating its existing presence in the NCR, Maharashtra and Kerala by opening showrooms in Gurgaon, Noida, Pune, Mumbai and Kodungallor.

The company has been planning to launch in Chennai for a while and was waiting for an opportune moment. Ramesh Kalyanaraman, Executive Director said,''Chennai is the most important and fiercely competitive jewellery market in the country and it was important to get the proposition right.  We have been planning extensively to ensure that shoppers have a delightful experience at this showroom. The showroom can accommodate up to 500 customers at any given time and it will also have parking space for 100 cars and 200 two wheelers. We have handpicked 500 of our best sales persons who can speak ten languages to explain the nuances of jewellery and educate customers on extracting value from their purchase. The jewellery itself has been curated by in-house design teams to fulfill distinct needs of the local communities.”

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