Titan may have got a better foothold in the online space with a majority stake in Carat Lane, but it now has the job of segregating its brands in its jewellery portfolio due to overlaps in positioning.
There is an overlap when it comes to the acquired brand of Carat Lane and Titan’s own jewellery brand of Mia, as both address the same target segment of young working women.
Carat Lane has already changed its communication across its 10 branded stores by adding that it is ‘a Tanishq partnership’ (Tanishq is Titan’s leading jewellery brand).
The Mia brand, which is sold through Tanishq stores as well its own, may need to have a different positioning. CK Venkataraman, CEO, Jewellery Division, Titan Company Limited, admits to the overlap between the two brands in the portfolio.
“We cannot afford to confuse consumers and have a job to do in dealing with this. Both Mia and Carat Lane cannot go after the same consumer. Now that we have acquired Carat Lane, we also have to sharpen its focus in a different direction,” he says.
Areas of overlap Apart from the same target segment, even the price points overlap between Mia and Carat Lane and both brands have almost the same number of offline stores at present.
“We have 15 standalone stores that have recently been re-branded as ‘a Tanishq partnership’. The back-end has been integrated with Tanishq but we will largely be an online brand, while Mia is going to be an offline brand,” said Mithun Sacheti, co-founder of Carat Lane.
Titan picked up a 60 per cent stake on Carat Lane recently, while the balance continues to remain with Mithun Sacheti.
Considering Tanishq has negligible presence online, the acquisition of Carat Lane is expected to serve its purpose of enhancing its digital revenues. “Revenues from the online medium is not even a decimal point for Tanishq, while Carat Lane is an online company. We expect to have larger revenues from the online space with the acquisition, apart from bringing Carat Lane on the path of profitability,” added Venkataraman.
In fact, except Tanishq and Mia, Titan’s jewellery brands Zoya (luxury brand) and mid-market offering under Gold Plus do not have an online presence.
“Unlike watches, which is big in the online space, jewellery sales is still small online as the medium is an enabler of purchase. Consumers tend to do research and experiment online before making an offline purchase. Growth in the jewellery category has been flat for the past two years but we plan to grow on the back of new collections and stores primarily,’’ said Venkataraman. Jewellery accounts for ₹9,000 crore of Titan’s ₹12,000 crore turnover.