Young Turk – Harsh Hemdev
Fourth-generation jeweller Harsh Hemdev has his finger on the millennial pulse. His consumers want wearable, multipurpose and pocket-friendly, and Hemdev is happy to provide — with a well-considered range of flexible jewellery designs. The results speak for themselves.
Family business, but first…
I have always dreamt of taking my family’s jewellery business to the next level. Even so, when I returned to India after completing my master’s degree from King’s College, London, I did not join the family firm right away. I wanted to understand the industry first — and this happens best when you work for someone else. For the necessary hands-on experience, I trained extensively in the factories of two renowned companies with great global exposure. Only after that did I join the family business Ghanasingh Fine Jewels (Kamlesh Hemdev Group).
New consumers, new design ideas
There is a subtle change in the way jewellery is being perceived, led by millennial consumers. To appeal to them jewellery must be trendy, unique and at the same time pocket-friendly. Consumers now are more receptive towards new ideas, designs and products.
Having reflected upon this, my design team and I started ideating on how best we could tweak jewellery to meet the expectations of our new-age clientele. Using Matrix, the latest software for jewellery design, we created a line of jewellery that can be worn in more than one way. We homed in on the concept of illusion settings and lightweight pieces.
Detachable — i.e., modular and multipurpose [Confirm. “Detachable” doesn’t sound self-explanatory.] — jewellery multiplies its utility to its owner, because it can adapt to a range of occasions. For example, a two- or three-line necklace can serve as a special-occasion adornment, while its detachable lines can be worn separately as tennis bracelets or leave behind an elegant and simple single-line necklace.
This concept makes the product trendy and more wearable. Making it lightweight and using illusion settings and other such methods result in a reasonable retail price without sacrificing visual appeal. Put these aspects together and you have satisfied consumers.
Market says yes, please!
We promote our detachable jewellery through social media and exhibitions, and the response is very encouraging. Since this is all BIS-hallmarked jewellery complete with certified diamonds, our customers are assured of being on-trend and with genuine products.
Initiatives like these have helped us reach out to more customers, and improved and increased our already strong brand recognition. The introduction of detachable jewellery alone gave us a 3–4 per cent increase in footfall.
Young Turk – Dipankar Jain
Head: Ushering in wind of change
Dipankar Jain, director, Nikkamal Jewellers, Ludhiana, Punjab, wants his showroom to stand out and be the must-visit destination for jewellery shopping. He plans on offering his clients a shopping experience which they have never dreamt of. He realizes for this to happen, he needs trained staff who he considers to be the most important aspect of his business.
Learning by doing
I started young. I began helping my father, Chandrakant Jain, in his work when I was just 19 years old. I started in the showroom on a part-time basis. Working with my father was a solid education, and I learned a lot about retailing.
After graduating from college, I wanted to learn more about the industry, but without doing a formal training course. So I ventured into the world on my own. I went to Surat and took up a job in a jewellery manufacturing unit. There I learnt jewellery-making, how the karigars work. In fact, I crafted two or three pieces entirely on my own.
From Surat I moved on to Mumbai, to work at Ishu Datwani’s Anmol Jewels, as part of the sales team, for a year. This helped me understand the thought process of an employee, so that now I can think like a worker and not just as an employer. I learned that the workforce, the sales staff, these are the backbone of a business. If you treat them well, the business will flourish.
When I returned to Ludhiana after this multifaceted apprenticeship, I acted upon that learning. I had learned that we had to place our trust in our sales staff, to motivate them and make them part of our growth story.
Success is sharing
Ultimately, it is the sales team that handles our clients, not us. If the team is happy and fulfilled, the company will gain happier and more loyal customers. We do not need to focus on customers alone, our first job is to focus on our employees.
Accordingly, we have prepared a detailed training manual for our staff. We will call in experts to conduct in-house workshops on how to handle clients, close a deal, maintain customer relationships in the long run.
To boost job security, we are planning to offer our staff employment contracts — and this is not a done thing in our city. We want our staff not to be just salesmen or women but qualified professionals. We have an incentive to motivate them to do well. We want our staff to belong, we want them to feel proud of being part of Nikkamal Jewellers. Our success stories should be shared success stories.
Results and experience
Staff training and motivation are a long-term effort. I do not look for immediate results, but I do appreciate excitement and enthusiasm. Those qualities tell me that my staff is ready to give its best. The results will assuredly follow, if not immediately then certainly in the longer term.
My clients get the very best shopping experience, the kind they might expect from showrooms in Mumbai and Delhi.
