Beauty engraved in glass jewellery

Murano glass jewellery can grace the fine neckline, the sparkling globules can dangle from the tender ear lobes. The moment is not far away for the Indian beauties as Natalie Hesse, President & CEO of LuckyClover International shares her retail plan in India.

Retailer: What opportunity do you see in the Indian market and how optimistic you are about the same?

NH: I am extremely optimistic about India. It is a huge market. We have received an overwhelmingly positive response from the clients at trade shows, specially the Franchise and Retail Summit, and I’m sure we have a great variety to offer to the Indian women.

Retailer: How do you plan to enter India? What is your market entry strategy?

NH: I am ideally looking for a master franchisor because I need someone on the ground to look after the development and management of infrastructure for the franchisees. I am looking for someone with a retail background with strong connections in the marketplace and who would know about the locations to choose and additionally have the ability to recruit and retain other franchisees.

Retailer: What would be your choice of location to set up shops?

NH: The best-suited sales avenue for our brand would be exclusive stand-alone stores on high street locations and shopping centres. SISs (Shop-in-shops) in department stores are also potential places I would look forward to for setting up shops.

 While SISs would have a limited assortment of the collections, our exclusive stand-alone stores would stock the entire range of different collections of LuckyClover.

Retailer: Tell us something about the LuckyClover jewellery. What is the USP and how do you keep your consumers excited about your brand?

NH: LuckyClover jewellery is extremely affordable and what I call as ‘Bridge Jewellery’.   Hence, while it can be kept for long as part of our collection, it is affordable enough to keep changing on different occasions.

Secondly, the Murano glass making technique is used for the manufacture of our LuckyClover range. It is a Venetian technique of glass making carried over from centuries. And besides Murano glass, we also use crystallised Swarovski elements, copper and bronze flecking and other mix of designs in manufacture of our ranges in order to keep up with changing demands of time. We have several hundred items in our LuckyClover collection. While we have a core collection that we carry all year around, we come up with regular spring-summer and fall-winter collections, which keeps changing. Besides, if there is something that receives great response, we decide to retain it as our core collection.

Retailer: Indian consumers are different from those in the west in terms of their preferences. Do you plan to tailor your offerings to suit their tastes and demands?

NH: I am keen on working with Indian designers to help me understand the nuances of the Indian women so the products would be well positioned with the needs of different seasons. While the Murano glass technique would be at the centre of the product line, I would like Indian designers to help me on the intricacies of the designs.

Retailer: Finally, how is your price strategy designed to deal with the value-conscious mindset of the Indian consumers?

NH: The price range of our LuckyClover jewellery collection varies from USD 25 to USD 200 and upwards, which makes it extremely affordable. For the Indian consumers, however, we have done a 15-20 per cent price correction.