Unperturbed by the decline in footfalls of consumers in malls and high streets, Symphony Asia-backed jewellery brand Melorra plans to launch 350 outlets by 2026 with a total investment of $50 million.
The company on January 21 launched three of them in Delhi besides one in Bangalore last month. It plans to launch at least a couple more in March in Mumbai and then step up the expansion from April with 30-40 outlets launched across the country by December.
"I do believe that COVID has accelerated the growth of online businesses ... for the jewellery business we are still talking about 10-20 percent in the coming years being online. There's still a huge market out there that online businesses haven't been to access by being purely online," Saroja Yeramilli, Founder and CEO of Melorra, told Moneycontrol.
"It is not necessary to be offline for trust or touch and feel. These issues are really going down as we speak and will go down more and more as India digitises rapidly. It is just about being wherever the consumer is... I am not one of the people who believes that offline retail is dead," she added.
Melorra last raised $12.5 million in an oversubscribed funding round by Symphony Asia, Lightbox Ventures and Alteria Capital, family offices of Burman, Jeejeebhoy and others.
On an average the company is investing Rs 2 crore in setting up one outlet of around 700 square feet. Yeramilli declined to comment on its fundraising plans.
Till late last year, offline jewellers across the country reported at least 20-25 percent dip in the business following COVID and successive lockdowns.
Melorra sells bracelets, rings, pendants among other jewellery itms and claims to be delivering across 2,100 pin codes in the country.
It targets young users seeking affordable, better-designed and trendy items. It locks horns with CaratLane which was acquired by Tata Group's Titan in 2016 and BlueStone, backed by firms such as Accel Partners and Saama Capital.
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