Trendsmith offers insurance on jewellery purchases

Burglary and snatching of jewellery was on the rise. Trendsmith, the national jewellery retailer, claimed here that it had come up with a solution to the problem.

The company has tied up with New India Insurance for covering all gold ornaments and jewellery purchased from any of its five outlets for a period of one year, free of cost. The cover would start from the purchase date.

"Our clients have the option of continuing with the cover from New India Insurance after one year," explained Samrat Zaveri, managing director, Trendsmith (India) Ltd.

Meanwhile, the retail chain of jewellery outlets from the house of TBZ was all set to expand its chain to 50 by 2005 at an investment of Rs 250 crore, a portion of which will be financed through an initial public offer (IPO) next year.

"The rest of expansion will be funded through a combination of debt and internal accruals," explained Zaveri. The company was also looking forward for foreign participation from international jewellery manufacturers in the form of equity in the company.

At present, Trendsmith has five showrooms, one each in Mumbai, Chandigarh, Chennai, Bangalore and the recently opened one in Kolkata.

"Our next destination would be Delhi and we intend to invest around Rs 5 crore for every showroom that we would be setting up in the next couple of year," added Zaveri, who was in town to launch the company's first showroom in Kolkata, today.

"We have also entered into talks with Vijaya Bank, our banker for providing finance schemes for our clients," he informed. "Talks are on and we expect to launch the scheme a few months from now," he added.

"The Trendsmith concept was born out of an extensive research carried across Indian cities to understand the shifting requirement and aspirations of consumers in the jewellery sector. The jewellery retail market is witnessing a transition and is catering to the emerging jewellery consumers "" Trendsmith intends to cater to just these," Zaveri explained.