We're back here in the integrity campus of Titan. We've had conversations in the past with Bhaskar Bhatt, Venkat, and now the latest to join the bandwagon is their newest MD, Ajay Chawla, who joins us on the show to discuss the growth plan forward, the aspiration, the vision for Titan of the future. Always a pleasure, Ajay. Thank you, Mangalam. Welcome to Titan once again.
Yes, if there is one word that describes our ambition, it is growth. But growth has many dimensions.
So, what's your aspiration here?
The last 6 years, I think we've grown a CAGR of 24% in top line and 22% in bottom line. If we can sustain that momentum at the scale we are, that is ambitious. To me, if you're able to continue growing at a healthy double digit, broadly in the 15 to 20% range, that's great. But it is not just about kinetic energy. I think growth represents kinetic energy. As a leader, the broader approach should be to improve the potential energy of our brands, businesses, organization, talent, and capabilities. So, it is more important perhaps to leave the organization in a better place than one inherited.
Yeah. Yeah. And what you said right now seems to sum all of that up. You spoke about kinetic energy, potential energy, the role of an organization, growing the business, leadership. You're right. What would be the next 500 and 1 billion-dollar opportunities for Titan?
In a year, we serve about 30 million customers. Much to many people's surprise, less than 16-17% is from jewelry. About 84-83% of customers are served by all other categories: watches, eyewear, perfumes. Jewelry by virtue of value dominates the value composition. But when you ask about the next billion or half billion opportunities, clearly watches, international business, CaratLane, Teal (Titan Engineering and Automation) which can get to half a billion in 4-5 years. Besides emerging businesses: eyewear, Taneira, Skin, Fastrack perfumes, Earth bags all together could be half a billion. And Damas, our new acquisition, itself could be at least half a billion. These are big building blocks assuming we don't do more inorganic expansion.
Assuming, but you've given me a fair amount of food for thought. We'll take a short break and come back, we'll sit and have a longer chat with Ajay.
Welcome back. Still in conversation with Ajay Chawla. Let's drag it down to individual categories, jewelry business. Last year obviously saw supernormal growth on account of higher gold prices. If you strip that off, organically, what should one look at as growth for this sector and Titan's role?
So, firstly, when we look at growth, yes, there is value growth, but I would also look at buyer growth. Last year, buyer growth was tepid, especially to December it was almost flat. So a good indicator is how buyers are growing, new buyers, started buyers. That indicates future potential. But with gold prices rising, it brings interest. For example, on Akshaya Tritiya, gold coins were flat but jewelry buyers grew. As disposable incomes rise, crossing $2,800 per capita, it fuels aspiration and premiumization. The second is the demography: Gen Z and Gen Y up to 35 years old are driving consumption based on experience, adornment, self-expression. The third is women, who are increasingly making independent decisions for high-end products. The fourth dimension is middle India: over 500 towns with 1 lakh to 1 million population, where digitalization and infrastructure are driving significant growth. Aspiration is a one-way street. You have about 800 stores in the jewelry market now.
Yeah. If you look at some of your formats, what's your aspiration? Growth to 2,000 stores? I include CaratLane.
Stores. That's about 1,150 odd stores. Surely, can we go to 2,000 stores in the next 4-5 years? Why not? is my answer. We don't have a specific number pinpointed. But it's not just about number of stores, also number of towns and catchments, and size of retail stores. If you transform stores into bigger ones for better customer experience, same store growth gets a big kicker. So it's retail transformation as much as expansion. On average, a store does about 50-60 crores annual revenue. Once you get to 2,000 stores, you can do the math. We'll be setting our FY30 ambition now.
But we are in the process of actually setting our FY30 ambition. There is a very strong international story evolving. So, billion dollars in international business by 2030, that'd be an important part. Why not? I don't have a number right now. Certainly we should be looking at that maybe beyond. Now we have Tanishq internationally and Damas. You're present in Middle East and North America. Both these regions are fairly volatile. Has there been any impact on the business because of that?
Middle East, yes, especially UAE. All put together, between Damas and our GCC operations of Tanishq, maybe about 4% to 4.5% as we speak. Middle East has taken a little break because of the war. But Tanishq in Middle East did rather well on Akshaya Tritiya. I won't use that as guidance. Next one or two quarters may be impacted, but we are in it for the long run. As Damas integrates, we see Damas can go beyond the Middle East. We have a four-year plan for Damas.
