Platinum Guild’s strategic expansion and diversified marketing strategies in India

Sujala Martis, director of consumer marketing at Platinum Guild International, talks about the brand’s growth journey.

Creating a new product category is one of the toughest challenges in marketing. This is precisely what Platinum Guild International (PGI) set out to accomplish in India. It introduced platinum to a market deeply obsessed with gold and gold jewellery.

The group’s branding efforts started in 2009 with the introduction of ‘Platinum Love Bands’.

Speaking about the brand’s evolution, Sujala Martis, director of consumer marketing at Platinum Guild International, says, “The Platinum Guild's journey began by identifying a relatively untapped segment: couple gifting.”

According to her, in India, a market where marriages are mostly arranged, jewellery is something that was chosen by the families and not the couple. The idea was to create a space for love and intimacy within these societal contracts. Martis adds that this innovative approach struck a chord with young women, establishing strong equity that the guild then built upon.

‘Platinum Love Bands’ is still one of the most successful brands for the group, says Martis.

From there on, PGI has expanded into three brands each catering to a different audience set in India. It launched ‘Platinum Evara’ for aspirational and independent young Indian women in 2015, and in 2019, it launched ‘Men of Platinum’ for ambitious men in the country.

Growth aspirations

According to Martis, its consumers are younger and hence, their needs are very different from the more conventional precious jewellery consumers in India.

“The need is to acquire what is considered to be contemporary and unique. Their need is also to acquire symbols that create social distinction and those that represent their self-image. This is why platinum could feed and fuel their aspirations,” she says.

“Platinum is anchored in being a precious metal that is truly rare. That rarity is our biggest functional differentiator and taps into all the motivations of the consumers today.”

She states that what the brand recognised is that today, there are a lot more occasions of personal victory and achievements that people like to celebrate rather than marriages alone.

“Jewellery is not looked upon as a store of value alone but a vessel of emotion too and hence within this realm the opportunities for platinum have only grown.”

According to the brand, platinum is the jewellery metal of choice for the young generation and has been growing by double-digits for eight years. The brand has grown from a mere 16 retail stores in 2002 to over 2000 plus stores across 330 cities with tenfold growth in the last decade.

Cricket, content and marketing

Martis states that The Platinum Guild has  taken innovative branding strategies for each of the three brands. While digital is the common factor among all three brands, content marketing is also an important part of their strategy. Offlately, cricket has emerged to be an important pillar for them, says Martis.

The guild's association with cricket began with a six-part mini-series featuring K.L. Rahul on Disney+Hotstar in 2022. But now, the brand’s association with cricket has grown in a different direction, says Martis.

“We realised that cricket need not be just about million-dollar investments. We realised that there is a lot of content that is around cricket which can be just as important as the matches,” she says.

It partnered with Cricbuzz during the 2023 IPL and launched a ‘Men of Platinum’ series that saw content integrations during the match’s review show. The company also onboarded Jemimah Rodrigues as a brand ambassador for Platinum Evara.

“In 2023, women’s cricket also had its moment with Women’s IPL and for us it became a natural segway. We have taken up cricket as a tool to connect with audiences deeper,” added Martis. 

Apart from these integrations, PGI also relies on partnering with a number of print and publication platforms like Grazia to drive awareness.