On the wake of the rising COVID-19 situation in the country, gold sales across India took a bad hit with jewellery owners facing huge losses. Now to tackle the mounting losses, jewellers have reassessed traditional ways of doing business and begun selling gold for a little over $1 online. A nationwide lockdown caused a massive crash in gold sales in India - the second biggest consumer market in the world. Stores were shut, but it also led to a bump in India's nascent market for online gold sales.
This was followed by popular jewellers, including Tata Group's Tanishq, Kalyan Jewellers India Ltd, PC Jeweller Ltd and Senco Gold and Diamonds launching offers selling gold for as little as 100 rupees ($1.35) either on their websites or via tie-ups with digital gold platforms. Consumers can take delivery once they have invested enough for at least 1 gram of gold. "COVID, obviously, has changed the mindset of a lot of jewellers and they have also been proactive in selling jewellery online. So this is just the extension of the whole mindset," Ketan Kothari, director at Augmont Gold, told NDTV.
The offers have been launched by the jewellers at the cusp of the festive season in India when gold demand peaks remarkably. With an increasing number of technology-friendly consumers and a rise in digital purchases via the Internet, sales are expected to boost the sector."We have been witnessing a renewed interest among consumers, especially youngsters, who are looking to make systematic investments in the yellow metal," according to Ramesh Kalyanaraman, executive director at Kalyan Jewellers. According to a World Gold Council report last year, online gold purchases accounted for only about 2% of the overall sales value in 2019. A majority of the transactions were made by those under 45.“A drop in gold prices has also boosted volumes on the platforms,” said Gaurav Mathur, founder of SafeGold.
“People perceive the current gold prices to below and they are more used to transacting digitally across categories and not just gold,” he added. "Since February last year, we have seen a 200% rise in sales on our platform with most consumers snapping up coins and bars in the range of 3,000 to 4,000 rupees," Augmont's Kothari said. "During the pandemic, buying gold in the digital form has gained immense popularity and we expect sales to increase by 20%-30% this festive season compared with last year."