This Indian Diamond Jewelry Supplier Caters to Hip Pop's Obsession with Bling on Alibaba.com

Surat, the Diamond City of India- Home to over 5,000 diamond manufacturing units and boasting 800,000 skillful diamond polishers. The city processes 90% of the world's rough diamonds before sending them south to Mumbai for trade.

The glitter of diamonds is visible everywhere in its narrow streets and markets, and so does the opportunity it brings. In such an industry hub where expertise and connections matter, it takes patience, business acumen, and decisiveness if somebody wants to make it big.

34-year-old Janak has been around Surat's diamond scene for so long that he can predict what is going to happen in the industry in the coming 2-3 months. When a new batch of diamonds arrives, his network of over 50 manufacturers will make sure that he gets the gems at a good price.

Starting as a humble polisher, today he owns a diamond jewelry brand Gurukrupa (meaning god's grace in his local dialect) Gems, and exports to countries like the U.S., Canada, and Australia through Alibaba.com.

Only 16 months into exporting, he managed to get orders worth ten millions in Indian rupees. Now, export accounts for 90% of his total business.

Polisher, Manufacturer, and Diamond Exporter

It took nearly 15 years for Janak to work his way up the Surat diamond industry pyramid.

In his early twenties, he took a job as a diamond polishing apprentice. For 6 good years, he learned the nuts and bolts of diamond manufacturing, from polishing to fitting diamonds into jewelry.

In 2017, he left and opened up his own unit, manufacturing for local diamond suppliers. Not yet a company owner, he wouldn't take stock and would only get into work when his client paid the down payment.

Even as a middleman, he could see that the same piece of diamond could easily sell for double the price in the U.S. market than in India, but most of his clients wouldn't think about exporting.

"If whoever is buying from me doesn't export, then I will." – With this simple yet impactful vision, in 2019, Janak took all of his father's savings, an equivalent of 2000 dollars, and opened his own diamond exporting company.

If you think Janak's story ends here, you are in for a surprise. Being a raw diamond exporter, he soon found that his client could make several times more than him just by refining the gems. If he could make the jewelry himself and sell it at a relatively lower price, people would buy from him. That's when his jewelry brand Gurukrupa Gems was born.

Rise of Lab-grown Diamonds and Hip Hop's Obsession with Bling

There are 2 main pillars of Janak's business: raw diamond manufacturing and jewelry making.

His choices of products reflect some very interesting trends from the buyer side: the rapid growth of lab-grown diamonds and the increasing demand for hip-hop jewelry.

As CNN reported, sales of lab-grown diamonds have increased from under 1 billion dollars in 2016 to just under 12 billion in 2022, representing just over 17% of the overall diamond market. The rate of growth is accelerating: Lab-grown sales shot up 38% from 2021 to 2022.

Janak started manufacturing lab-grown diamonds in 2017. Currently, the proportion of his natural diamonds versus lab-grown diamonds is 30% v/s 70%.

When it comes to his jewelry brand Gurukrupa Gems, Janak taps into the expanding market of Hip Pop jewelry.

The popularity of rappers and their bling culture opens up a window for jewelry. Thick diamond chains, skeleton pendants, and diamond teeth are popular among the hip-hop communities in markets such as the U.S., Canada, and Australia. Unlike bridal jewelry, lab-grown diamonds are widely used in this kind of jewelry making.

With the help of e-commerce, such a blue ocean niche gives medium-sized jewel dealers like Janak a gateway to success.

References
1. https://www.forbes.com/sites/joshwilson/2022/07/24/ice-cold-exploring-the-unique-relationship-between-hip-hop-and-jewelry/
2. https://edition.cnn.com/style/lab-grown-diamonds-popularity-2023-bof/index.html