How This Female Entrepreneur Conquers The Indian Diaspora In America With Her Jewelry Brand?

While Sunaina Ramisetty was pursuing her master's degree in chemical engineering at the Florida Institute of Technology, she began showing off some of the gems she had collected to raise extra money. To his surprise, it turned out to be a huge success.

Today, a decade later, she runs a T-shirt brand, which receives a lot of love and attention from American and Indian customers. In 2017, she ventured online with a capital of only $ 500, where the brand sells modern jewelry online in the United States and India, where it has also opened several stores.

Working with 35 unconventional designers, Sunaina says, Tarinika would not have seen the light of day if it were not for her brother in charge of all the previous work, from manufacturing to shipping from their factory in Kolkata.

"I didn't expect to do that well in my first year of being online because people don't know who we were as a brand, but we earned a total of $ 300,000. We pushed my brother into manufacturing because the rate was huge," he says, adding that the brand now has eight manufacturing units employing about 3,000 workers.

Beginning Story

When Sunaina signed up for a two-day program in 2009, she expected to earn about $ 500 to cover her monthly expenses in the United States. To his surprise, all of the products, which were mostly sterling silver, were destined for western audiences and sold out in six hours, and he returned $ 5,500 the first day.

"I realized there was a lot of opportunities, especially since competing domestic brands in the United States were being sold at incredibly high prices, ten times higher than in India, which I thought was not possible. That's right," he said. ai. Over time, Sunaina has seen a huge "empty space" for Indian jewelers to reach the United States.

She noted that Indian women make up 60 to 70 percent of the audience for most jewelry shows, "which means they have no problem spending". He later learned that most NRIs were ordering jewelry from India, but was faced with unpleasant shopping experiences.

Buying options included smaller brands in India through social media, followed by inefficient communication or established brands that are very expensive.

This prompted Sunaina to open an online store. She registered the brand in 2017 and went into business the following year to offer high-quality Indian jewelry at affordable prices.

For a year and a half, she ran the show with the help of a marketing advisor and her husband who helped set up the e-commerce site.

Ironically, about 100,000 of the 300,000 orders came from India, which opened up a whole new market for Tarinika. Today she owns several stores across India and Sunaina plans to move to India soon to expand her retail business. That year, she also launched a new sub-brand called Paksha.

It costs between Rs 500 and Rs 5000 and includes traditional Indian jewelry such as Maang Tikkas and Daminis, bracelets, and anklets, among others. Sunaina plans to increase its supply below 2,000 rupees in order to attract additional customers in the fashion jewelry segment. The other brands in the market are Pipa Bella and Sukkhi.

To be an "ambitious woman"

Jewelry has been a part of Sunaina's life as far as she can remember, thanks to her father, who sold pearls and other jewelry in a modest retail store in Hyderabad.

A high school graduate, he moved to Calcutta in the 1990s, where his jewelry business grew, attracting B2B clients like the Pantaloons from a group of hundreds of people looking for the opportunity.

“He was always traveling, worked really hard, and is definitely a big inspiration to me. I grew up and watched the industry function by attending shows in Singapore, Malaysia, and China, ” she tells HerStory.

She also learned from her father not to be afraid of ambition, even if it was not good in society. She had often felt guilty about running the business as a young mother and often faced the question of how to leave a six-month-old at home and focus on her job. With Tarinika's vision in sight, Sunaina does not allow herself to be discouraged.

In fact, Mother Teresa was the first inspiring woman she met when she volunteered with the missionary in Calcutta. “It really had a big impact because I realized that women can do all of this and be powerful,” she says, adding that her experience inspired her to create the Tarinika Foundation, which empowers people from all over the world. disadvantaged areas. Mentoring supports and offers various professional opportunities.