The Conversation - STEPHEN LUSSIER

THE GEMS AND JEWELLERY INDUSTRY WAS AMONG THE EARLIEST TO OVERCOME THE DISRUPTIONS CAUSED BY THE COVID-19 LOCKDOWN. WHEN THE BIG FAT WEDDINGS WERE CURTAILED, AND PEOPLE COULDN’T GO ON EXPENSIVE HOLIDAYS OR BUY EXPENSIVE CLOTHES, THEY INDULGED IN JEWELLERY. AS A RESULT, 2021 WAS THE BEST YEAR FOR THE WORLD’S LARGEST DIAMOND MANUFACTURER, THE $5.6 BILLION DE BEERS GROUP, WITH BUSINESS GROWING OVER 25%. STEPHEN LUSSIER, CHAIRMAN OF NATURAL DIAMOND COUNCIL, GLOBAL CEO OF DE BEERS’ RETAIL BRAND FOREVERMARK AND STRATEGIC ADVISOR TO THE DE BEERS GROUP, TALKS ABOUT THE BOUNCE-BACK, ADOPTION OF TECHNOLOGY AND COMMITMENT TO SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS PRACTICES. INTERVIEW BY AJITA SHASHIDHAR.

- AJITA SHASHIDHAR

GROWING DURING COVID-19

How did the diamond industry bounce back so quickly?

In January 2020, when I first heard the word Covid-19, interestingly, we were at a safety conference in Johannesburg. I got an email from a colleague in China asking if we could find masks in South Africa as they couldn’t run stores without wearing masks. That time, we didn’t realise what was happening. We had already started losing sales in China and had no idea of what was coming. When Covid-19 really hit, we closed our mines. Our priority was safety of people, and we understood that until we change the way we work, we will not be able to keep them safe. So, we had to close our operations in mining communities. That was painful economically, but necessary.

Soon after Covid-19 hit India, our cutting centres in Surat 1 had to close down. As it spread, retailers closed, and there was a point in second quarter of 2020 when everything was shut. In the darkest days of second quarter of 2020, it seemed that the world economy was going to stop. However, what we didn’t see was consumers coming back as fast as they did. They came back faster than the industry recovered. It started with ecommerce. They started buying online. Retailers started re-opening before mines and cutting centres. It gave us confidence that consumers are going to be interested in buying diamonds. It also cleared the inventory in the long pipeline between the mine and the retailer. Consumers were buying but nothing new was being made. There was a lot of inventory with jewellery manufacturers and retailers that was getting used.