Lack of skilled man power in the luxury products sector in India is shaping up new opportunities in the world of luxury education. A former senior executive of a luxury clothing company has realized the potential of this opportunity and has come up with a solution. He has started a new venture, Luxury Connect and is collaborating with educational institutions in the West to impart education and training focused on luxury.

Luxury Connect to partner with institutions

Luxury Connect is partnering with a management school from Italy, to introduce a business management programme which focuses on luxury segment. With the cooperation of SDA Bocconi School of Management, the programme will be introduced in India from April 2012. Luxury Connect has also tied up with Jean Claude Roustrant, to offer a course in the institute. Jean will offer a course in luxury customer experience management.

Lack of trained individuals

Lack of skilled workforce is one of the important problems faced by the luxury products industry. It is projected that the industry will need about 1.76 million trained individuals for various positions in the business.

According to Abhay Gupta, the man behind the venture, the company will also provide consultancy services to global brands and help them to launch shops in India. He added that the company will also serve Indian brands and will help them to go global.

Indian luxury product market to expand

India enjoys 15th position based on the number of high net worth (HNI) people and holds 2nd position based on the growth rate of this consumer segment. The combined effect of these factors has led to the increase in the number of Indian millionaires by two fold. This has made a significant impact on the luxury product business in the country. It is estimated that the Indian Luxury product sector will expand by about 2.5 times by 2015.

The affluent households to increase by 13 per cent

In India there are 3 million households whose annual income is over USD 100,000 and it is estimated that the number will increase by 13 per cent in the years to come. Furthermore, projections say that the Indian luxury market will be worth USD 5.8 billion in 2013 and USD 6.8 in 2015. It is clear that the demand for luxury products will explode in the near future.

Why luxury education?

However, the industry in the present condition is not equipped to meet the surge in demand. The main reason for this is the lack of trained manpower. Luxury products are completely a different set of products and the manpower we have is not trained to meet the requirements of the industry. It is an entirely different business which requires an entirely different management perspective to run the business. So the management programme to train the executives has to be different from the usual programmes. Even the kind of training needed for the sales executives is different.

This calls for the need of luxury education in India, where the industry has a different set of requirements.