Despite early failures of expansion, TOUS managed to identify the right markets for its internationa

While studying in Barcelona for the start of the Master Degree in Global Entrepreneurial Management, I had the opportunity to visit the headquarters of the Jewelry Brand TOUS http://www.tous.com/us-en/ and hear the history of the company from Salvador Tous, the CEO himself.

Created in 1920, TOUS is a Spanish family owned company which started from the father of the current CEO, Salvador Tous Blavi, who owned a watch reparation store. When getting married, the current CEO Salvador Tous and his wife Rosa Oriol, started expending into jewelry creation. Nowadays, TOUS has approximately 2000 employees and the third generation of the family is working in the company.

TOUS is a multi brand company creating and selling jewelry as well as accessories and defines itself as an affordable luxury lifestyle brand. The spirit of the brand is defined by these characteristics: tender, sweet, joyful and young.

TOUS now has 505 stores in 50 countries worldwide. However, the internationalization of the company did not start so well.

When starting the internationalization process, TOUS targeted classic countries: Germany, USA and Japan. However they failed in Germany and realized that Europe was already a mature jewelry market and that they needed to target new markets. Regarding the USA, out of the 18 stores they opened in California, 17 had to close since the Spanish culture and spirit of the brand did not seduce the Californians. Facing this problem, TOUS understood that the Spanish spirit of the brand was a critical aspect that new markets should accept. Therefore, TOUS opened a successful store in Florida where the Spanish culture is more integrated into the American culture.

Then, TOUS started developing its brand in Latin America, which contrary to Europe is not a mature jewelry market. Moreover, the Spanish style of the brand encounter huge success in the latin countries. However, TOUS has not entered Brazil yet, as the managing team is concerned with the fiscal system and the level of corruption in this country.

After successfully entering Latin America, TOUS focused on Asia and started a partnership with a local producer in China. Unfortunately, the partnership did not hold and TOUS had to reconsider its entire plan for China.TOUS selected a new local partner and this relationship worked out well, since TOUS now counts 6 stores in strategic locations in China and is working on further expansion in Asia.

A lesson from this case, is that internationalization is a challenging process that requires perfect analysis of the company’s values and the trends in the potential markets. As proven here, choosing an inappropriate market can lead to big failures. However, TOUS learnt from its mistakes and managed to find the right partners in the right market to expand its brands.

Consult their website to discover their beautiful collections and shop online ! http://www.tous.com/us-en/