Behind the brand that is bringing affordable fine jewellery to the GCC

In an interview with Arabian Business, Brendarou said he thought of creating Terrasuya – which comes from the words terra meaning world and suya meaning her – when he realised that there was a gap in the GCC market for affordable fine jewellery.

Terrasuya launched its website in February and saw a pick-up in sales in April, during the Ramadan and Eid Al-Fitr period.

Emanuel Brendarou

What is the concept behind Terrasuya and what is the market need for the jewellery brand?

Terrasuya designs and sells affordable everyday accessories, produced with sustainability in mind.

We saw an opportunity to build a GCC native brand, focused on creating elegant everyday designs in the overlooked affordable segment, whilst also addressing customers through a localised approach.

A majority of fashion brands in the region are international and operate with a limited degree of localisation in contrast to my home country, Sweden, which has a many strong homegrown brands catering to a local audience and beyond.

Further to this, I believe there is still an imbalance in the GCC, where premium price points are over-emphasised as a large share of the market remains underpenetrated.

Hence, we wanted to i) create elegant and affordable accessories ii) build a GCC native brand, focusing on community through a local approach, yet with a global ambition iii) be part of growing a still very nascent start-up community in the region.

How were the initial funds raised?

The business has been self-funded to date. I have been working as strategy consultant in parallel, advising selected e-commerce companies and private equity clients, and funnelling the means towards different initiatives in the GCC.

I have chosen to postpone raising funds to focus on building the business. Fund-raising and the reporting that comes with it post funding, can be time consuming and so, at this stage, I believe more value will come out of me focusing on operations. Also, finding funding is relatively easy but the challenge lies in finding the right partner, meaning a partner who shares our vision and can complement our capabilities, to support growth of the company beyond a cash injection alone.

How did your startup adapt to coronavirus pandemic?

I started the company during the pandemic, although most of the legwork had been done prior. I have long had the ambition to build my own business. Having worked as a strategy consultant with a number of consumer goods companies and private equity clients in the region, the potential in the GCC has always been very clear. To me, the time and place to build a D2C (direct to consumer) e-commerce-oriented business based out of Dubai, could not have been better.

What are your expansion plans?

We’ve identified are a number of exciting markets out there with attractive macro fundamentals, where we think Terrasuya would do well, and these are part of our go-global plan. For now though, the GCC is our primary focus.

What advice would you give to those who want to launch their own startup?

Set a clear vision, prepare for a long-distance run, work hard and be patient.

I know that is very generic advice, but really, one of my main take-aways so far has been to have a clear long-term ambition and then to take one step at a time. The last part is important because it can be discouraging to look at the distance you need to cover with all the obstacles in the way.