Ariane Fine Porcelain is a brand born out of a need to set higher standards in the world of tableware. Conceptualised to offer exceptional and extravagant tableware products, Ariane Fine Porcelain, provides unparalleled quality with creative designs and excellent durability
The Japanese fundamentally believe that a beautiful dish enhances the flavour of the food. They are true advocates of the old adage ‘you eat with your eyes first’. Today, all high end gourmet restaurants and hotels emphasise that tableware must spell opulence, extravagance and leisure. After all, dining is not only about the meal, but the entire experience it offers and tableware plays an integral role.
With a steady rise in the number of fine-dining restaurants and hotels in India and around the globe, it is safe to say that tableware makes a statement. Connoisseurs of the kitchen and the hotel industry appraise that most fine hospitality establishments replace on average, 30 per cent of their original tableware every year.
With an aim to offer the finest experiences to their guests, the majority of five-star luxury hotels opt for porcelain tableware due to their functionality and durability. However, to date there is no such porcelain tableware manufacturer in India. In the country, we witness the production of bone china tableware on one hand, and low-end stone-ware products on the other hand. Stone-ware products are of low quality and bone china inherits many hygiene and quality related problems. In contrast, porcelain tableware offers very high strength, chip and scratch resistance, and longevity. Unfortunately, since porcelain tableware is not locally available, all high-end restaurants and hotel chains in India resort to importing this kind of tableware, whereas the mid-range ones are compelled to settle with the substandard bone china supply or stone-ware. However, since the inception of Ariane Fine Porcelain in the country, the Indian hospitality and food service industry is no longer dependent on imports of porcelain tableware.
Brand vision
Dr Khater Massaad, partner and chairman, is the creative mind behind Ariane Fine Porcelain. He has lent his 30 years of experience and expertise to develop this company. “Our long and successful experience in the field of ceramics and porcelain tableware combined with the creativity, technical know-how and our knowledge of the international market led us to create our new entity Ariane Fine Porcelain. Our aim at Ariane Fine Porcelain is to produce the best quality possible of designers’ collections to suite most trends and satisfy our customers’ requirements. We will not spare any effort to give the best services to our clients,” opines Dr Massaad. Peruma Reddy, CEO of Ariane Fine Porcelain, a pioneer in the field of porcelain and ceramics has combined his 21 years of experience and skills to develop and evolve Ariane into a fine porcelain tableware brand of international quality and standard.
On October 19, 2014, Ariane Fine Porcelain launched its new manufacturing facility, Umberto Ceramics International, hence emerging as one of the first and only porcelain tableware manufacturers in the country. This unit is spread across an area of 30,000 sq m in Gujarat. Speaking on this, Reddy states “We have the most modern present day iso-static press at the hand of which we can produce superior quality porcelain tableware. We also have an automatic cup production plant by which cups are produced with utmost precision. This unit is also equipped with a high-pressure casting machine, ensuring that tableware of almost any shape can be manufactured to perfection.”
A major challenge in today’s scenario is that not every company is able to sustain the product quality along with the price. In such cases, quality and durability often take a backseat in a competitive market resulting in low quality tableware unable to withstand daily usage. While hotels may make an effort to curtail their expenditure, they do not compromise on the quality of the products being used. Ariane Fine Porcelain offers a perfect solution, delivering high-end, professionally designed and exceptional quality porcelain collection at a value for money proposition. The effective usage life of its tableware is 1.5 to 2 times of normal bone china products available in the country making it cost effective in the long run. Additionally, since Ariane Fine Porcelain products are locally manufactured, customers in India are offered a comparatively lower price thus being able to deliver European standard products at a reasonable price. The unique composition of raw materials, advanced technology and a thorough quality assurance team, guarantees reduced risk of chipping, scratch, abrasion and shock resistance and increased thermal resistance.
Ariane Fine Porcelain tableware has successfully passed tests for handle strength and rim-chipping carried out by SFC France and has been accredited by top quality certification programmes internationally such as the FDA and Proposition 65 as certified by UKAS from the UK. In June 2014, Ariane Fine Porcelain had been awarded the SA8000 certificate by TUV. It is also accredited with ISO 14001 and certified by Ceram Research, UK. Ariane Fine Porcelain endeavours and strives for continuous customer satisfaction through an effective and clear distribution and replacement structure. Reddy adds, “We take pride in offering a five year rim-chip warranty applicable to all our heavy-use tableware.”
Unique designs
Functionality is important but satisfaction to the eye is inevitable. A presentable and attractive table emphatically enhances a guest’s dining experience, as well as the feel and ambience of the establishment. For every luxury hotel and upscale restaurant venue, the right selection and display of chic tableware assortments is as important as having the right dish on the menu. To this effect, Ariane Fine Porcelain collections are designed by experienced and renowned European designers who combine a contemporary feel with individualism to live up to the expectations of its clients by providing up-to-date designs in tableware. Ariane Fine Porcelain also offers its clients the possibility to customise products with personalised décor, shapes and the addition of the establishment’s logo on all products. “Our colours coalesce with glaze and sheen to create textures that lose none of their luster even after years of use. We continuously strive to devise contemporary unique designs that fulfill the needs of modern gastronomy while maintaining the functionality required by industry professionals,” says Reddy.
The Indian tableware industry has failed to make a mark in the premium tableware category till date despite having the right ingredients for the industry to flourish. “Except for a visionary market offering, it is the demand that drives the supply. That in turn brings in innovation, investment and installations. Moreover, the international market was not so open to Indian supply for multiple reasons that includes trust (quality, consistency, service), and absence of MNCs in the segment who already have market reach. The scenario is fast changing. We do agree that the quality was compromised earlier. Also there were attempts for producing porcelain a few years ago by some manufactures, which failed unfortunately. Porcelain requires a different kind of expertise and altogether a different kind of attitude to cater to the challenging market demand. This takes time to master. Furthermore, bone china products are not Halal and also not suitable for solely vegetarian markets as it contains a considerable quantity of bone ash of unknown animal origin. This is also one of the reasons as to why those products failed to take off in the international market. Ariane Fine Porcelain has been approved by the Vegetarian Society of UK for being 100 per cent vegetarian and is also Halal certified. Our porcelain products are devoid of bone ash and are essentially made from clay and feldspar. We thereby provide an ultimate and absolutely hygienic vegetarian solution catering not only to the highly competitive porcelain tableware industry but also to those markets that are solely and exclusively vegetarian,” mentions Reddy adding, “It is the quality, competitiveness, the market reach and international experience that brings you in the forefront. At Ariane Fine Porcelain, we have all of this along with the guiding vision that eventually will make us a dominant world player in the near future.”