Kaliningrad Amber Combine opens first store in China, discussing openings in Hong Kong, Azerbaijan

KALININGRAD. Nov 8 (Interfax) - Kaliningrad Amber Combine, part of Rostec and which owns a set of stores in Russia, has opened its first store in China, the company's press service said.

The outlet operates under a franchise owned by the Chinese company Shenzhen hudafu jewelry Co Ltd.

"The store has opened in the Chinese Mecca for amber - the Bao'an district of Shenzhen. As part of the franchise, the Russian enterprise has supplied 1,000 finished items made of amber to China," the press service said.

The store, which has an area of 115 square meters and a Kaliningrad Amber Combine sign in both Russian and Chinese, is located in Shenzhen's amber trade center, which hosts dozens of stores selling amber.

"The Amber Combine currently produces around 150,000 items a year. Its collection is updated at least twice a year. In opening our store in China, we aim for long-term cooperation," Kaliningrad Amber Combine CEO Mikhail Zatsepin was quoted as saying by the press service.

"China loves amber. Our country is the world's main consumer of this gem," the director of sales at Shenzhen hudafu jewelry Co Ltd Liu Shaojie said.

Negotiations between the Russian side and its Chinese partners on distributing finished amber items took place during the Expo 2023 exhibition in Shanghai in November last year. An agreement on licensing and distribution was agreed, which launched the creation of the Amber Combine's franchise retail network. Outlets will subsequently be opened in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou.

Kaliningrad Amber Combine operates nine stores in the Kaliningrad region, Moscow and St. Petersburg. It plans to open stores in the Moscow region and Kazan in the near future and is negotiating the launch of trading sites in Hong Kong and Azerbaijan.

The combine is the only enterprise in the world carrying out industrial extraction of raw amber and which manufactures amber jewelry and souvenir products.

As much as 95% of the world's amber reserves are located in the vicinity of Yantarny, on the coast of the Kaliningrad region. Only the Kaliningrad Amber Combine carries out industrial extraction of amber in the region. It produced 627 tonnes of amber in 2024.