In very slow years for the industry, such as 2009, attendance at trade shows drops precipitously, but if this year’s first-quarter results are any indication, the upcoming Las Vegas jewelry shows should see a healthier crowd than they did last year. That’s not to say that everyone attending will be buying, necessarily, but a full house is better than an empty one, regardless of how many checks are written. Decent sales for the first three months of 2010 will hopefully give everyone at this year’s shows a chance to breathe.
First-Quarter Results
“Sales have been good so far,” said Patrick Larkin, manager of Burri Jewelers in Cheyenne, Wyoming. The reason, he says, that 2010 looks better than 2009 is “because everyone is seeing that the economy is getting better.”
Jim Jessop, owner of Jessop Jeweler, with two stores in San Diego, California, agrees that the economy seems to be picking up, although for him, that hasn’t translated into sales just yet. “My feeling is that the economy has stabilized a little bit, but jewelry hasn’t come back all the way yet,” he said. “First-quarter 2010 was very month to month, and my January and February were extremely slow after a strong Christmas. But March was very good, and April has been strong. Still, I found our slow start frightening after the slow period we had in 2009.”
In Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, Mac Ahmad, owner of Bartikowsky Jewelers, has not yet seen any improvements over 2009. “The first quarter of 2010 was virtually the same as the first quarter of 2009, which was not a banner year,” he said. “We have been supplementing by buying scrap gold and selling it to the refiners.”
On the other end of the spectrum, some businesses are reporting double-digit increases over their 2009 numbers. “We’re ahead by 25 percent,” said Paul Geiss, owner, Paulo Geiss Jewelers in Charleston, South Carolina. “People are starting to spend again, and I think things are slowly improving. Last year was tough, and we weren’t prepared. But this year, we knew we had to rein in our inventory and cut back on our spending.”
Gambling On Vegas
That said, storeowners are, for the most part, planning to return to Vegas in 2010 even if they don’t intend to spend. “I think we need to go to Vegas,” said Jessop. “We’ve been very conservative in Vegas for the past two years, but I feel the need to bring exciting things to my clients now, and Vegas offers that. I’ve been to the show every year since it opened. I would say we don’t even do 20 percent of our buying at the show, but we establish new contacts and see new lines. It’s a little early in the year for us to be ready to buy. But we are anticipating our buying.”
Most agree that buying is not the main point of going to the shows. “We haven’t been going every year, but we were there in 2009, and we plan on going this year,” said Richard Neustaedter, owner of Neustaedter’s, with one store serving the St. Louis, Missouri, area. “We like seeing the latest designs and the different lines, and we go to see new people. We’ve done a lot of buying there in the past, but I think this year, we won’t buy as much because of our cash flow situation. We used to just buy, buy, buy. But we’ve learned our lesson, and we’re going to buy smarter now.”
Other storeowners are equally cautious about stocking up at the trade shows. “We haven’t attended the Vegas shows in the past five years, because all of our reps come to us, and we don’t have to go anywhere,” said Larkin. “This year, we’re going to see what’s new out there and see what can help us. We still won’t buy much there, though. We’ll still be buying 98 percent of our inventory from vendors coming to us.”
So if retailers aren’t going to the shows to buy, why do they go? “We go to Vegas primarily for the entertainment value, but we will look at new products and hopefully make some new contacts that might lead us to new memo programs,” said Ahmad. “We haven’t made any trade show purchases, other than incidental ones, for a number of years. We prefer to have the vendors come to our shop so we can have home-court advantage.” Ahmad said he mainly goes to the shows for the experience. “Trade shows are a chance to meet people and see new products,” he said. “The locations are usually enticing. You get a feel for where the industry is trending and how to approach the year. I won’t say it’s extremely important, but it has become a part of the process.”
Article from the Rapaport Magazine - May 2010. To subscribe click here.