Are you going to Las Vegas?

Two jewelers explain why they will or won’t be attending the upcoming jewelry shows.

By Phyllis Schiller

CRAIG UNDERWOOD
PRESIDENT, UNDERWOODS FINE JEWELERS
FAYETTEVILLE, ARKANSAS Yes, I will be going to Vegas this year. It’s a buying show, and we go to see vendors we’ve done business with, as well as new vendors, and to network with colleagues and friends. Last year, we did everything; the year before that, we did not do Couture, but we did Luxury and some of the others. This year, who knows? We have a hit list of things we need, and then we just follow our nose and see where it leads us.

“It will be interesting being back in the old venue with a new floor plan. We’re going to have to relearn where our vendors are. It will be different with the American Gem Trade Association (AGTA) at a different site altogether. There are a lot of changes this year.

“We do a lot in custom work; it’s our mainstay. Although we go to the AGTA show in Tucson, [Arizona,] we will typically spend some time looking at the loose color at JCK as well. We will also do some diamond buying. JCK is not really that important for loose white diamonds. But when it comes to fancy-colored loose diamonds, it’s an important show for us. Now that the AGTA Gemfair is no longer part of JCK, I will be making time to go see their vendors in their new venue at the Las Vegas Convention Center.

“We do one international show a year. We alternate between going to shows in Vicenza, [Italy,] Basel, [Switzerland,] and Hong Kong. We attended the American Gem Society (AGS) Conclave this April. It was one of the best I had been to in years; the subject matter and lectures were good, and the turnout was the biggest in 15 years.

AMANDA COLEMAN-PHELPS
OWNER, NELSON COLEMAN JEWELERS
TOWSON, MARYLAND We are not going to go to Las Vegas this year. In fact, we have not attended the show there for many years.

“We are members of both the Leading Jewelers Guild and the Retail Jewelers Organization (RJO). Based on these two groups alone, we attend more than four shows during the course of a year. These shows have offered us the opportunity to develop amazing relationships with our vendors — most of whom are the same ones we would see if we went to the Vegas show.

“One of the benefits of having multiple shows to go to is that we can really customize when we buy based on cash flow. This allows us to buy ‘smart’ and not strap ourselves financially. We also get to have a plethora of different topics and speakers that are available to us all year round instead of just once a year.

“I would say that the time spent away from the store, along with the cost of going to Vegas, have both played a part in our decision not to go to that show in prior years. This past year, those two items have not been factors, but we have still decided not to go. We have invested a great deal of time with the current vendors in our specific buying groups and have become familiar with the layout and the size of those shows. These buying shows are much smaller and give you a personal touch that we haven’t experienced in Vegas.

“The main thing we do feel we miss by not going to Vegas is learning about new technology, trends and buzz in the industry. For that alone, we are considering going next year.

Article from the Rapaport Magazine - June 2019. To subscribe click here.

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Tags: Phyllis Schiller