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Cover
Retail Rap
By Phyllis Schiller
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| Carelle |
The 4Cs are not the only things that make a piece of diamond jewelry a sales winner. In an ongoing series, Rapaport Magazine explores the “3Ws” — what’s selling, what’s not and why — by going straight to the people who really know — jewelry retailers. Each month, we ask a sampling of retailers to comment on the important issues that are facing the industry today. Here is what they had to say when asked: “What are your expectations for the holidays? Have you started seeing shoppers?”
“We have started seeing shoppers. We’re doing well. I’m expecting a strong finish to this year, especially at the higher price points. We’re selling a lot more of the larger, finer-quality goods; they’re moving very nicely. We’re very optimistic.
“Our bridal business is very strong; married couples are upgrading to larger and better goods. In fashion, the branded and nonbranded jewelry is also moving very well. It’s pretty much across the board. We’ve seen that since the end of the first quarter. We’re a very high-end store but we also carry lower price points. We stock Alex and Ani and we’re expecting that to be very strong as well. In general, business has been very strong.”
“In the past two weeks, we’ve seen a lot more traffic, both in phone calls and people walking in the door — almost double. Yellow gold seems to be what they’re asking about now. They’ll look at rose when I offer it, but basically they’re asking for yellow. We’re getting in a new collection of Italian fashion jewelry, bigger, more high-end pieces. So I guess you can say we’re looking for a ‘big’ Christmas.”
“We have seen shoppers. We actually had early snow and we think that makes a big difference in how soon people want to come in; it puts them in the mood. We’re hoping that it will be a good Christmas. It’s been a good year so far.”
“I have really started to feel the love. I don’t know what’s going on, but we’ve had a really blockbuster November so far. It seems to be starting a little earlier than usual, so I’m feeling great, better than I’ve felt in a long time. Of course, we really won’t know how Christmas went until December 23. But I feel that we’re busier.
“I think people have frugality fatigue. They’re tired of not spending money. I think we’ve all not spent money since 2009, and we’re just tired of it. Now people are saying, ‘I’ve saved and saved and saved. The stock market is good. I haven’t lost my 401(k) that I thought I lost back in 2009. So I’m going to get out there again.’”
“We’ve haven’t seen any holiday shoppers yet but traffic has been decent in general. From the end of October through November, there’s been an uptick and it’s been decent.
“I’m anticipating the holidays to be very good, partially because of all the things we’ve worked on to set the stage for it. The world has dramatically changed in the past 24 months and anyone who hasn’t adapted to be an omnichannel retailer is going to be in trouble. We’re on our eighth iteration of our website and we’ve made a lot of internal and external changes in much of the way we do business. We’ve reinvented ourselves in the past two years and in the past several months, it has started to bear fruit.”
“We have had people in. This year has been so strange with all the stresses. I don’t think the greater population has any awareness of the tumult in the diamond world because of the delisting of EGL certificates; I don’t think that has registered at all. We do a fair amount of custom color and that’s been pretty stable. There is the possibility that it could be a good season, but I honestly don’t know.”
“Typically, it would be too early to see this but Christmas shopping is well under way and, knock on wood, seems to be positive. This September and October were very pleasant. The beginning of November hit a little bump after Halloween but now it’s trending nicely.
“In 2008 and 2009, a lot of people rethought what they were doing and we saw people being a little more conservative in their gift giving. But now, we’re starting to see a return to more typical shopping. We have everything from $20 fun sterling silver rings to $50,000 pieces, so we have the gamut for shoppers to choose. But you never really know. Christmas Eve is always big for us. Men are notorious for sometimes putting off buying until the last minute and we’ve been known to pull through for last-minute shoppers.”
“We’ve already seen some signs of life; we’ve already started selling holiday presents. Diamond earrings are really doing well and we’re starting to sell more gold jewelry now. So we’re cautiously optimistic.
“We think it will be good, but of course, all it takes is one little thing to mess things up. So we’ll wait and see and watch the news and what happens in terms of the market, the feds, the terrorists and Ebola and all those things. But if everything stays neutral and everyone stays happy, I think we’re going to do well.”Article from the Rapaport Magazine - December 2014. To subscribe click here.
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