Modern Jewelry Trends

This Christmas, diamonds will speak louder than words. The theme of the Diamond Trading Company holiday campaign is “This Christmas, Say Everything without Saying a Word.”

The new theme will be most elegantly communicated in a new television commercial without dialog, called Sleeping Beauty , which will begin running in mid-November. This ad will have two versions: one with a journey pendant, the other with a three-stone ring.

In an unusually unified strategy, the men-targeted Seize the Day print and outdoor campaign will also reflect the theme. In the now-familiar black with white type format, quote marks have been added around the pieces of diamond jewelry depicted, which include Journey necklaces, three stone necklaces and rings, diamond stud earrings, diamond solitaire necklaces, and diamond right hand rings. Advertisements with lines like “Be a Man of Few Words,” “Speak Love Fluently,” and “Show Her You Mean Everything You Never Say” will appear in 18 men’s magazines as well as online, on the Reuters and Nasdaq boards in Times Square, and throughout Grand Central Station in New York. Marketing materials, including a free downloadable ad slick featuring the line “This Christmas, Say Everything without saying a Word,” are available at www.dps.org. The Diamond Promotion Service is encouraging the trade to use the new theme line in their holiday marketing and merchandising campaigns. Customizable television ads for journey diamond jewelry and three-stone jewelry can also be created online at www.spotrunner.com/dps.

If you are an independent jeweler, sometimes it can seem as if the web is stacked against you, with thousands of sites advocating buying jewelry online and few talking about the advantages of buying jewelry the old-fashioned way, in person. To help balance the information available, Modern Jeweler has created some custom online content to promote the advantages of buying from your local independent jeweler. There are two versions of this article which we are making freely available to jewelers and others to publish online. The first, Ten Reasons to Buy From Your Local Independent Jeweler, is designed for sites like this one. You can use this article on blogs, community sites, anywhere you like. The second version, let’s call it Ten Reasons to Buy From Us, is written in the first person. This article is designed to be personalized with your store’s name, charities, brands, and services and posted on your own company web site. We put it in a pop-up window so you can easily “view source” and copy the html to post it on your own site. We’ve also created a custom version for IJO jewelers. We hope freely distributing these reasons to shop locally will spread them widely across the web and help remind consumers everywhere of the advantages of choosing an independent jeweler that you can know and trust. Do you have even more reasons? Submit them in the comments and we’ll add them to future versions.

Remember those book and record clubs? Once you signed up, you would get a delivery of a pre-selected item every month. QVC is now applying the concept to jewelry too with its new Auto-Delivery Jewelry program. For example, you can buy a sterling silver Judith Ripka cross charm bracelet for $84.78 plus shipping and then every month for five months they will send you another cross charm to add to that bracelet and bill you $35.54 plus shipping. Other Auto-Delivery jewelry items include a collection of thin 14k Eternagold bangles for $186 each, sterling turquoise pendant collection, each $127.62, and a Judith Ripka heart charm bracelet. This seems like a clever way to get beyond price point resistance. That charm bracelet is $292.30 and the stack of four bangles is $768.88, perhaps beyond the impulse level for QVC customers. Does it work? Both Ripka bracelets are “waitlist only,” so maybe it does.

Sterling has relaunched the Kay Jewelers website and now offers online shoppers the choice of shipping or free in-store pick-up.  This option, common in electronics, isn’t common for jewelry yet (Zale.com doesn’t offer it). New bells and whistles at Kay.com include 360 degree views of jewelry in its exclusive Leo Diamond collection. Actually the pendants are 180 degree views, they don’t show the back (Must not be pretty!) The interactive 3D views are pretty nice but not quite as good as the 3D-view movies at JamesAllen.com. But since both are created with 3D modeling, not product photography, they never really look real to me. I still prefer beautiful photographs with multiple views. And if there is too much retouching I assume they are hiding something.

Photography is really important to the appeal of any website and is especially critical for ecommerce sites. According to a recent consumer survey by the Jewelry Consumer Opinion Council, 85% of consumers said more detailed photos would help their online shopping experience. That’s behind only better prices (89%) and free shipping (95%) in level of consumer interest.

The web is a great way to spread positive (and negative) word of mouth. When you Google your store name (which of course you do regularly, right?), pay particular attention to mentions on consumer review sites.

Although most of these shopping rating sites focus on online stores, there are a few that also include reviews of bricks & mortar stores as well. For example, one place to look for consumer comments about your store is Insiderpages.com. Do a search for jewelry and your city and see if there are any reviews.

Of course, we aren’t recommending that you review your own store (or trash the competition: let’s face it, the anonymity of the online world can lead to dirty pool, which is why you are Googling your store name regularly, right?) but you can and should encourage your customers to post their compliments online.

Although Pricescope.com is an online diamond shopper’s haven, where consumers go for advice on what diamond to buy (and how much to pay), a thread from last May included some praise for bricks and mortar jewelers, even from some consumers who bought their diamonds online. Who received these accolades?

In order of mention: Hudson Poole Jewelers in Tuscaloosa, Alabama; Cornell’s Jewelers in Rochester, New York; Liberty Diamonds in Irvine, California; Birks in Montreal; Garrett Jewelers in Aptos, California; Willow Glen Jewelers in San Jose, California; Joe Escobar in Campbell, California; Barker Diamond Company and Village Jewelers in Nashville, Tennesee; Brown & Co. Jewelers in Roswell, Georgia, Goldworks in Chapel Hill, North Carolina; Jewelsmith in Durham North Carolina; PhilMar Jewelers in New York; Ulman’s Jewelry in Fredericksburg, Virginia; Optima Jewelers in Narberth, Pennsylvania; Good Old Gold in Massapequa Park, New York; Hogan’s Jewelers in Gaylord, Michigan; D D Designs in Rockford, Illinois; Special Designs of Jewelry in Suffern, New York; Nice Ice in Roseburg, Oregon; J. Lewis Jewelers in Bellevue, Washington; Roman Jewelers in Flemington and Bridgewater, New Jersey; Geoffrey’s in San Carlos, California; Bernie Robbins in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; A. T. Thomas Jewelers in Lincoln, Nebraska; Bracken Jewelers in Santa Monica, California; Long’s in Burlington Massachusetts; Goodman and Sons in Williamsburg, Virginia; Harper & Faye in Boston, Massachusetts; Norris Jewelers in Milford, Ohio; NewStar Jewelers in Naperville, Illinois; Linde Meyer Gold & Silver in Philadelphia; Jack Kellemer’s in Haverford, Pennsylvania; Govberg’s in Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania; Desinger and Dolan in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania; Tivol in Kansas City; Pearlmans Jewelers in Battle Creek, Michigan; David Nygaard Fine Jewelers in Virginia Beach; and Princess Jewelers in Burnsville, Minnesota.

Want to make sure your store is noticed in this online community with annual traffic of over 3 million unique visitors? Pricescope has a database of net-friendly jewelers. If you are willing to compete for the sale and to set diamonds purchased online, you can be listed: pricescope.net.