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Blog de tiffany jewelry (page 26)
Tiffany & Co. and Other Top Jewelry Firms Looking to Hire at July 26 Career Fair in New York
In fact, the Institute currently has more than 400 positions in its job database.
In addition, hiring representatives from some of the gem and jewelry industry's top firms will be offering positions to qualified job seekers at GIA's annual Jewelry Career Fair July 26 in New York. Bulgari, Chanel, Christie's, David Yurman, Henry Dunay Designs, Lux Bond & Green, Tiffany & Co., and Zale Corp. are among the more than 50 firms expected to participate in this year's event, according to GIA's Career Fair planners.
"We're very excited to find people who are looking to be sales associates, assistant managers and store managers for the Manhattan area," said Leesa McElroy, manager of staffing for Zale Corp. "Career Fair is perfect for us."
The event features panel discussions and career counseling with many of the jewelry industry's leading executives and noted experts in areas such as jewelry sales, manufacturing, and design. Renowned designer Henry Dunay -- whose exclusive designs are carried by Neiman Marcus, Saks Fifth Avenue, and others -- will be one of the featured panelists in the "Working to Win" session. Marc Dorio, author of "The Complete Idiot's Guide to the Perfect Interview," will present a workshop on interviewing skills.
Some 1,100 job seekers participated in last year's event, including Sarah Cheng -- who secured a graduate jeweler gemologist designer position with upscale jeweler Lux Bond & Green in Uncasville, Conn., as a result of Career Fair.
"Attending Career Fair was a very important step to me because it literally opened the door to the career I've always wanted," said Cheng, a native of Taiwan who earned her Graduate Jeweler Gemologist diploma from GIA.
Jewelry Career Fair, founded by GIA and The 24 Karat Club of Southern California, is sponsored by The VNU Jewelry Group. The event opens at 9 a.m. -- with recruiting beginning at 10:15 a.m. -- and concludes at 3:15 p.m. It will be held at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center, Lower Level E Hall, on 11th Avenue (between 34th and 39th) in New York. For more information, call GIA's Jewelry Career Fair hotline at 800/421-7250, ext. 4100, visit www.careerfair.gia.edu or email careerfair@gia.edu. Admission is free to job seekers.
About GIA
An independent nonprofit organization, the Gemological Institute of America (GIA) is recognized as the world's foremost authority in the grading and identification of diamonds, gemstones and pearls. Established in 1931, GIA has translated its expert knowledge into the most respected gemological education available. In 1953, the Institute created the International Diamond Grading System(TM), which, today, is recognized by virtually every professional jeweler in the world. Through research, education, and gemological laboratory services, the Institute is dedicated to protecting the interests of both the public and the Tiffany bracelets jewelry industry alike.
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Tiffany backs Temple St. Clair in new retail jewelry venture
NEW YORK-Retail icon Tiffany & Co . is branching out into another corner of the retail marketplace-this time, through a Southern designer who got her start at Barneys New York.
With Tiffany's financial and strategic assistance, designer Temple St. Clair will open two boutiques in September and November, respectively. The announcement comes roughly five months after Tiffany officials told investors it planned to roll out a second retail concept in the fall, outside the Tiffany & Co. brand.
In December 2002, Tiffany invested $4 million in Temple St. Clair through a subsidiary called East Pond Holdings, pledging an additional $9 million would follow. While Tiffany spokes-woman Linda Buckley declined to reveal what percentage of the company Tiffany now owns, renorts have indicated that it is a majority.
"We have been watching Temple's business for 3 loner time and believe there are opportunities for her to grow the business into a retail as well as wholesale operation, which is something we can provide her help with through investments and consulting," Buckley said. "We believe there are interesting, underdeveloped opportunities in the jewelry industry to which Tiffany can bring expertise and contribute to growing those ventures."
Temple St. Glair's first boutique is scheduled to open at the South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, Calif., on Sept. 18. The second will appear at a shopping mall in Short Hills, N.J., in mid-November.
A divergence from what Buckley called Tiffany's "classic American" design aesthetic, Temple's pieces incorporate more yellow gold and semiprecious gemstones and retail from $500 to $35.000. Her pieces were first shown at Barneys in 1987, and have since been picked up by retailers including Bergdorf Goodman, Neiman Marcus and Fred Segal.
"Temple's business is a separate business-she will have her own store look, and her stores will be completely independent from Tiffany bracelets from the point of view of the consumer," said Buckley.
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As summer approaches diamond jewelry selling briskly
Diamond sale jewelry merchants' boats were lifted by the broadly rising tide. "In general, first quarter sales across the country were positive," said Susan Fortgang, vice president of M. Fabrikant & Sons.
The positive trend continued into the second quarter, Fortgang added. None of the independent jewelers she spoke to had experienced declining sales, and most reported sales up from zero to 5 percent over last year, with a few enjoying increases in the 8 to 10 percent range.
Matthew Wilson, vice president of Wilson & Son jewelers in New York City, also saw an upswing, which he expects to continue. "Classic goods are selling well-diamond line bracelets, diamond studs, solitaire necklaces."
The first months of 2004 continued an upward trend for Wilson & Son which has lasted for a few years now, Wilson said. Larger, better goods are in demand, he said, including diamond studs of 1-2 carats total weight and up.
"Better goods and branded diamonds, all certified, are in demand. The GIA certificate is the most popular. We also sell the Rand Diamond product with the provenance report," Wilson stated
Leon Cohen, the outgoing president of the Diamond Manufacturers and Importers Association of America (DMIA) and president of Rand Diamond, also indicated that the high-end independent jewelry and department stores his firm does business with, such as Saks Fifth Avenue and Tiffany's Money Clips, are in good shape. "If they were doing well previously, they are doing better now," he said.
Cohen credited this strength to high-end jewelers' successful marketing of high-quality goods and their flourishing trade in branded diamonds. "They support diamonds all the way down to the consumer. There are a lot of different retailers, each with its own flair and style."
Chain stores enjoyed even stronger growth through the first months of the year. ZaIe Corporation, one of the largest of the chains, said its revenues for the three months ending April 30 were $483 million, a 7.6 percent increase over the $449 million it took in the same period last year. Comparable store sales rose 7.2 percent in this period year-on-year, and net earnings shot up 48 percent to $11.5 million. For the nine months ending April 30, the jewelry chain took in $1.85 billion in revenue, up 4.5 percent from $1.77 billion in the comparable period a year before.
Mass merchandiser Wal-Mart sells even more jewelry than Zales. For the fiscal year ending January 31, 2004, the company reported sales of $256.3 billion. During that year, jewelry made up 1 percent of sales at Wal-Mart's Discount Stores and Supercenters, which are the majority of Wal-Mart Stores. Since the company also sells jewelry through its members-only Sam's Club stores and its international stores, it seems reasonable to assume that Wal-Mart jewelry sales totaled close to $2.5 billion for the year. Even if only a portion of that was diamond jewelry, it seems apparent that Wal-Mart is a major presence in the market.
Fred Michmershuizen, director of marketing and communications for the Jewelers of America, said the chains have been doing better for quite a while now. "Sales gains over the past few years have been slightly stronger for chains than independents," he told New York Diamonds. "I can also tell you that the general trend over the past five years or so has been for increased growth for chains and more consolidation among momand-pops."
Cohen placed the U.S. diamond jewelry trade's strength within a context of solid international growth. "There is a stronger consumer front, not just in the United States but in Hong Kong, China, Japan, the Arab countries, the Middle East, and Europe. They have all had a strong pickup, and diamond remains the leader in jewelry by far. It has always been one world market for the past 15 years, and all the world markets are now performing nicely."
Cohen stressed his view that this is healthy growth. "None of the markets is on fire in some crazy way. All are performing well in a plannable business way," he said. "There is no hoarding or investment rush. Consumers are buying diamonds to wear. It is the healthiest scenario you could hope for." He added that the major diamond producers are putting out rough at 100 percent capacity, another indication of a strong market for diamond jewelry.
Diamond jewelry received a traditionally modest holiday boost in May. "For independents $3 million and up, Mother's Day was generally positive-not overwhelmingly, but stronger than last Mother's Day definitely," Fortgang said. "It's not a holiday that can be compared to Christmaslower price point goods are sold at Mother's Day." As a result, chain stores which sell cheaper items, up to $500, had a "very positive" holiday, she said.
Wilson said that "Mother's Day was good for us, better than last year." In terms of specific types of diamonds, he said, the fancy yellows his store specializes in are selling well. "That's the color that does the best."
The positive trend seemed to be spread fairly evenly across the country. Fortgang thought that there was some geographic inconsistency, but could not identify where sales had been strongest. Cohen opined that diamond jewelry sales were "very broad based, with strength throughout the entire country."
In this, the industry reflected the broader retail economy. Figures from the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi indicated that U.S. retail sales excluding food services rose by comparable amounts in April in every region of the country. The South experienced the strongest retail sales growth at $108.2 billion, up 8.1 percent over April 2003, and the West had the slowest retail sales growth at $63.1 billion, up 6.9 percent over the previous year.
The consensus in the trade going into the JCK Show in Las Vegas at the beginning of June was that the outlook remained strong. Cohen said that he personally had been unable to rent extra hotel rooms in Las Vegas, since they were sold out a month and a half before the JCK Show opened.
The broader economic outlook also remained cautiously positive. Michael Niemira, chief economist and director of research for the International Council of Shopping Centers, told ShopperTrak that retail sales would undergo a seasonal increase in June following the Memorial Day holiday weekend.
Cohen said the trade looks set for strong growth through the rest of the year. "I definitely have the impression of a very steady positive note within the diamond industry, based on what's happening globally. There are so many regions now [that are buying diamond jewelry].... It looks positive going into Christmas."
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For Landlords, Jewelry Stores Are Big Gems
Driven by strong sales and the rise of tiffany & co jewelry as a fashion item, some of the industry's major players are paying top dollar to open new stores or expand current locations. From high-end Tiffany & Co. to Zale Corp.'s Piercing Pagoda -- a teen favorite for belly-button rings -- jewelry retailers at every echelon are vying for bigger, better space in key cities and shopping centers.
Watch specialist Tourneau Inc.'s new Las Vegas store is about 16 times larger than the one it replaced. Celebrity bling-master Harry Winston, meanwhile, plans to open a three-story flagship store on Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills later this year. A handful of jewelry designers, including David Yurman and Judith Ripka, are opening stand- alone stores after years of relying on department stores for distribution.
"The jewelry category within retail has been one of the hottest in the past 18 months," says Jim Okamura, a senior partner at retail consulting firm J.C. Williams Group Ltd. At Mills Corp., which owns 42 malls in the U.S., leasing of new space by jewelry tenants is up 70% over this time last year, according to Mills spokeswoman Becky Sullivan.
Behind the love affair between jewelers and landlords is an explosion of demand for everything from classic engagement rings and pearl strands to more fashionable "right hand" diamond rings and other colorful baubles featured in magazines like InStyle.
While young buyers are avid consumers in the category, it's the baby-boom generation -- folks born from 1946 through 1964 -- who are most richly adorning themselves. In particular, consumers aged 50 to 55 represent the jewelry trade's "sweet spot," says Ken Gassman, president of the Jewelry Industry Research Institute, an independent research and consulting group.
The craving for rings and things is helping results at some of the industry's publicly traded companies. Last week, Tiffany said that sales at stores open at least a year rose a strong 11% in its fiscal first quarter, which ended in April. Zale, the biggest fine jewelry chain in North America, said earlier this week that its same-store sales rose 3.5% for the period ended last month.
Zale typifies some of the industry's recent expansion patterns. This year marks the first since 2001 that the company will increase its store count, says David Sternblitz, the company's treasurer. The chain is slated to open 65 new U.S. stores as well as 50 freestanding Piercing Pagoda stands.
Additionally, Zale has begun eyeing locations outside of traditional malls for both its Zales and Zales Outlet stores. Zale executives estimate that about $10 billion, or a third of the specialty jewelry market's sales, are generated by independent jewelers at off-mall locations. "We feel there's opportunity to capture market share in more of these neighborhood centers," says Mr. Sternblitz.
Last year, Tiffany bangles launched a new retail division called Iridesse, which sells pearl jewelry, opening up stores in malls in McLean, Va., and Short Hills, N.J. Four more Iridesse stores are slated to open this year. Within five years, the company expects to have at least 20 Iridesse stores open.
Landlords have a good incentive for courting this gilt market: Store owners can afford to pay top dollar for space. Jewelry sales in the U.S. hit $27.4 billion last year, a nearly 5% increase from 2003 and a nearly 10% jump from 2000, according to the Department of Commerce. Five years ago, a typical mass-market jewelry store in a shopping mall rang up $700,000 to $800,000 in sales a year. Today, that same store generates sales of $1.2 million to $1.5 million.
Although jewelry retailers typically take up a small amount of space -- roughly 1,000 to 2,500 square feet on average -- they have the highest sales per square-foot of any retail category and therefore pay some of the highest rents at the mall. That works out to about $68 a square foot, or considerably more than the rent paid by movie theaters (under $10 a square foot), women's specialty stores (about $27 a square foot) or athletic shoe stores ($24 a square foot).
What's more, the jewelry chains typically like to occupy high- profile space in a mall or retail center, such as the center court, which command the steepest rents.
But the retail march of big names in the jewelry and watch business isn't all glitter. As chains like Zale move into more markets, many local, family-run jewelry stores are feeling the pressure and closing up shop.
The number of jewelry retailers in the U.S. has been shrinking for the past decade, according to the rings Jewelers Board of Trade, a trade association. There were 24,765 jewelry retailers in the U.S. at the end of April, down from 28,497 at the end of 1995. "The larger guys may be branching out, but they're eliminating independent retailers in the process," says Dione Kenyon, president of the Jewelers Board. "We see more and more mom-and-pop operators dropping every year."
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Jewelry, watches category shines in holiday Web sales
RESTON, VA.-In what has almost become a ho-hum success story, Internet sales continued to shine this past holiday season, bearing out optimistic forecasts with a holiday retail growth rate of around 25 percent over Web sales from 2004, according to comScore Media Metrix Reports.
After the online selling season screeched to a halt on Dec. 24, comScore Networks reported that online sales for November and December peaked at $19.6 billion for all non-travel sales, a 25 percent increase over 2004 holiday sales, which had shown a 31 percent increase over 2003. Apparel and accessories-including jewelry-rose 37 percent over the 2004 holidays, bringing total sales for the category to $3 billion.
The online holiday season started strong and built steadily through December, ending 2005 with record online sales of $143.2 billion for the year, comScore says. Online consumers spent 27 percent more on jewelry and watches in 2005 than they did in 2004, the report finds.
In general, luxury goods fared especially well through the holiday season. Online starfish necklace jewelry sales jumped 39 percent in November 2005 over the previous month, with some 16.4 million shoppers. Coach.com reported 2.71 million shoppers visited its site for the month, followed closely by Zale.com, which saw 1.72 million shoppers responding to its aggressive holiday marketing program.
"We were pleased with our e-commerce business," says David Sternblitz, vice president and treasurer for ZaIe Corp. "We had-double digit returns this holiday, so we continue to make nice progress."
Last year, Zale reported 30 percent annual growth for its online division, which accounted for 1 percent of all the company's sales. Sales results for 2005 had not yet been released at press time, but in July 2005, ZaIe outsourced its transactional Web site management to GSI Commerce of King of Prussia, Pa.a move that proved profitable for the jeweler through the last half of the year.
"It's fair to say we will continue our relationship, and continue to expand our e-commerce business," says Sternblitz.
Other large chain retailers also reported ongoing growth in Web business through the end of 2005, with jewelry sales representing a bright spot within the overall retail picture.
"We can't break out jewelry as a merchandise division, but it was one of our standout areas of the holiday season," says J.C. Penney spokesman Tim Lyons.
Online sales for all categories of merchandise at J.C. Penney were up 25 percent in December 2005 over the previous year, Lyons says.
Independents fared well on the Internet, too, even with less experience to fall back on. Suzanne Martinez, partner in Lang Antiques, purveyors of estate jewelry in downtown San Francisco, says that adding transactional abilities to its Web site was a big winner this holiday season, and that 25 percent of Lang's total holiday business came through that channel in 2005.
"Consumer confidence in buying high-ticket items online was very strong," she says, adding that Lang saw multiple sales through its Web site in the $15,000-$40,000 range.
She also reports that many customers who came to the store to purchase had visited Lang's site prior to coming in.
Luxury jeweler tiffany & co jewelry. reported that direct marketing sales in 2005 rose 14 percent to $63.7 million, bolstered by substantial growth in Internet sales-including a greater number of orders and more average tickets per order. That's nearly a tenth of Tiffany's net sales for the holiday period, which rose 6 percent to $712 million.
By mid-December, a majority of Internet retailers were riding a strong cyber-sales wave. At that time, nearly 60 percent of retailers contacted in a Shop.org survey were reporting that they'd seen increased order size over the previous year, and more than half reported the number of serious buyers was up while the number of tire-kickers was down in the run-up to Christmas.
Days before Christmas, Amazon.com announced its best season ever, with demand peaking at 41 items purchased per second in early December. High-ticket jewelry sales over the holidays included a $94,000 pair of diamond drop earrings, but diamond solitaire rings, diamond stud earrings, 18-karat gold jewelry and pearls showed strong movement all season, Amazon reported.
To keep the momentum high, more than half the online retailers polled by Shop.org said that they were offering premium shipping at standard prices during the week before Christmas. Blue Nile pushed the envelope as far as it could when it announced guaranteed Christmas Eve delivery on all orders placed by 3 p.m. the day before.
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