Look Book

s navigating a mall was a huge positive. Customers knew they would not have to contend with larger crowds by visiting retail jewelers was an important factor. Once inside, there was no need to emphasize the importance of closing the sale. If a customer visited a jewelry store in the middle of the pandemic, they were buying. And buy they did at a higher average ticket than ever. They were determined to make those visits and those purchases count. Not surprisingly, diamond jewelry sold exceptionally well throughout the year. At a time when our lives were filled with uncertainty, stress and anxiety, customers made safe choices when they shopped for jewelry, and diamonds provided that low-risk option time and again. As to what 2021 will bring, I believe we will see a continuation of strong retail jew- elry performance for the next few months. As long as the underlying conditions remain the same, there's no reason to believe that performance will change. Customers will continue to respond to the personal touches, your Podium outreach, your social-media presence, your live-streaming, and your curb- side pick-up. They will continue to frequent bricks and mortar stores, but be warned, while only about 15 percent of business was conducted online in the second quarter of 2019, 80 – 85 percent of customers started their journey online, so you must have a strong online presence. It is crazy to think that it took a global pandemic to afford jewelers a break from the post-recession challenges of 2008 and beyond, a time that saw thousands of retailers cease operations, but that is, ironically, the case. Readying your business for the next chapter has never been more impor- tant. If you can use this temporary respite to upgrade your team (even as you might downsize your head-count), adopt a less-is-more strategy on product, commit obsessively to replenishing what is working, implement technology (data-sharing, podium, online, social-media, live-streaming, virtual appointments etc.) and re-think the in-stores experience, you can look forward to emerging even stronger than when you entered into this awful uncertainty last March. There is reason to be optimistic for bricks stores, but there's work to be done. Peter Smith psmith@ctfna.com Peter Smith is an industry veteran with more than thirty-five years' experience in both wholesale and retail jewelry. He is the president of Memoire and Hearts On Fire (Chow Tai Fook, North America) and a columnist for National Jeweler and The Jewelry Book, where he writes about the retail experience. He is also the author of two books, Hiring Squirrels – 12-Essential Questions To Uncover Great Retail Talent and Sell Something, Principles and Perspectives for Engaged Retail Sales- people. Smith is a graduate of Boston College and the Key Executive program at the Harvard Business School. I believe we will see a continuation of strong retail jewelry perfor- mance for the next few months. 58 www.thejewelrybook.com

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