[Jewelry making - Article 00879] - Re: [Orchid] How has it been for everybody else?

[Neilthejeweler]

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    I'm a little concerned for those who say things are slow. So perhaps
    it might be good for those who are busy to reflect a little and tell
    us to what they attribute their busy-ness. 

    My perspective... 

    Whenever a salesperson comes in my door I always ask what they hear
    from other jewelers. The most common comment is that its the service
    oriented jewelers who are doing well or at least OK. That would
    include me for which I am grateful. But it hasn't been all luck. When
    I designed my business model(cliche, sorry) I did it with the intent
    to be profitable this time, not to fit some dreamy jewelry utopian
    ego gratification thing. (My own utopian ideal for many years was
    that I could make and sell exclusively, intricate fancy intense
    colored diamond stuff. Life thankfully rid me of that delusion. That
    takes extreme capital). Satisfy your customer, not just yourself. 

    But what is service? 

    Yes it includes repair. That is a great traffic generator. Before
    you can sell anything you have to have the customer in your
    store(bricks and mortar type here, you web types have another
    problem) and repair does just that, Gets em in and exposed to you and
    your products. BUT repair is also a profit center(more cliche' sorry
    again) in and of itself. Mr Geller no doubt has driven that point
    home by now. 

    It also would include custom work. I see there are people who do
    custom via the web. While I've done it in a few cases with
    established clients I have to really wonder how one can use the
    'closers' on a stranger when you don't have that eye to eye contact
    to build confidence. But this may be something that's just beyond me.
    Old dogs new tricks as they say. But people will eagerly pay for good
    custom work, and they become repeat custom-ers and bring you other
    new clients. Fact. 

    Service also means tuning your presentation to suit that particular
    client's needs/desires. Gift wrap, delivery, returns, free appraisal
    with purchase, whatever it takes to float that person's boat. It
    means seeing people, not sales figures, standing in front of you.

    Now I know there are many other jewelers out there in orchidland who
    will have other ideas and concepts that could be beneficial to
    everybody. So I climb down from the podium... 

Oh, yeah, and having a sense of humor helps too.
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