Sept 08 Cover.qxd:CJSept05_Cover.

qxd 9/15/08 1:32 PM Page 2

CJ
SEPTEMBER • OCTOBER 2008

125
OVER YEARS
IN THE BUSINESS OF
RETAILING JEWELLERY

Holiday Trends
STYLES AND CATEGORIES
YOU NEED TO STOCK
CANADIAN JEWELLER

canadian jeweller
magazine
Original G.
MASTER DESIGNER
SIMON GHANIMIAN SPEAKS

E xcellence in Design:
SEPTEMBER • OCTOBER 2008

THE WINNERS ARE…

PUBLICATIONS MAIL 40678000 | 60 BLOOR STREET WEST SUITE 1106, TORONTO ON, M4W 3B8

Going That Extra

Mile
MINDHAM FINE JEWELLERY’S MYLES MINDHAM

S ha de s o f G l o r y
A NEW LOOK AT COLOURED
PLUS: DIAMOND FLUORESCENCE

ALL THE LATEST MARKET NEWS, TRENDS & EVENTS

059-062.CJ_MrkWatch02.qxd:Layout 1 9/16/08 2:50 PM Page 59

marketwatch

Geomarketing Comes to

Jewellery
Di Modolo, Milano 18K
gold Triadra necklace.

In every business, the ability to put the right

product into the right market at the right time is the
proverbial ‘Holy Grail.’ And from the point of view of
any business analyst, the jewellery industry has
been massively inefficient in this regard since the
dawn of large-scale jewellery manufacturing.

B Y R OBIN G AMBHIR

roducing any piece of jewellery is a capital intensive

P business requiring expensive input costs in raw materials

such as precious metals, diamonds, gemstones and labour.
In addition, jewellery is a luxury item which asks consumers
to spend discretionary income on a something that appeals on
an emotional level — something which adds a greater degree
of uncertainty to a product’s success in the market.

SEPTEMBER • OCTOBER 2008 CJ 59

059-062.CJ_MrkWatch02.qxd:Layout 1 9/16/08 2:50 PM Page 60
With the advent of online shopping, the process of tracking
consumer behaviour and preferences became easier for online
retailers, who could track product sales from their website.
That was fine for online-only plays such as Blue Nile, but what
about independent jewellers who do the majority of their sales
in a store? Happily, most consumers still prefer to purchase
their jewellery from a store in their community; local jewellers
provide a level of service that online-only retailers will never
be able to match. But independent jewellers and their suppliers
need new tools to compete in markets that are faster and
smarter than ever before.
Giving Local Jewellers the Tools to Compete
OpenBlue’s raison d’etre has always been to provide those
local, independent jewellers with modern websites that give
them the ability to compete by leveraging their suppliers’
inventory. This approach provides consumers shopping
online with an inventory that is wider and deeper than any
online-only retailer could match. And since OpenBlue sites
drive traffic into the store (displaying an average of 10,000 items
60 CJ SEPTEMBER • OCTOBER 2008
“prefer
Happily, most consumers still
to purchase their jewellery
from a store in their community;
local jewellers provide a level
of service that online-only retailers
will never be able to match.
”
of finished jewellery, loose diamonds, watches, clocks and
giftware on a retail site), it gives independent retailers
more inventory to drive a sale than any other jewellers’
website. Every time consumers shop on a site powered by
OpenBlue, everything they click on is recorded and fed back
to the retailer and their suppliers. When a supplier’s rep
visits the store, there is no doubt about the items that should
be held in stock by the retailer. Using this data, suppliers can
deploy the right product into the right market. Retailers who
want to give it a try, can go to www.openbluestores.com.
See the Market
Up until now, readers of CJ have had the benefit of seeing
the market for different categories of jewellery through
statistics; these statistics and the magazine’s consumer-driven
lists of the top 10 and top 100 are unprecedented in the
industry. With this edition of Canadian Jeweller, OpenBlue is
pleased to show the next level of market data — maps. In this
and upcoming editions of “Market Watch,” you will be able to
actually see the market for jewellery.
059-062.CJ_MrkWatch02.qxd:Layout 1 9/16/08 2:50 PM Page 61

marketwatch

Map 1. A world map where each balloon represents one or more

consumers from the particular city that clicked on the Canadian
diamonds category. Noticeably, there is a lot of traffic from the
United States.

screen snapshot

screen snapshot

Map 2. Results for consumers searching for loose Canadian

diamonds. The map depicts interest in Canadian diamonds/
diamond jewellery across the country, as well as central
and eastern United States.

Map 3. In this map, there is a different distribution pattern for

a particular style. There is some interest from the west coast of
the United States, as well as heavy concentrations in Ontario
and Alberta.

screen snapshot

Using this new technology, OpenBlue can now map market
data for any category of jeweller, any loose diamond, watch,
clock or giftware item. This serves as a broad step towards that
‘Holy Grail’ of putting the right product into the right market
at the right time. Using geographical data to guide sales and
marketing is known as Geomarketing. OpenBlue will make
this data available to the industry as a free service this fall at
www.thewiredjeweller.com. Detailed statistics, along with our
top 10/100 lists, will continue to be available in the pages of
Canadian Jeweller.
Mapping The Market For Canadian Diamonds
So-called “blood diamonds” have led to an increased demand
for Canadian diamonds as their “conflict-free” status seems
unimpeachable amongst consumers. Indeed, Canadian
diamonds have become the “brand” for diamonds free of the
blood diamond stigma. So while retailers offer Canadian
diamonds, and diamond jewellery made with Canadian
diamonds are largely based in Canada, the demand for them
could extend outside of North America.
OpenBlue retail sites have a category of finished jewellery
called “Made with Canadian Diamonds.” Shown on this page
is a world map (Map 1) where each balloon represents one or
more consumer(s) from the particular city that clicked on this
category. While the majority of OpenBlue-powered retail sites
are based in Canada, there is a lot of traffic from the United
States and some scattered distribution across the globe. That
means that a lot of Americans are finding these Canadian
retailers and shopping at their sites.
Many OpenBlue retailers also have loose diamond searches
on their sites and one of the options on those searches is to only
show Canadian diamonds. Map 2 shows all the consumers who
selected that option when searching for loose diamonds.
Maps 1 and 2 depict a lot of interest in Canadian diamonds and
Canadian diamond jewellery across Canada and in central and
eastern United States. These maps represent broad trends and
in the online version of the mapping system, you can zoom in
on any area and pick out specific areas of concentration.

SEPTEMBER • OCTOBER 2008 CJ 61

059-062.CJ_MrkWatch02.qxd:Layout 1 9/18/08 12:23 PM Page 62

marketwatch

“Applying this sort of Geomarketing technology to jewellery

takes a lot of the guesswork out of deploying products for both
retailers and manufacturers.
”

Polar Ice Canadian

For a supplier trying to decide where to market a specific diamond solitaire
style and for a retailer who is trying to decide what to stock,
they need very specific information. To illustrate, we selected
a Polar Ice Canadian diamond solitaire.

When we look at map 3 on the previous page, we can see that

this particular style has a different distribution pattern,
compared to the broader maps which show general interest
Dall'Avo for Gold Expressions 18K
in Canadian diamonds. Here, the style of the ring itself
gold white cromo collection with
comes into play and we can see some interest from the west hardened white ceramic.
coast of the United States. In Canada, there is strong
interest across the country, with heavy concentrations in
Ontario and Alberta.

Applying this sort of Geomarketing technology to jewellery

takes a lot of the guesswork out of deploying products for
both retailers and manufacturers. Over time, geomarketing
will yield efficiencies and save everyone time and money by
putting the right products in the right markets. [CJ]

62 CJ SEPTEMBER • OCTOBER 2008

CJ_031_Open Blue Network.qxd:Layout 1 9/12/08 9:44 AM Page 44

For details, write #126 on Free Info Page, page 104.