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Reviving Wristwear: How Experiences Fuel Watch Market Growth with Brandon · The Growth Class with Phil Masiello

• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: Hey everybody and welcome back to the growth class.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: I'm your host, Phil Massiello.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: And when we talk about scaling a business, we often focused on a lot of tech, digital products, consumer products, e-commerce.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: But today we're looking at a brand that's mastered the art of physical experience.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: So joining us is Brandon from Provence Diamond, a premier name in high-end jewelry in Rhode Island.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: For decades, they've managed to do something incredibly difficult, stay relevant across generations while maintaining an uncompromising standard of luxury.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: So we're going to dive into how you build that legacy brand, how the white glove approach to customer growth and what the future of retail looks like in the digital world as well as the physical world.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: So, Brandon, Brandon, excuse me, thank you for taking the time to come on the show.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I appreciate it.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's my pleasure.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_01: My pleasure.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_01: And uh you're and you're right about the uh the future of retail.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: It's changing dramatically.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, why don't you take us through, I know that uh you didn't start the business, but it's multi-generational, I think, at this point, right?
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: Take us through what it is that you guys do, how you do it, and what makes you different.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: So the business was started in the 80s, just as a quick education of jewelry stores.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_01: And in the 80s, jewelry stores uh switched a little bit from being a traditional jewelry store into either doing jewelry or investing in brands.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_01: Uh our store, our family store, uh went the way of the brands.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_01: And from that, uh, the brands themselves have taught us a lot along the way about service, uh, how to brand your own store, and how to stay relevant uh as trends change.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_01: And so where where we're at now is we've taken a small family business and brought it up to a larger family business that's pretty significant now.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: And it's due to the fact that we've invested into the community and into the training and the service structure of our business.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_01: Um, no one, no one in our it's a retail store, no one works on commissions, so the incentive for them to do well is a different type of training.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: Is it is that different than most jewelry stores?
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: Are most jewelry stores commission-based?
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: I would say the higher-end jewelry stores, the ones that are a little more elegant, that maybe have those brands, I'd say the majority of them are not commission-based.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, the ones that aren't at that level generally tend to be because that's what motivates the salespeople to sell.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: The brands end up bringing people into our store, which is 80% of retail, getting people into your door.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: And with the and because they're coming for the brands, it's a destination's uh destination.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_01: We're assuming they're gonna buy something.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_01: So our job is to make that experience great so they want to come back again.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_01: So it's a longer-term approach than just getting the sale and transactional.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, I always wondered, like if it, you know, if what we find we do a lot in e-commerce, we do a lot on on Amazon, we do do help, we do help a lot of omni-channel retailers with driving people into the store to buy their product.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: But I always wondered if there was a metric, and I if you could figure out how many times a customer has to visit the store before they actually pull the trigger and make the purchase.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that that is so in in most, I think in most stores it's like something like two or three times.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_01: Uh for our store, and it's we have different stores.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_01: So this is a very, this is a very interesting question.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_01: I'll just explain why.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_01: In our store, uh, we carry a brand, we carry Rolex, we're an official Rolex jeweler.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_01: And uh with the way the market is right now, people want to come in and buy, but they can't.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_01: So what do you what do you do about that problem?
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_01: Uh in our bridal department, uh, people want to come in, but most likely you're gonna they're gonna shop around because it's a very, very important decision for them.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: And then in fashion jewelry, if they want a brand like David Uhrman, this is the only place to get it unless you go to Boston or online.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_01: So these are the different types of channels that we deal with.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_01: And um so when asking how many times are they gonna come in, most of the time when someone comes in, it's one or two times and they're buying something.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, that's most of the time.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_01: What we've trained people to do and where the future retail is is to create an experience that makes them want to come back, a feeling, a wow moment.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_01: And that can be it's free to do in most cases.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_01: And and it's up to the employee or um the managers to really set that tone and they get that direction from us, which is to make the experience unforgettable.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_01: And naturally you will have people come back.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_01: And uh that's stuff that we're trying to do.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: Well, what I I guess when you have a a store and and it's so tightly run, you can create that um connection with the customer so that they do want to come back.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: But you you said something about Rolex.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: Why can't people buy them?
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: They come to the store, you said, but they can't.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_00: They want to buy, but they can't.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_01: So I don't want to say that they can't.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_01: It's just that the supply uh is outweighed by the demand.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_01: And so when we don't have enough products uh to meet the demand, which is extremely high, it's it's abnormally high.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_01: It's not as high as it probably should be.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_01: It's too high.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_01: But because of that, uh, most of the people who are going to want to buy one have to wait for them.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_01: And it's not just a transactional, again, it's not an ordering transactional process.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_01: We take it seriously.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_01: It's a lot of money, and we want the experience to match the product that they're getting.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_01: And so when someone comes in and we meet with them, we are learning about them.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we're getting to know them and we're making those extra efforts to make them feel special.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_01: And you'll see that even in the digital world, that happens.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, when you go on websites, they find out what you want, they target you with an ad.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_01: That's a way of kind of making you feel special, but we can do it in a physical form here.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_01: And um, yeah.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_01: So, but that's the reason they can't do it is because it's supply and demand.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_01: And and it eventually comes, but some of the weights are uh into years.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: And is that everywhere?
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: Like every Rolex you have.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: So if I if I go to you and I say I want to buy a Rolex, you say I can't, uh there's nothing for another year, I can I drive to Boston and and and get one?
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: New, not used, new.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_01: So this is a this is a great question.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_01: And let me hit it with two points.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_01: This goes into kind of just the service and what we do.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_01: Someone comes in and says, Hey, can I buy a Rolex?
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_01: I'm I'm never gonna say no.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_01: That that why would you ever tell your customer no?
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_01: So these are just sales.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um, what I would say is it's gonna take some time.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_01: And what what I'm gonna do is advocate for you and do my best to make sure you get it as fast as you can.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_01: Can you go to Boston?
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: The same process will take place there.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we receive probably around anywhere from 30 to 60 calls a day for the product, and I'm sure Boston receives more.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_01: So it's a you know, we don't have an idea of how many watches Rolex makes.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: Some people think it may be, you know, million, 1.5 million.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_01: What let's say it's three million, which it probably isn't.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_01: Think of how many people there are in the world, and that's how many they can make a year, and you can see that if there's an over demand, that's that's what causes the slowdown.
• 7:30
  unknown: Yeah.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: RP at this point, you know, I'm fascinated by the the watch um business because I see so much of it on social media.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: I see so many people talking about watches and the all the different brands, and you know, and I I think uh I told you in one of our calls that there was a point in time, about 20 years ago, where I wanted to buy a paddock and I went to Philadelphia and uh I never pulled the trigger, but I wanted to.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: I love I love the simplicity.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: I can't remember the exact uh uh the exact model, but it was just it's just the most simple one with just a gold bezel.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's just beautiful to me.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_00: And I almost pulled it and uh pulled the trigger, but I never did, and I kick myself now because I look at how much they're worth.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: How much is it now?
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my God.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and um and I I think to myself, are people buying watches um to to wear, or are they just why uh buying them now to stick in the drawer and collect because they see these antique roadshows where you have the the box and you have the original receipt and you have everything and then all of a sudden it's worth you know$200,000?
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so I can touch on that a little bit.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_01: First of all, the store was really this store, uh, Province Diamond is was a diamond store.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_01: We sold diamonds and jewelry.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we didn't really get into watches until uh the 90s, and that's when Rolex came on board.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_01: And uh even still up into 2000, into the 2010s, uh Rolex was really the only brand that was carried.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_01: And it was considered a jewelry brand.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: It's we're an official Rolex jeweler.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_01: And uh now we have a full watch store, uh 3,000 square foot lounge bar.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and why is that?
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so I can touch just on what you said about that Antiques Roadshow.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_01: And what's really fascinating is uh, and I know that other companies like Rolex are doing research into this phenomenon because it is a phenomenon.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_01: And one of the things that has been found is that uh people stopped using their watches a lot uh when the iPhone came out.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_01: And when the iPhone came out, there was about a seven-year trend of people stopping watches.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: Then the uh Apple Watch came, and a lot of watch companies, not Rolex, but a lot of watch companies were scared, is that going to take away more of our business?
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: But no, it did the opposite.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_01: What happened was it trained people to wear something on their wrist again.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_01: And in doing so, people's trends usually ran around seven, eight years.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_01: And as this trend was slowly dissolving, us an interesting thing happened where we were able to see things like that antique roadshow virally because it's targeting us, because algorithms are targeting us, which didn't happen 10 years before that.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_01: We were able to see things like Paul Newman's Daytona sell for$18 million, which is unheard of.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_01: And these these types of uh events, we call them black swan events or whatever you call them, catapulted the interest in watches uh coupled with needing that wrist real estate.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_01: And what ended up happening is that uh we had a pandemic and people had extra money to spend and they knew that those watches went up in value.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_01: And what would I want to spend my money in if I can't go on a vacation and can't buy a boat?
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_01: And so uh it catapulted into a huge phenomenon of people loving watches, getting interested in them and creating a whole culture.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_01: So that's where we are today, and that's why we built the the second thing on.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, it's it it is amazing that all of a sudden you know, all of these uh startup watch brands became, you know, popular around that same time, like movement MVMT and uh Shinola, and you know, just uh there's another one here locally, you know, uh in mid-range.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, they're not building.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, these are boutique brands.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_01: Boutique brands are what what came out of it.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you can look at it like clothing or jewelry or or any of that where you see there's you know, think of cars even.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_01: You know, there's you start out with the big three.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_01: Think of TV.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: Start out with the big three and then it dissolves into boutiques, and that's where we are.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: And I think every business does that.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_01: And so we we capitalized on that.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think it's it's funny.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: I I was at an event uh last week, and I s in in in it used to be, right, there's there's like basically six outcomes that people look for when they're you know when they're buying a product.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: They're looking for some sort of an outcome.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: And um and if you're good at marketing, you're targeting that outcome.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, obviously uh Rolexes or paddocks or any of those high-end watches have been about status.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_00: You wear a Rolex because it says, you know, I had$15,000 that I could afford to spend on something, and I have it here, right?
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: And and then, you know, I started to see people that are collecting them, not necessarily wearing them everywhere.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: But I was at an event uh about a week and a half ago, two weeks ago, uh, and I saw this guy, and he's got a Rolex on on his right arm, and he's got his Apple watch on his left arm.
• 12:53
  unknown: Yeah.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: And I said, I said, I don't understand why you want to wear two watches.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_00: He's like, well, I need this one because it it's it's getting all my stats, my, my, you know.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_00: And and I'm thinking, so you want everybody to know you can afford the I didn't say this to him, but I'm thinking you can you want everybody to know you can afford the Rolex and you're successful, but you still want the stats coming out of, you know, your Apple Watch, because you know that Rolex isn't gonna come out with with that type of watch.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_00: So I just think it's funny the behavior, because I love watching consumers and I love watching and trying to understand their behavior and trying to figure out if that makes me a better marketer or not.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_00: But you know, I just love watching how people react to things because the the Apple Watch is very specific.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_00: Like I wear an Apple Watch and I I do it because I want that, I need that information, right?
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: But uh I don't need it to tell time.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: I have a c I have a, you know, I'm carrying around a phone that has the time on it, and you know, so correct.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um Rolex will be the first to tell you uh nobody needs their product.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_01: That's yeah, nobody needs it.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_01: So if nobody needs your product, why would they buy it?
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_01: And one of the things that you'll find with a lot of Rolex uh owners, a lot of them, is that they're driven by achievement and that's a symbol of their achievement.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_01: It's something that product and it's and and I find that I think in the 80s, you you you know, long ago in the 80s, you saw Rolex as that status kind of symbol.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_01: That's what set that mark.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but now it's something a little different.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_01: We find that people are really coming in when they're finding something in their life is important to celebrate.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_01: And we love being a part of that.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_01: That's again part of that experience where we understand how important that purchase is.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_01: It's not like buying a piece of clothing.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_01: It means something to them.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_01: And we take that seriously.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_01: And because of that, I think the respect is built for future relationships.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_00: I did see that in the in the late 80s.
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_00: I remember when I, you know, was in college and um and I was uh seeing people that were, you know, either working in the finance side of it or whatever, starting to buy Rolexes, obviously, as as their their primary watch.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: And and they were obviously much more reasonably priced back then, but still, and you're 100% right.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: It was it was a symbol of achievement, it was a symbol of status.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: It said, you know, I can afford to spend this.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_00: But then I started to see recently, like probably in the last seven or eight years, that a lot of guys are taking pride in finding these vintage Rolexes or paddocks or you know, all these other ones, the ones I can't pronounce, Admar what I can't pronounce.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you see these uh you see everybody looking for these vintage ones to wear because that has become like they may buy a new Rolex or they may have other Rolexes at home that they're collecting, but they have these vintage ones that they like wearing on their on their wrist.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_01: There's a coup, a couple reasons for that.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_01: One of them is a lot like cars.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_01: So I collect cars.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_01: How often can I show my car collection to you?
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_01: This is this is I can I can carry 50,000 in my pocket and show it to you, um, 100,000, a million, whatever.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_01: The uh the ability to to show off, again, your achievements, your collections in a small area is great.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_01: The other reason is a little bit of status, uh, those vintage watches, because they're so rare.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_01: If I go to a party, chances are someone may have on a modern-day Rolex that I'm wearing or a modern-day Ottawa Paget or any any of those.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but the chances are they're not gonna have that vintage one.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_01: And that's gonna draw some attention and it's gonna show that you you have a you know an interest in something that other people are interested in.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_01: So I I find that a lot where people are buying those vintage, a because they love it, they're collectors, or b, they want something no one else has.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, exactly.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_00: They want something that nobody else has and and nobody else can get because it's it's it's limited.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I uh yeah, I find it, I find, I find it fascinating.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_00: I just love I love watching consumers.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_00: I love their behavior, I love watching people and uh and understanding sort of you know what turns them on.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_00: But aside from the watch business or the watch side of it, uh is is is the jewelry business sort of growing, stagnant, uh hurting because of of things in the economy, especially when it comes to diamonds.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_00: And and then I have a second question after that regarding specifically diamonds.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_01: So uh in regards to jewelry, uh fashion jewelry, as far as the brands, David Yeurman, if you look at Chanel, um Cartier, things like that, those are all up.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the higher brands are up.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_01: We found that uh stores that don't have the brands or maybe a little second tier lower than us uh have felt a little bit of a crunch.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's due to gold prices.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we had in many of our vendors, we had almost three time three increases last year, uh, not only for gold, but tariffs.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_01: So both of those things uh affected, but in our business, for our clientele, the level that we're at, we didn't see as much of a slowdown.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_01: Uh where we are seeing a little bit of a slowdown is in the bridal business.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_01: So when you go on to talk about diamonds, we do see a, you know, we see people waiting to get married a little bit more.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um, we see people not getting married.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um if you see, you know, certain, let's say, uh same-sex marriages or same-sex couples, they may wait a little bit longer than some others uh to get married.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um younger people who may have been getting married in the 20s are getting married in their 30s.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_01: So we're seeing that that bridal, that bridal business, uh, not necessarily for us like slow down, but we we see it.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_01: We see it a little bit.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't, it's not slow to hurt, but it we see it.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: And um we're hearing that as well.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_01: What's your question on diamonds?
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_00: Well, no, the um uh this whole trend towards uh w what do you call lab uh lab created diamonds.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_00: And because I I grew up in New York and we were always taught the we were always taught that if you're gonna get engaged, if you're gonna, you know, do anything with you know with a diamond, you go down to the diamond district, you find your um the diamond, you pick out the diamond first, then you worry about the setting, right?
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_00: You want to get the best quality diamond that you could possibly get, and then you uh you worry about the setting.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_00: So you don't necessarily buy a finished ring, you're sort of constructing it, right?
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_00: And then the but but there's this whole trend now towards lab-created diamonds.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_00: And to me, I don't know, is it does it hold the value the same as a regular diamond?
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_00: Is it the same type of quality?
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_00: Do people view it the same?
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so uh what what happens um with lab grown diamonds is that it's the it's the same process that a a diamond would go through except very f in four weeks instead of four million years.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: And when it comes out, it is it is a diamond.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's chemically a diamond.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: There's attributes to it that or minerals I believe that are in it that can be tested to tell that it is a lab-grown diamond.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_01: But why would why would someone buy that?
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um there's a lot of reasons that people would buy the lab-grown diamonds, and we see it, we see a huge increase in it.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: So we we don't advertise it, but we have them here when people are asking for alternatives.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_01: Uh when something's 10,000 and they can only spend five, maybe that's a good alternative if they need a certain size.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_01: Uh certain social circles require um conformity amongst their friends.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_01: And if they can't afford to conform, then maybe that's a good uh suggestion.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_01: I I I don't know.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_01: I've I've seen uh just in the past six months, we've seen an uptick in natural diamonds come back.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_01: It reminds me again of the 80s, 90s when people would go to uh uh Canal Street in New York and get Louis Vuitton bags that were fake bets.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh there was something cool about that.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_01: I got a fake Louis Vuitton bag.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_01: That eventually runs its course.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_01: And now people ask, is that real or fake?
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_01: And as that social trend happens, people shift more towards real because they don't want to answer that question.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I don't know if diamonds will do the same thing.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_01: They might, but I think there's a use for them.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_01: If you're 16 and want to get diamond studs, maybe you get lab groans, and by the time you're 21, I can get you new ones since showing me that you've kept them.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_01: Uh that's a great, great use, I think.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_01: You know, someone who wants to put money on a house as opposed to buying a diamond ring, but wants, you know, needs to have that, I think it's good use.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe after five years, you say, let's let's get a real one, you know, after you've established yourself.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_01: There's a lot there's a lot of uses.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um, again, when we're here talking to clients, we're giving them advice.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_01: We're learning about them and saying, as a friend, this is what I would do.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_01: And we don't care about what they buy.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_01: We care about, you know, trusting us.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_00: Care about whether or not they're happy with the services they got and whether or not they're gonna come back.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_01: Like like the restaurant, right?
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_01: You'll go back if the if the The food's bad, but if the service isn't good, you're not going to go.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you're you in your business, you're creating, you're, you're trying to create that long-term customer because if you're going to buy a piece of jewelry once, you're going to come back.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody buys one piece of jewelry in their life.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you if I'm going to buy something for my wife, I'm going to go and buy it and come back maybe every, you know, Christmas, every birthday, every Mother's Day, whatever it is.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so yeah, that's you want that that re-retention.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I've tried, I'll be honest, I've tried buying things online from places like Blue Nile and and things like that and jewelry.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I have never been a hundred percent satisfied.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_00: I've always sent it back, and then I've always gone to uh there's a local jewelry store that I that we go to.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um because I think you need to have I think in it's really difficult, in my opinion, and I can sell anything online, but in my opinion, it's difficult to sell really high-end jewelry, diamonds and and and white gold and yellow gold, et cetera, because you I think you have to touch it, feel it, look at it.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_00: You know, obviously a picture of a of an earring always looks bigger than the ones you're gonna get in and and so I think in the jewelry business, e-commerce is I mean, look, it blue Nile does a phenomenal job, but I think they have a very specific audience for that, not somebody who's really looking for high quality, in my opinion.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_01: No, it's it's it's true.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_01: So we have that in like every every industry, every product.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the people who are buying from us want quality and they want to they want to have trust in what they're buying.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_01: I think the the you know uh a schema of jewelry stores is am I getting ripped off?
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_01: Like in the 80s, 90s, like, am I paying the right price?
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_01: Am I doing this?
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I think that's I think that's another reason people want to go in there because now you're doing it online and you're like, it's even even more of a question.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um so yeah, so being nine, I think it's like 92% of jewelry sales are still done in store.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_01: And I I think I really believe it's because it's an emotional purchase more than anything else.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: It's emotional and you can't connect, you can't connect that emotion with the screen.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and if you do, you're s the the pro like what you said, you're gonna be unhappy somehow.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't know if you can quantify that, but I think it's because the emotional disconnect that happens with that purchase.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_00: So Yeah, that's true.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: I think that that has a lot to do with it.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_00: I th I also think that the online the online jewelry stores affect the mall jewelry stores more so than the independent high uh the the independent high service uh a lot of those people shopping there I think are buying, I think a little bit more necessity, like I gotta get this for the for the holiday, um which we have that too, but I think that's more of that necessity is it poised to caring about the quality of what they're getting.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_01: And that's that's not here or there.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_01: That's fine.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_01: Everyone has different they may have a quality and different something else, but that's not important to them in that uh piece.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's fine.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_00: That that industry is fascinating to me.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I I don't do we don't do a lot in in in the jewelry industry, but it's always been fascinating, even as a consumer, right?
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_00: Because I I obviously I have I have a wife, I have four daughters, and and so you know, I've spent my life in uh in jewelry stores.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_01: And think well, think about that, think about how many years jewelry's been thousands of years.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_01: Egypt.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it's jewelry's always been a part of humans' lives for some reason.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_01: Uh most jewelry stores, most are family-owned, most are family businesses.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_01: This is a family business.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_01: And uh and uh you'll find that most jewelers, the people making the jewelry, are family businesses.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_01: So there's something about that.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_00: That's a whole different segment.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_00: Is uh you know, when you can get something custom-made, there was a a person outside of Philadelphia, I I can't remember her name, but she dealt strictly in um in platinum, and she she had a whole showroom just making making jewelry, and it it becomes unique.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, when you have what you buy clothing, right?
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_00: Women buy clothing, men buy clothing, and that clothing has a lifespan and it gets pushed away, right?
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_00: Whether you donate it or whether you throw it away or whatever it is.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_00: But jewelry, you know, you've got pieces of jewelry.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_00: My wife has pieces of jewelry that her grandmother had or her great-grandmother had that were passed down and she's got jewelry that she's given to the the girls, and you know, and it becomes this thing where nobody I don't know people who go, you know, it without necessity to go and sell their jewelry.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_00: You know, they just keep it and they just keep passing it on.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, that's it's the best recycling.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_00: Well, we're we're about out of time.
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate you coming on.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_00: I think you know, it's been a uh a really good uh explanation of how to treat customers like almost like lifelong partners rather than just transactions.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_00: Because I think too much too many too many times we're in a world of transactions and we sort of lose sight of the fact that we're talking to people, we're dealing with people, we're selling to people.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_00: So I really appreciate how you uh run your business and and how you uh you deal with customers.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and for those listening, remember, you know, growth isn't just about getting bigger, it's about getting better at the things you that can't be automated or that you don't, you know, that that you need a personal touch for.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_00: So you know, learn more more about Brandon and the team, check out Providence Diamond.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_00: You could look at them online, you can go and visit them in in person if you're in the Northeast, see what great retail looks like.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and again, thanks for watching.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, our Instagram site's great.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_01: It's uh it's a good one to look at.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: Just it's it's good in the jewelry industry.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_01: We're looked at for it.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_01: So it's a nice one.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_00: What's uh what's the name of the in what's the handle on the Instagram account?
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's just Providence Diamond.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and yeah, if you look it up, but we in the jewelry industry, because it is families, it's a little bit slower to come to market.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_01: We've we've done really well with that, and uh we get some nice accolades.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um my wife actually does all of that, and so again, family business, and she she's buying as well and a lot of roles, but uh that one specifically we're very proud of.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_01: So appreciate you appreciate being on.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_00: We'll put the uh link to your website.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_00: We'll put the link to the uh Instagram account uh in the description so everybody can go and take a look and see for yourself.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for coming on.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_01: That's my pleasure.
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_01: We'll see you soon.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_01: Bye.