VMSD - October 2013 - (Page 32)

Right Charming Charlie is doing for scarves, bags and jewelry what H&M has done for fashion. It's affordable, disposable, trendy and fun. Below There are 250 Charming Charlie stores around the country and young shoppers are flocking to their informal, accessible settings. 32 OCTOBER 2013 | vmsd.com Derwoed notes that Ralph Lauren has created an accessories sub-shop inside its traditional vendor shop for its new line of men’s bags and other accessories. If the hot new item today is iPhones, says Ken Nisch, chairman of JGA Inc. (Southfield, Mich.), an equally important accessory is the cover on the device. “Today, your accessories have accessories,” says Nisch. “Snap-on iPhone or Galaxy covers is a whole new sector of merchandise. Swarovski, Coach and Louis Vuitton are among the brands, and they can reach $200-$300.” As designer brands extend their accessories offerings – to eyeglass frames, umbrellas and iPhone covers – jewelry is increasingly in their cross-hairs. David Yurman, Ted Muehling and Gurhan Orhan are as important brands to today’s shopper as Tiffany, Cartier and Harry Winston. They’re all fighting for a piece of the $33 billion U.S. jewelry market, which is beginning to show signs of life again after five years of lackluster performance. Some of the industry’s finest jewelry designers – like Temple St. Clair, Kara Ross, Amrita Singh and Ippolita Rostagno – whose treasures have sold in New York’s Bergdorf Goodman and Saks Fifth Avenue – are beginning to produce custom pieces for individual clients willing to pay five or six figures because the retail jewelry market has become somewhat fragmented. “The world was collapsing, and the price of gold was astronomical, and people just weren’t buying jewelry,” Ross recently told The New York Times. “I was down 75 percent,” Singh, who has been selling her collection at Bergdorf Goodman for about 10 years, said in the same article. Now, though both designers still show their fine jewelry collections in a number of stores, including Neiman Marcus, they also sell their less-formal costume jewelry on QVC, where Singh’s Bangle Bangle line, with pieces between $50 and $400, sold more than a half-million units last year. “There’s an increasing awareness of designer brands in jewelry, just as there is in fashion and other items,” says Pam Levine (Levine Design Group, New York), a strategic branding consultant and visual merchandiser specializing in luxury, jewelry, fashion and home accessories. “Jewelry shoppers are increasingly looking for designer names.” Bergdorf Goodman has an entire floor of its New York women’s store devoted not only to fine jewelry (gold, silver, platinum, diamonds and precious stones) but also to fashion jewelry – alternative materials, metals and gems. (In the 80s, its designer jewelry offerings were limited to two showcases.) Barneys New York now offers fine, vintage, antique and fashion jewelry. ABC Carpet & Home, the Manhattan one-off home furnishings store, and Anthropologie, the craft-oriented sister of Urban Outfitters (Philadelphia), have extended their fashion jewelry offerings. Even traditional Tiffany (New York) has introduced a line of jewelry designed by architect Frank Gehry. PAT RI CI A S HE E HA N, CL E VE LA N D S E C TOR S POT LI GH T: ACCESSO RIES http://www.vmsd.com

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VMSD - October 2013