The first holiday wave swept the U.S. stores and Internet space in late November - Thanksgiving Day (November 28), followed by an epic day of sales on Black Friday (November 29), as well as weekend discounts offered at shopping malls followed by the finishing touch of Cyber Monday (December 2), the main day of the year for online sales. This year brought no breakthrough for the sales, but it has shown that trade is increasingly shifting to the Web.
Unlike last year, jewelry was not on the top of the most popular shopping list drawn up by comScore, the lead analyst of online sales. If in 2012 jewelry was among the most sought after selling categories in the festive season, this year it was outstripped by electronics, video games, clothing, household goods, garden items, etc.
According to a study of the National Retail Federation (NRF), this year the percentage of buyers who made jewelry purchases has slightly risen. If in 2012 jewelry goods were purchased only by 15% of consumers, in 2013 the choice in their favor was made by 16.9 % of buyers - an increase of almost 2%.
However, electronic devices and computer accessories enjoyed much greater demand on the part of consumers and were bought by 37.7 % of consumers, which is more than 2 times higher than the percentage of jewelry buyers.
Recall that it was not so long ago when jewelry goods (especially diamond graced) were considered a traditional gift for Christmas in the U.S. Today, their share in the gift basket is being taken away by smartphones, tablets and other intelligent gadgetry.
Moods are different among retailers.
"The US government shutdown and the consequent drop in consumer confidence makes me a little bit less positive about it. The industry is projecting a thinner Christmas then we had last year. I am now projecting that we ought to hold or marginally increase on last year’s numbers," Malcolm Koll, CEO of Charles Koll Jewellers, said in a recent interview to Rough&Polished.
"We believe we are well-prepared for the holiday season. Our talented sales teams are well-trained and ready to provide customers with an outstanding shopping experience," Mike Barnes, CEO of Signet Jewelers said after the company announced its U.S. sales went up almost 10% in the third quarter.
“We’re trying to keep our heads down and focus on our guests,” not worry about forecasts for how the consumer might spend during the holiday season, Theo Killion, CEO of Zale Corporation, said during a conference call with analysts.
In its latest press release the National Retail Federation repeated that the sales forecast for the holiday season in 2013 remains in force - sales growth will be 3.9 percent, and the total volume of trade will exceed $ 600 billion. This is despite the fact that sales at stores and on the Internet fell 2.9 percent over the holiday weekend of Thanksgiving for the first time since 2009. According to the NRF, total sales for the period amounted to $ 57.4 billion.
According to Chicago-based ShopperTrak, which is counting shopping foot traffic, store sales reached $ 22.2 billion during the four festive days, up 1 percent compared with one year ago. At the same time, retail traffic fell by 4 percent.
ShopperTrak predicts sales growth of 2.4 percent in November and December, the smallest level since 2009.
And to crown it all, Unity Marketing released mixed results of their survey of 1,200 affluent buyers conducted in October. Every fourth respondent said that this year they plan to spend less on gifts than in 2012, while 60 percent said their spending will remain the same.
As for personal impressions, this year’s Black Friday was more successful for the correspondent of Rough&Polished than in the past. I happened to survey some jewelry stores in San Diego regarding their Black Friday sales in 2011 and then I took part in selling jewelry in 2012 ( hands-on, as the Americans like to say), but this year I helped coordinate online sales of a local jeweler.
Internet sales have been much more successful than trading over the counter. As it is noted by many experts and surveys, consumers are starting to buy more over the Web using computers and mobile devices. Therefore, we wish all jewelry companies in this season to have a valid E-shop, preferably optimized for mobile devices.
Olga Patseva, Editor in Chief of the American Bureau, Rough&Polished
