On this day before Christmas 2015, I am cogitating over the seeming mountains of flyers that have arrived in the mail, the paper kind, in the last few weeks. I do not recall it ever having been that intense, and I can only attribute it to a soft season that pushed so many retailers to offer big discounts so early in December, even in November. I recall that years ago, no discounts showed up until January. Long gone, those days. In all of it, jewelry was almost entirely missing. Yes, I received flyers from Macy's that included jewelry, but they do that all year round. Signet had plenty of ads on TV for Jared and Kay Jewelers. And there were a few promos via e-mail. After that, zip, at least as I can recall. Worse yet, as I have noted before, the big fashion magazine issues were nearly devoid of jewelry. The apparel ads were great, but almost none showed a model wearing jewelry. Oh yes, and Forevermark showed up in some magazines and newspapers with full page ads. But
Observations on trends and events in the gem and fine jewelry business.