GemThoughts

Here is the list of issues we have been covering — we are up to number 7. The Gig Economy Millennials Climate Change Consolidation and/or Decline Natural Diamonds vs Lab-Grown Banking Image  Demographics Retail Evolution Industry Structure _______________________________________ I have been writing about these "issues" for a while.  I did not start out trying to put them in any particular order, but here we are addressing the first of the last four, and all are bound to be particularly affected by the pandemic, no doubt in ways that none of us could have conceived of just months ago.   The definition of image, and how that definition is being forcefully altered, is one we ponder carefully these days.  The word itself is in many ways more powerful than an alternate that some people use - brand.  Some brands, say Coca Cola, have instant global recognition, but what we retain is sensory - what it tastes like, what the c...

Trade shows have been an essential part of the jewelry business in the US for the last half century or more.  We have seen transitions, expansions, contractions, and evolution over those years, but we now confront unfamiliar, highly disruptive forces. Pandemic and social distress. The pandemic will leave us with an altered retail environment, but it is one that was coming slowly anyway.  Department stores have not been able to counter the efficiencies and range of cyber-retail, and have been shrinking and fading for years now.  Independent stores of all sorts, not just jewelry, have also been disappearing at a rapid rate, though mostly because the country became badly over-stored in the boom years of the malls, and for many other reasons. So something had to change.  We didn't know into what, but we did know that retail formats were not keeping up with how people lived, worked, and shopped. What I recall so clearly are the halcyon days when there were dozens o...

_____________________________________ Here is the list of issues we have been covering — we are up to number 6. The Gig Economy Millennials Climate Change Consolidation and/or Decline Natural Diamonds vs Lab-Grown Banking Image  Demographics Retail Evolution Industry Structure _______________________________________ Have you been wondering where I am?  So have I.  We have all, it seems, been wandering in a wilderness with no milestones, road signs, or even taco carts.  I started out months ago offering some thoughts about an industry that was having a bumpy ride, and found that when I was half way through, everything was turned on its head.  So I paused, just to see what we might see as we look ahead that is not a mirage. But now, as we observe worldwide assaults on the status quo, ailing as it is, we need to stand back, take a deep breath, and prepare to dive into very unfamiliar seas. Our case in point in this post - banking.  Answe...

____________________________________ Here is the list of issues we have been covering — we are up to number 5. The Gig Economy Millennials Climate Change Consolidation and/or Decline Natural Diamonds vs Lab-Grown Banking Image  Demographics Retail Evolution Industry Structure _______________________________________ Natural Diamonds vs Lab-Grown Not a day passes where we don't read news about the steady expansion of the production, distribution, marketing and retailing of man-made diamonds (I have called them MMDs for years, even though the popular term these days is lab-grown, or LGDs).  The issue is topmost in the minds of anyone in the diamond business. I have been cautioning diamond dealers about this disruptive technology for over twenty years.  (I have posted on this blog for years about the subject - see "The three tipping points of man-made diamonds"; and the post on De Beers announcing their jewelry venture using MMDs - Lightbox.) ...

Last time, we concentrated on the effects climate change might have on the jewelry business.  This time, we cover a long lasting trend, the continuing consolidation of the business.  It has effects that are particular to our industry. ____________________________________ Here is the list of issues we have been covering — we are up to number 4. The Gig Economy Millennials Climate Change Consolidation and/or Decline Natural Diamonds vs Lab-Grown Banking Image  Demographics Retail Evolution Industry Structure _______________________________________ Consolidation and/or Decline It’s not news to anyone that retail in the US has been consolidating and evolving for decades.  Think of what has happened in drug stores, books, software, electronics, and department stores.  In some cases it has been near total.  Macy’s, for example, has absorbed hundreds of operations — in some cases merging with or buying some firms that had in t...

Last time, we wrote about the Millennials, and how we might need to plan for the social environment they might be building.  Well, they and GenZ, the super-techies that follow hot on their heels, will be dealing full bore with that other environment, the Earth, that is about to throw another wrench into life as we know it. ___________________________________ Here is the list of issues we have been covering — we are up to number 3. The Gig Economy Millennials Climate Change Consolidation and/or Decline Natural Diamonds vs Lab-Grown Banking Image  Demographics Retail Evolution Industry Structure ____________________________________ Climate Change.   The subject is the undercurrent for everything we do today.  We do not know how to handle it personally, as it represents a huge looming threat to life as we know it, and that in itself leaves us feeling unmoored and anxious.  There is international agreement that the threats may be existential. ...

Last time, we wrote about the Gig economy, and now we move on to an important part of that movement, the Millennials, and, by extension GenZ.  It is most important to think about our youth carefully, not only out of concern for their future, but also because they now account for the biggest part of our economy.  And, in many ways, they will either accept or reject much of the extraordinarily complex world we are passing on to them.  I restate the list issues covered in the series of posts: The Gig Economy Millennials Climate Change Consolidation and/or Decline Natural Diamonds vs Lab-Grown Banking Image  Demographics Retail Evolution Industry Structure Millennials.   This generation is now fully into its prime working years, but does not have the sense of optimism felt by the Boomers and even GenX.  For those who are the children of the top 10%, there is some sense of entitlement, earned or not.  But for the rest, forget any se...