Articles and News
BRAND NEWS: DOVE’S NEW ONLINE SEARCH; PARAMOUNT GEMS’ BABY CONTEST; IWC, IPPOLITA OPEN BOUTIQUES April 25, 2012 (0 comments)
New Doves Site Allows Retailers Instant Inventory Search Capability
Doves announces the launch of its newly revamped retailer website, featuring a new design and enhanced search capabilities. As Doves president Doron Hakimian explains, "The redesign will allow our retailers to have access to our full stock at the touch of a button." The program is smart-phone and tablet compatible, and allows retailers to search the entire Doves inventory by category, style, material, and retail price point, and also to check in-stock availability. Once retailers log on they can create a proposal by adding items to their shopping cart, which will later be sent to them as a pro-forma.
"We designed this site with the retailer and their customers in mind. If a ring catches the customer's eye at the store, the salesperson can now quickly and easily access our entire collection to find matching earrings and pendants in a specific price range. At the end of the day, this leads to customer satisfaction, which is the ultimate goal," says Doves customer relations director Yossi Abrahimi.
URL for the new site is www.dovesjewelry.com/retailer.
Paramount Gems Celebrates New Baby With Mother’s Day Drawing
New York, NY—The Paramount Gems family will soon be welcoming a new baby. To celebrate, the company is holding a “lucky draw” competition on Facebook. Fans who like the Paramount page are asked to comment on the page every day from now until Mother’s Day (or whenever the baby is born). Fans who comment on the actual date of birth will be entered into a drawing to win a piece of Paramount jewelry.
Posting on Paramout Gems' Facebook Timeline.
IWC’s First New York Boutique Launches
New York, NY—International Watch Co., known to aficionados as IWC, has opened a boutique on Madison Avenue at 54th Street, according to a report in Women’s Wear Daily. The brand, based in Schaffhausen, Switzerland, is part of the Compagnie Financière Richemont SA stable of luxury watch brands.
The new IWC boutique in New York.
The Madison Avenue boutique is the brand’s third U.S. outpost—its first two are in Las Vegas and Los Angeles—and is its largest flagship store in the world. IWC North America president Gianfraco D’Attis told WWD the brand is expanding its U.S. presence, and this door was a key step in the process.
The new shop carries all six IWC collections: Portuguese, Da Vinci, Ingenieur, Pilot’s Watches, Aquatimer, and its latest, Portofino, which bowed last September. The shop also carries the Flagship Collection of hand-curated items, which the firm calls “toys for boys,” as well as themed accessories for each collection, such as bomber jackets in the Pilot’s Watches room.
The Pilot's Watches collection room.
The store was designed to be a fully interactive experience, says the article. For example, the room dedicated to the pilot’s watches, above, features a fully maneuverable flight simulator, real Top Gun flight gear from the U.S. Navy, and a remote controlled model of a Spitfire, while the room dedicated to the Portugese collection features a six-foot model sailboat and couches made of sailcloth.
Ippolita Gears Up For Branded Boutique Launch
New York, NY—Ippolita, the Italian gold jewelry designer known for her fashion-forward line of gold and gemstone jewelry—and silver as well—is gearing up to open a branded boutique in New York this fall, according to a report in Women’s Wear Daily.
The line, created by Ippolita Rostagno, is a favorite for specialty stores like Saks Fifth Avenue, Bergdorf Goodman, Nordstrom, and Neiman Marcus, as well as at some top independent jewelry stores. Prior to her 13-year success as a branded line, the designer’s signature hammered gold pieces were most often found in gallery jewelers.
The new shop—the first of 12 planned Ippolita boutiques—will occupy the former Damiani space on Madison Avenue between 67th and 68th Streets, part of a 10+-block stretch of the street that’s home to so many luxury jewelers it could be called New York’s “other” jewelry district. Just a few of the neighbors Ippolita will have include the likes of David Yurman, Graff, Mauboussin, Kwiat, IWC’s new watch boutique, and more. Ivanka Trump, meanwhile, recently decamped from her post on Madison to new downtown digs on Mercer St. in Soho, but she also keeps a toe in the neighborhood, renting some space from Papa Donald in Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue for her uptown clients.
Ippolita already had developed a following of fashion-conscious customers who snapped up her wearable gold, diamond, and gemstone pieces prior to the recession—and since the recession, the brand has increased business five-fold by adding a silver and gemstone line just prior to the 2008 meltdown. She also has a line comprised of rose gold and sterling silver that sits in the space between silver and gold, effectively “bridging” the two collections. But Ippolita CEO Joe Cavalcante told WWD it’s very easy to sell low or high now, and not so much in the middle. For this reason, the brand now is developing more products for the “true luxury customer,” he said, citing a $20,000 necklace of 18k gold and gemstones that’s been hard to keep in stock.
Richemont To Build Watchmaking Center
London, United Kingdom--Compagnie Financiere Richemont, parent of such brands as Cartier, Jaeger Le Coultre, and IWC, has invested 100 million Swiss francs ($110 million) to build a manufacturing, research, and educational center dedicated to the future of watchmaking, Women's Wear Daily reports. The campus is to be located on a 324,000 square-foot site in Meyrin, Switzerland, near Geneva. It will house several high-end watchmakers, as well as makers of components and parts. It's expected to open in fall 2014.