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Retail News: Dorfman Closes Its Doors; Florida Jeweler Tips Off Industry To Siri’s Sales Pitch March 16, 2016 (0 comments)
Dorfman Closes Its Doors; Liquidates Through Auction House
Boston, MA—Just one short year after a million-dollar remodel that took six months to complete, Dorfman is the latest luxury jeweler to shutter its doors. Brothers Jonathan and Douglas Dorfman, third-generation owners of the business, told the Boston Globe that the changing luxury landscape and fewer overseas buyers drove the decision to close.
“We figured it made sense to monetize the inventory and say goodbye,” Jonathan Dorfman told the paper.
Interior of Dorfman's newly-renovated store
After posting a special farewell letter announcing 50% off its renowned collection of high-end jewelry—such as Alexandra Mor, Picchiotti, and Bayco—the remainder of the store’s inventory was liquidated through an auction at Skinner in February.
The landing page for Dorfman's website shows the Skinner auction.
Florida Jeweler Not Amused By Siri’s Shopping Suggestions
Lighthouse Point, FL—In the process of checking on his store’s search-engine results, jeweler Sean Dunn, vice president of JR Dunn, found something very unsettling: Siri, Apple’s electronic personal assistant built into its iPhone, is not just assisting, she’s selling.
When Dunn asked Siri to find various watch brands near him, she responded in each case by suggesting the Apple watch instead.
Siri’s screen results did put JR Dunn at the top of the list for Breitling and all the other brands Dunn queried, which pleased him, but he doesn’t sell Apple watches and after initially thinking it was cute, he grew annoyed thinking about how much Apple already has bitten into sales of Swiss watches. In fact, smartwatches outsold Swiss-made watches in 2015, overtaking luxury timepieces for the first time ever.
Dunn got so annoyed, in fact, that he wrote a post about it on his store’s blog. While he believes Apple is unlikely to sway someone in the market for a high-end luxury watch, it certainly might impact watches in the same price range.
When The Centurion asked Siri about finding a Breitling watch, she also replied that she is a fan of the Apple watch. She suggested an Apple watch for several different queries--including "Where can I buy a Rolex?" but not using the keyword "watch." But when asked directly “what watch should I buy?” she said “I can’t answer that.”
One day later, however, when asked the same questions again, Siri simply queued up the results and didn't suggest the Apple watch anymore. (Perhaps she was programmed to understand the difference between "nudge" and "nag?")