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The Centurion Holiday Sales Success Index, Week One: Luxury Jewelers Off To Very Good Holiday Start | December 08, 2020 (0 comments)
Merrick, NY—Luxury and better independent jewelers are on track for very strong holiday season, based on early results from Black Friday through the first full week of the season. Based on the initial reports, it’s looking like those predictions of unspent travel and entertainment dollars being poured into jewelry may well be coming true.
Two-thirds (66.6%) of respondents to The Centurion’s survey reported notable gains over the same period last year, with 53% of respondents reporting sales up by more than 10% over last year. One respondent even said sales leapt by more than 50% over the same period last year!
13% of respondents reported sales gains between 6% and 10% over the same time last year. Another 20% reported sales for the period were even with the same period last year—not a bad score at all, considering that 2019 was the strongest holiday ever for luxury jewelers. That makes the sales gains this year even more remarkable, given the situation we’re in with the COVID-19 pandemic.
How Were Your Sales For Black Friday Through December 6?
The Centurion findings track with other industry surveys, including this one from National Jeweler and an earlier-season report from The Edge Retail Academy and strong third-quarter results from Signet. But respondents to a survey conducted by InStore magazine were more subdued—there, the majority of jewelers said their initial holiday sales were about what they expected—which in some cases wasn’t much.
53% of Centurion’s respondents also said their Black Friday and first week’s sales were about what they expected, though our survey is limited to higher-end stores, who have been performing well as a whole since the fall season began. Indeed, another 40% of Centurion respondents said their first week holiday sales well outperformed their own expectations, and only 7% said sales were disappointing.
Overall, How Were Your Sales For Summer And Fall 2020?
Higher-end independent jewelry stores have been performing well since the summer (above), and that trend continued through the first week of the holiday season (top chart).