Sustainability on the Agenda at JCK – 2009
By Meghan Connolly Haupt
Meghan Connolly Haupt is a regular contributor to fairjewelry.org. Here, she reports from conferences she attended at this JCK Show.
~ Marc Choyt, Publisher.
The JCK annual jewelry show is presently taking place in Las Vegas. The show was kicked off on Thursday with a full day conference featuring 20 free seminars for jewelry retailers. To my delight, three of the four seminars I attended focused on or at least touched upon the call to action for sustainability in the jewelry sector. I use the term ‘sustainability’ to refer to business grounded in social and environmental responsibility.
The first session I attended was called “Making an Impact: Cause Marketing.” While cause marketing is but one small aspect of being a sustainable company, it is indeed a step easily implemented by any jewelry retailer.
For example, a retailer can donate a percentage of sales for a month or on a specific piece to a nonprofit organization in their community. A cause marketing effort of this type would require little work, but would go a long way to demonstrate the retailer’s commitment to its constituents.
The most important thing is not how much money is raised, but rather that you are sincere in your effort to support the community. In so doing, it will in turn support you. Anne Dale Jewelers in New Orleans is a great model for a retailer that has embraced cause marketing as part of the company’s DNA. They have donated thousands of dollars to community organizations, positioning the retailer as a positive member of the community.
The second session titled “Understanding How to Market to Generation X and Y Consumers” wasn’t specifically about sustainability, but a strong take away from this session was that the younger generations are increasingly concerned about the ethics, values, and practices of companies they support.
Your future customers are socially conscious and possess a keen understanding of the global marketplace (largely because of the Internet). Therefore, retailers that can help consumers align their values with their purchasing decisions will be more successful going forward. Things like minimizing waste, using recycled paper, switching to low-energy lighting and donating a portion of profits are easily implementable steps in the right direction.
The debate around global warming has shifted from one of whether or not it is real to what can we do to mitigate it as much as possible. There is no longer a doubt that global warming is taking place and that it is largely due to human behavior. As such, most industries, including energy, agriculture and fashion, have responded by offering sustainable alternatives. In “Adding Value by Greening Your Business,” sustainability expert Brian Natrass elevated the discussion from the retail level to the industry as a whole.
He called us out…ask yourself the question…what strides have you made as a jewelry retailer to be more responsible to the global community? How have you contributed to innovation and solutions?
The reality is that there are but a few independent designers and retailers driving the sustainable movement forward in the jewelry sector. They recognize that their efforts translate into a competitive advantage reflective in the bottom line, but more importantly, that it is the right thing to do.
Hopefully, at next year’s conference, when Brian asks the audience what they have done in the past year to be a more responsible company, people will respond with cause marketing stories, and maybe even bold changes like switching to alternative energy, becoming a paperless company or only using fair-trade gems.
Meghan Connolly Haupt is the founder and principal of C5 sustainable fine jewelry, offering custom design services and ready-to-wear pieces that you can feel good about. C5 jewelry is responsibly made in the United States from recycled precious metals and ethically sourced gems (both fair-trade and lab-created).
