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Fast Facts from the Retail World
- Same-store sales rose 3.7% in February to their highest levels since November 2007, according to the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC), which had been counting on an increase of just 2%. In manufacturing, meanwhile, the Commerce Department says new orders for factory goods rose 1.7% in January.
- Despite widespread predictions that 2009 would bring an avalanche of store closures, the number of closings announced by national credit tenants totaled just 4,763 in 2009, according to ICSC. That is far fewer than the 6,913 closings announced in 2008, or, for that matter, the 7,041 announced store closings tallied by the trade group in 2001. Bear in mind, however, that those figures exclude regional and local chains, as well as mom & pops.
- In 2009, dollar demand for gold soared above the $100 billion mark for the second year in a row, according to the World Gold Council. Average gold prices last year were about 12% higher than in 2008, at $972.35 per ounce. The "cash for gold" phenomenon certainly buoyed many retail jewelry stores and helps explain why fewer jewelers closed last year than many analysts had anticipated, says Buxbaum Group Executive VP Stevan Buxbaum.
- Import cargo volume at major U.S. retail container ports is expected to rise 13% in March compared with the same month a year ago, and double-digit increases are expected to continue through the summer as the U.S. economy improves, according to the National Retail Federation/Hackett Associates.
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Word Spreads continued
"I'm now working with an AGS jeweler in Durango, Colo. who bypassed our competitors and signed with us after receiving a recommendation from M.J. Christensen the prestigious Las Vegas retailer we worked with in April 2009," Jorgensen says. "Jewelers are spreading the word about our services."
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Consider the letter John Atencio sent to Buxbaum Group in March. Over a period of six months, the famed Colorado designer had worked with Jorgensen's team on a position-strengthening strategy that involved both store-closing and inventory-liquidation sales, as well as important changes to the merchandise mix in all locations that contributed to strong gains in sales and margins.
"After meeting the professionals at Buxbaum, it was immediately apparent they were not just interested in using a canned strategy," Atencio wrote. "They brought a fresh approach …
 Buxbaum ran a successful store closing sale in December for Corbo Jewelers' Rockaway, NJ location. Local chain still operates 5 locations.
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[and] remained open to listening to our ideas and finding ways of balancing that with their proven strategies … The truest test of satisfaction is in the adage, 'would you use them again?' To which I would answer with a resounding, yes!"
The jewelry division also conducted successful sales for retailers and manufacturers such as Optional Art Fine Jewelry, Bond Jewelers, Corbo Jewelers and Shine Diam/J. Designs by Shine. Elsewhere, in May, the division sold every item in the $8 million inventory of Henricks Jewelers' 12,000-square-foot superstore in Bonita Springs, Fla. "They came in under budget on expenses and beat all volume projections," Buxbaum notes.
A savvy approach to promotions—one that balanced the sensitivities of AGS jewelers' customers with the aggressiveness required by the "hand-to-hand combat" that is American retail today—was a big reason for this success, Buxbaum explains. "One client hired us to run sales in four of its stores, but took a business-as-usual approach to its flagship and another store," he notes. "The four stores we ran all saw same-store sales increases of more than 20%. Sales at the two we didn't touch were flat. It was the same chain, same trade area and same merchandise, but with very different results."
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