Having your own business seems to grow more and more necessary these days. Whether you just want to add an additional stream of income to your day job or achieve a fully-fledged business that you can 100% rely on, there’s no better time for you to start working towards your dream business.
If you still didn’t know by now, jewelry is one of the most lucrative ventures that you can get into. The value of the jewelry market is ever increasing, topping at 230 billion USD last 2020 and it’s expected to even grow by nearly 300 billion USD by 2025 according to major business analysis organazation’s recent release.
The reason behind this is because fashion doesn’t really go out of people’s needs and wants. Regardless of the situation, time and time again that it’s proven that people would still spend money on their appearance. That includes keeping up with the latest trends of jewelry.
So how do you build a jewelry business of your own?
One of the simplest ways that you can do is to buy your jewelry items wholesale then sell them for retail. In fact, this business model is utilized the most because it just simply works, and it doesn’t put a lot of pressure on the business owners.
In this step-by-step guide, we’ll cover everything that you need to do to start your very own jewelry empire using this business method.
- Get Your Necessary Business-Related Certifications and Documents
Before we get to the point of shelling out money and buying your jewelry stocks, you have to first establish your business.
This is more on the legal and bureaucratic side.
Laws and business requirements depend on where you live but essentially, you need to secure your business and licensing permits first before you can legally operate your own jewelry store. This is the same case whether you want to have a traditional brick-and-mortar store or just have an online shop.
Aside from it’s mandatory, you can rarely secure a true wholesale deal directly from wholesalers and/or manufacturers if you don’t have any proof that you’re an established business that resells jewelry. The majority, if not all, wholesalers require that you present your seller’s permit (can be called reseller’s license or wholesale ID depending on your country) for you to avail the wholesaler’s discount.
Getting your jewelry stocks at wholesale prices is the key to your business. If you can’t get your jewelry at the lowest price possible, then you’ll easily be overshadowed by your market competitors.
- Know How Much Your Initial Capital Will be
Many starting jewelry business owners often overlook how expensive the start-up capital would be. Since you’re essentially starting from scratch, it can get pretty overwhelming to build your inventory.
So crunch the numbers and take a look at your financial situation. Estimate how much you can comfortably spend as your initial capital for buying wholesale jewelry without risking your personal or other business-related needs.
Knowing how much you’re willing to spend will also give you a rough guide on how big your initial purchase and how diverse your jewelry selections would be. That way, you can properly budget your resources without under or overspending.
- Make a Wise Choice About What Type of Jewelry Niche You Want to Sell
As a jewelry reseller, you will get to know there are tons of varieties of jewelry types to sell, such as fashion jewelry, fine jewelry, sterling silver jewelry, rose gold jewelry, hip-hop jewelry, gold-plated jewelry, crystal jewelry, etc.
Choosing an approriate jewelry niche will be one of the first priority for most jewelry resellers. It is wise to review your interest to see which jewelry type is your favorite, so you will have more motivations during the process of business setup, boosting sales and aftersales service. Moreover, different types of jewelry will determine your future sales and business development as well because your social relationship and personal resources will to some extent assist with your jewelry resale. For instance, if you are an undergraduate and plan to have jewelry sales among your peers or your target customers are mainly from campus, then your choice of jewelry is better to be youngsters’ favorites of high fashion costume jewelry. If your friends and social sphere are mainly middle-aged ladies, then you definitely want to choose elegant rose gold jewelry or fine jewelry type to sell for profit. However, these more expensive jewelry pieces requre more professionalism and experience regarding of pre-sales consulting and aftersales service.
Your choice is significant becasue it will affect your overall business plans including jewelry sourcing, marketing, branding, service, etc. Hence, you need to thoroughly scrutinize your preference, assets, and social connections before making decision about what type of jewelry you really want to sell.
- Look for a Trusted Wholesaler
Now that you got your permits and the money to start your business, you have to find the right wholesaler that will turn your business vision into reality.
You really have to dig your nails to your research when it comes to this part because it’s a make-or-break situation. You want to end up with a wholesaler that can supply your jewelry needs consistently and doesn’t dupe you out, especially if this is the first time that you’re setting up a business.
With the current situation, you’re most likely inclined to look for a wholesaler online. There are a lot of jewelry suppliers online that specifically cater to providing stocks for business owners to resell. So definitely buy from those stores instead of a co-retailer. You will want to firstly find some qualified ones and then short list them to pinpoint 3-5 excellent target jewelry wholesalers. Afterwards, you will want to contact the wholesaler to communicate by asking relevent concerned questions. Their responses quality and responsiveness will reflect the professionalism of the wholesaler, this factor should also be considered when doing the final decision.
Reading wholesale jewelry businesses online reviews and feedbacks should also be an important work when evaluating the jewelry suppliers. Good wholesalers should be accompanied by many previous positive feedbacks, if you see many bad comments towards a specific business, then you should be very cautious and frown to it.
If you’re just starting out and your budget is really tight, meeting the minimum order quantities (MOQs) that suppliers would usually require can be hard. If you’re in this situation, there are a lot of wholesalers out there without MOQs. However, you can expect that the prices that you’re going to get can be a little bit higher since discounts are generously given if you’re ordering in larger quantities.
- Don’t Underestimate the Importance of Business Relationship
A good business relationship is probably the most important tip that we can give you when you want to get the best deals in the wholesale market. If you’ve been in this venture for quite some time, you would realize that not all wholesalers are the same when it comes to their relationship with their clients.
Some wholesalers are only focused on getting the most money out of your pocket. They would woo you to buy certain stocks at a certain quantity that would benefit from them. If your wholesaler does this to you constantly, then that’s a huge red flag.
An excellent wholesaler is the one that genuinely cares for your business, especially when you’re just starting out. You should feel the “special treatment” that they give because good companies prioritize building a great business relationship. That way, both parties (you and them) can benefit from that position in a long run. So you should find jewelry suppliers or wholesalers that can offer the best service besides the jewelry products they can supply and grow together for success.
- Know How to Strike A Deal
A lot of wholesalers that directly own the factories for jewelry production are willing to strike a deal because again, it’s a practice that promotes prolonged business interactions.
So if you think that you found the right wholesaler for you and you’ve established rapport with them, don’t be hesitant to strike a deal. Most of the prices that wholesalers give upfront have a certain adjustment range to accommodate haggling and other deals that both of you might come up with during business talks.
But of course, know when is enough. You don’t want to come across as too stingy with your business and become a difficult client to work with.
Another tip is to find a wholesaler that offers flexible payments. This is incredibly helpful for people who are just starting out with their jewelry business. That way, you won’t drain your capital in one go and you can keep a fraction of your money for other business expenses.
This is also a great strategy if you don’t have enough capital to buy the inventory that you need. By having flexible payments, you can just pay the down payment needed and use the earnings from the jewelry to pay for the rest.
A secret tip that not all retailers know is that you can actually find a wholesaler that will let you pay the inventory once it’s been sold. This can only be usually done if you already have a great relationship and reputation with your supplier.
- Keep Up With The Jewelry Trends
Now that you have found your supplier, it’s time to actually purchase your jewelry inventory.
This might come off as the easy part, but the thing is, you want to do this mindfully and strategically. Lest the chances of you being stuck with unsellable jewelry products.
The best way to do this is to do your market research. Take a look at your jewelry competitors and see what they have in their store. What jewelry designs sell the most? What items pale in comparison when it comes to audience appeal? Things like these would give you an idea of how you’re going to collate your inventory.
It is advisable to follow some leading jewelry and fashion blogs such as JewelryBund’s blog to keep up with the latest trends in the jewelry world. Also, you can follow some K.O.L.s’ Facebook, Instagram pages and Youtube channels so as to learn the news and get inspired by their choices or recommendations.
Be updated with the latest jewelry trends. Know what certain designs are currently trending and what styles are fading out. That way, you’ll have an idea of how much you can purchase a certain design and whether you’re going to keep purchasing it or not.
- Purchase Small To Test The Waters
There is a brilliant reason why some stores would hold a “soft opening” before their actual operating business days. During the soft opening, there is a little bit of everything that the store would offer and the main goal of it is not to sell out their inventory, but rather see how their customers react to it.
The same principle goes when you’re ready to purchase your initial inventory. Don’t go all-in at first. Have a little bit of everything that you’re sure would be sold within the first couple of weeks —ideally, not more than a month’s worth of stock.
That way, you can test the waters and see which particular items are selling out fast and which ones take a little bit longer to get cleared out. Then, you can now place your order and adjust the quantities and design to the result of your initial purchase.
- Place The Highest Yet Reasonable Mark-Up You Could Offer
The mark-ups on your jewelry are a very personal decision.
We really can’t tell how much exactly you need to add for you to have a reasonable profit but the advice that we’re going to give you is to go high as much as you can while still being reasonable and appealing to your customers.
One way to tell is to again, do market research. Take a look at your competitors and check the general price range of their products. You’re doing this not because you want to copy their prices but to stay within that range (ideally, even lower) to be competitive.
But don’t put your prices too low that you’re not getting any profit, or your customers would be suspicious of the quality of your product. Remember, your goal is to make them buy it and be satisfied with what they bought!
- Take Advantage of Peak Seasons During Your Restocks
Unlike other business ventures, jewelry is such a finicky thing to be involved with. You really need to have the dedication to keep up with the demands and trends of the market if you want to be incredibly successful at it.
A good jewelry business owner always knows how to take advantage of the trends of the market. That includes certain peak seasons for jewelry. Unlike other market niches, jewelry has certain “surplus” seasons where customers are more inclined to buy jewelry, whether it’s for themselves or as a gift.
These seasons are always on months with special occasions. That includes Christmas and New Year’s, Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, and more. Prior to these peak seasons, your wholesaler would release promos and discount offers to entice their clients to buy from them. So as much as possible, try to restock during these times.
But of course, since people are more inclined to buy jewelry during these periods, you also have to make sure that you have enough to sell with a little bit more to spare. Don’t wait until the very last minute to restock your inventory.
Also, consider the shipping time. Since these peak seasons will have higher traffic when it comes to international and local deliveries, you have to be able to foresee these mishaps and allocate enough adjustments for them.
- Practice The Art of Selling
At the end of the day, no matter how well-planned you are when it comes to your wholesale strategy, the bottom line is to sell your products.
So make sure that you practice your art of selling. That can include anything from your social skills up to your marketing skills. Find the right audience for your retail shop and build a community within. Customers love it when you treat them special and not just as another source of profit.
Invest in your social media marketing. Everything can be looked up on the Internet nowadays so definitely build a strong online presence for your jewelry store. You can do it on your own with a little research or better yet, hire a professional to handle it.
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Most importantly, always offer quality jewelry pieces that are right for the price. The brand is important, but nothing speaks louder than the product itself.
