BoF: Why luxury jewellery? What was the opportunity you saw?
BAC: Luxury brands, and jewellery brands in particular, were very slow to start online. And it was a really interesting business, with beautiful products. And the more I looked into it, there were a few different areas that seemed to be completely lacking in the market, online or off. One of them was design. Another one was preciousness. And the third one was colour.
A large proportion of the market, in the UK, was either Bond Street or high street. And they basically sell silver and diamonds. And it’s all very generic — a little diamond on a little chain. That sort of struck me as odd. And the more I looked into it, I saw that men, who were once the primary purchasers of jewellery [for women], weren’t that interested in the design of women’s products, but that women were buying more and more jewellery for themselves — you buy your Louboutin shoes, you buy your amazing handbag, you’re going to buy jewellery for yourself and you’re going to want something beautifully designed.
Then, there was the whole idea of preciousness. We have a mantra in the office: ‘Go precious every day.’ This is a £5,000 pair of earrings [gestures] and most people will put them in a drawer and wear them when they go to the opera or something. And we’re like, ‘No, you can wear them with jeans!’ It doesn’t have to be a special occasion to pull out your jewellery. As a brand, that’s what we believe. Additionally, there were not many brands that celebrated colour. I have a personal love of coloured gemstones and I saw a real opportunity there.
So, I think there is an opportunity for a brand to try and own that space, somewhere between Bond Street and the high street, embracing all the things established jewellery brands aren’t doing: design, colour and educating people about preciousness.
