From underdog to a 900 pound gorilla.

[Brian Knox]

What do we do when the companies that we once cheered in a underdog fashion morph into the corporate monolith that we were once striving against?

At what point do you say, I am no longer comfortable shopping at Wal-Mart?

When Wal-Mart first opened in my community, I loved going to the store which at that time proudly mentioned in much of its marketing the slogan "made in America"

This slogan somehow helped relieve my cognitive dissonance that came from buying from a corporate giant.

My cognitive dissonance is at a high level again with all the outsourcing debates as well as the much debated social effects of big box stores on communities, Mom & Pop stores, etc.

Wal-mart has changed their slogan.

So where am I going with this?

Blue Nile reported sales last year (2003) of $129 million, Congratulations, but I''m sorry, this means to me that you have crossed to the other side and have become a corporate giant.

Yes, Blue Nile supplied many quality diamonds at good prices to consumers but did it return anything to that consumer''s community? , Ah, the big picture question.

Many artisans in the jewelry industry have lost their jobs to the outsourcing of manufacturing jobs to China, Thailand, India, etc.

Wal-Mart is the 900-pound gorilla of corporate America (?) and the biggest retailer of jewelry in the world.
Blue Nile is the 900 gorilla in the online diamond market.

Would a corporate driven Blue Nile business strategy involve many Internet choices for consumers? Of course not!

They are here to eat up all of the Mom & Pop Internet retailers, which I would define as most of the other Internet sellers.

If Blue Nile had their way, do you think they would want you looking in a search engine for the best price on a diamond?

Of course not!

Shop smart but try to shop with the small independent B&M or Internet dealer.

Support the artisans of this industry.


Brian Knox

Ps, Yes, I have a horse in this race but so do you in the big picture.

 

[valeria101]

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On 6/15/2004 9:52:07 AM brianknox wrote:



What do we do when the companies that we once cheered in a underdog fashion morph into the corporate monolith that we were once striving against?

----------------

Never cheer any single underdog tooo much ? (joke, I hope

).

It seems that BN started posting lots of info with their diamonds (pictures, GCAL certs with the implicit stats, but no 'Scope yet). Prices? well... not that great but obviously they can carry a large inventory and through in finds in even more online presentation

but cater to each person's finger... I doubt. Those BN diamonds must come of a paper clip setting for now. This unless I am missing some huge technological and business model development somewhere. I have a hard time imagining how could a large scale operation get up close and personal adjusting custom work and presenting diverse merchandise person-to-person (such as ideal diamonds are debated an dissected on PS, and the pleasant read that some websites around here make inviting to further dialogue). They might offer top service for the few very expensive diamonds they list, but making a great ring with a piece around a carat.. maybe not just yet. BN doesn't seem to go on the trail of Tiffany

Is there any large scale retailer that proves this reasoning wrong?

 

[aljdewey]

Brian, here's the bare truth of the matter for me: I don't care if the animal is a delicate butterfly or a 900-lb gorilla. What I do care about is customer service.




I care about the vendor who cares about what's important to me. I care about the vendor who gives a return policy instead of "sorry exchange only". I care about the vendor who says "yes, I can do that" and not "sorry, that's not possible."




Most of my cronies here know that I've been searching in vain for a wedding ring I like for my impending wedding in July. After 6 months of searching and being 5 weeks before my wedding, I was vulnerable and just wanting to find SOMETHING.



Round one: I went to a local family jeweler with one location. I wanted a plain band in 18K gold - "sorry we don't carry that". I found a small band with little diamonds....doesn't look good with my ring at ALL, but I succumbed to peer pressure from my friends. I asked about return policy - "exchange only". That set off a HUGE alarm in my head...which I ignored because I was desperate. I bought the ring.....and instantly regretted it. I'm stuck with a $750 ring I HATE, and I can't get what I want from them. I'll end up having to exchange for some other piece that I really don't need/want because I can't return it. If I could at least return it, I'd feel better about the jeweler and would be likely to return for other purchases in the future. As it stands, I will never set foot in that store again after I make my exchange.




Round two: Went to another local family jeweler this weekend. Saw a 7-stone ring in 14K gold/white gold prongs; .54 cwt for $899. Asked to get a price for the same ring in 18K/platinum with ideal stones. Response: "We can't get ideal stones for it, and the price with 18K/platinum is $1699!...Oh, and they begin the work on it until July 12 (my wedding is July 11)." WHAT? Too bad, because the local salesperson was a gem.




Compare that to Whiteflash...."yes, we can make your ring, yes we can use ideal stones, yes we can put a slight knife-edge on the shank to more closely match your e-ring, yes we can do 18K/platinum and it's HUNDREDS of dollars less. Oh, and it will be ready in ten days!"




I want the kind of service that I get from Whiteflash, and the truth is that I cannot get that from my local jewelers. I TRIED to put my dollars into my local community, but my local community was difficult/impossible to work with. I'm not here to support my community at MY expense...if they want my support, they need to step up and deliver.




So, now my dollars contribute to the community of Houston, TX. Honestly, with the way goods have been outsourced to other countries, I'm thrilled just to buy American!




If Whiteflash eclipses BlueNile and becomes the Wal-mart of the industry....I don't care. As long as they can continue to provide me with exceptional customer service as they have to date, they EARN my business.

 

[Iceman]

Brian:

Im on your side. Ive seen Wallmart get all the perks on starting up a new store, only to see them brake up a comunity. Yes, they created new jobs, but the business that were lost were more.

BN us to be a threat, I would have to lose money to beat their prices. But now I show people their website and then they tell me what they want.

I wont shop at Wallmart. I just as soon pay $2 more someplace else were you feel like part of the stores family. Lower prices dont always do it .

Brian things are changing , there are ways to battle the giants. I think I should start posting them

You have overhead on your side

Corey

 

[Hest88]

I take it on a case by case basis. I really hate how big box stores have turned every town into a clone of another, but that doesn't mean I won't shop there if I feel it's the only place I can get what I want with the kind of service I expect. I often can't find some of the books I want at my local stores so Borders and B&N it is. If the service and product line are comparable, though, I'll go for the smaller store every time.

Wal-Mart is another thing altogether, though. Not only have shoved out mom and pops and helped homogenize the landscape but they treat their workers deplorably. I'm never shopping at Wal-Mart.

 

[Nicrez]

Based soley on the fact that I do not like the majority of their quality, I will not shop at a Wal-Mart. I have shopped at places that literally were owned by a family, or those big behemoths. It all depended on selection, service, and price.




Yes, I'll admit that sometimes the larger places can offer more, and often can give that all to you at a better price. For kitchen paper and such products I have no problem going to a BJ's or Target, or whatever. But when it comes to Organically fed chickens, or locally made pies, and organic fruits and veggies, I head to the pricey store (owned by the sweetest guy) right by me. I think i have paid over $14 for a small baby chicken, and grumbled a bit, but know that somethings are worth the price. If I wanted to, I could buy fresh pheasant and quail from him, and can't seem to find that at a Pathmark or A&P....




Some things are worth getting cheap, and some things are worth the extra money. But the best thing about the independant stores is that you can't find exotic, original, and unique items like you can there.




The service levels (should) be well over the major stores, and when people want quality they (should) be able to truly find it at those independant stores. it's all about finding your niche market and not competing, but complimenting.




Like the custom made wedding rings to match the sub-par e-ring from Blue Nile. A few years down the road, they come back and want you to redo the e-ring, because they prefer the quality (and service) they have on their custom w-ring....

 

[pqcollectibles]

I do shop at Wal-mart, but not exclusively.

I buy a lot from the little local grocer right here in my small town. Why?? Because the owners are local folk who reinvest in our community. Wal-mart does too, but not on the same scale. The local store has supplied all the paper products and flatware for all the pre-game Pasta Feeds for our High School football team for years. Anyone who's ever bought paper goods and flatware for 100+ people knows that adds up. Imagine the $$$ amount for an average of 12 games/season. (We have a winning program that has gone all the way to the State Championship.) And that's just one of the many groups they have helped. They recently ran a "Coupons for Education" program. For every $10 spent at the store, the customer got a "Coupon for Education" to put in a box for the school of their choice in our district. Each coupon was worth $0.25 that would donated by the store owner directly to the school. They donated in excess of $10,000 cash to the schools in our district.

We have a local B&M jeweler who supplies all the tiaras for all the High School Football HomeComing Queens, free of charge. Need a trinket or bauble donated to raise money for your group,....... Done!

I look for many of the same things mentioned by other folk here. Service. Return/Refund/Upgrade policies. Same things apply when I buy over the Net. I also like to find companies that reinvest in the community. It may not be my community, but they are giving back in their community, or thru some nationwide program like many large corporations have now.

 

[niceice]

We don't believe that Corporate America will ever be able to provide people with the same level of personalized service that our customers seem to appreciate, but it should be acknowledged that a lot of "Mom & Pop" companies fail to offer a level of quality or service which is any better than that offered by many corporations. Companies that provide their customers with excellent service, quality, proper disclosure / descriptions of the product being offered, a fair return policy and reasonable prices in comparison to their competitors will always prosper, even they may do so in the shadow of giants like Blue Nile.

We buy service, we personally prefer to pay a little more for something in order to receive a level of service. While price is a factor, we recognize the fact that companies must make a reasonable profit in order to succeed and remain in business so that they may serve our needs in the future.

We don't object to Blue Nile's position in the market, the truth is that we benefit substantially from the amount of money that they spend on advertising to keep the wheels of commerce turning in their direction... People often start out on their web site and end up on ours and the sites of our competitors like GOG and WF because BN is incapable at the moment of providing the level of individual service that we can provide as smaller, more personable companies. Many of our customers have told us that they didn't buy from BN because they "work in a corporate environment and simply distrust corporations" let's face it, many people have dedicated years of their productive career lives building up a corporation that cast them to the side without a second thought in order to make the bottom line look a little better for their stockholders at the quarterly shareholder meeting...

Don't make the mistake of assuming that all of BN's "inventory" is "real" and on-hand, a large number of those diamonds can be sourced by any other dealer here on PS because they are off of the same virtual list of diamonds available to the trade by subscription and then those diamonds are drop shipped to customers just as they are by other virtual dealers... Many suppliers are beginning to provide clarity photographs and proportions analysis in accordance with the demands of the virtual dealers, but this does not replace the service provided by dealers who are willing to personally evaluate diamonds on behalf of their customers because the cutters "always" think that their production is exceptional and the truth is that a lot of it isn't even worthy of representation in a maul store.

Allow us to "speculate" as to the reason that you're not seeing the diamonds offered by Blue Nile on everybody else's virtual list... Could it "possibly" be because BN has tied up the virtual inventory of many of the diamond cutter's by contracts which restrict the on-line representation of their inventory so that it can only appear on the Blue Nile web site? Oh no, of course not, that would kind of be like a "restriction of free trade" which would be a violation of Fair Trade practices, but of course that wouldn't really be a problem unless somebody requested an FTC inquiry into the practice and even then it might not be worthy of a full investigation.

We can tell you for a fact that many of our suppliers seem to be "extremely" fearful of being caught selling the diamonds that are listed on the Blue Nile web site to any other internet dealer... "Systematic elimination of competition" seems to be the way of many corporate giants, they do so by restricting inventory and initially offering seemingly unbelievable prices, but when the smaller guys have been eliminated from the market the prices always seem to increase and the service seems to fall to the wayside along with the employees which once made the company great... So are we afraid of the Big Bad Dog Blue Nile? No, we and many of our competitors provide a level of service that can't be matched by a large corporation and our customers seem to recognize that fact, but don't think that we don't watch their every move as they watch ours. Paranoia = Reality, an unfortunate truth.

 

[Pair0Ducks]

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On 6/15/2004 9:52:07 AM brianknox wrote:




My cognitive dissonance is at a high level again with all the outsourcing debates as well as the much debated social effects of big box stores on communities, Mom & Pop stores, etc.
----------------

Outsourcing is only a bad thing if you feel that everything should belong in our country. If you take a more global perspective then it isn't a bad thing at all.

Anyway, that's a fairly political statement so you are welcome to take it or leave it.

 

[aljdewey]

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On 6/15/2004 11:06:17 AM aljdewey wrote:




....'yes, we can make your ring, yes we can use ideal stones, yes we can put a slight knife-edge on the shank to more closely match your e-ring, yes we can do 18K/platinum and it's HUNDREDS of dollars less. Oh, and it will be ready in ten days!----------------

Something I should have been clearer on in this post. Yes, the savings in this situation was hundreds less, but what would I have chosen had WF's price been somewhat MORE than the B&M......?

Still would have chosen Whiteflash. Price is not my focus, value is. If I'm getting better customer service, better turnaround time, better attention to detail......THAT'S what I care about.

Service is worth paying for.