Sell Repairs

As we wrote in the recent “Pricing Repairs for Profitability” tip, accurately pricing repairs can have a big impact on your bottom-line. The Jewelers of America 2008 Cost of Doing Business Survey reinforces the increasing importance of repairs, which accounted for 11 percent of sales in 2007.

It’s crucial that as a jeweler you and your sales staff can communicate with your customers about the most common jewelry repair processes. In a Counter Points series featured in Jewelers of America's newsletter, The J Report, entitled “Understanding and Communicating Jewelry Repairs," JA Director of Education David Peters detailed how retailers can communicate repairs and close more sales.

Some tips from Peters on how thrive in selling repair services:

• Educate Sales Staff. Research shows a large percentage of customers seeking out a new jewelry store are doing so because they are in need of some type of repair service, so be sure that your sales associates are prepared to discuss the repair processes in an easy-to-understand and comprehensive manner.
• Have the right attitude about selling repairs. Sure it’s not as sexy as selling a diamond, but taking care of your customers is about providing them with the products and services they need (and when they need them). Making a repair customer happy will most likely lead to many future merchandise sales.

• Never underestimate the value a customer places on their broken jewelry.
• Create trust: Selling repairs is about doing right by the customer and their jewelry. They seek good value and quality repairs from your store. Remember that you can lose trust by over selling unnecessary repair work, or by not taking the time to alert the consumer to repairs that must be done.
• Evaluate needs: Don’t just write up a job card and shuffle the customer out the door. While your customer is in the store, give the piece a quick cleaning to give you time to chat with the customer and find out more about the piece’s history—this information provides valuable insights to how to sell repair services that best fit the needs and motivations of your client.

Take The Tip:
Jewelers of America members can read the full six-part Counter Point series on “Understanding and Communicating Jewelry Repairs," by logging into the Member Section of the JA website, www.jewelers.org. The Member section contains a large archive of popular JA publications, such as Counter Points, Ask a Gemologist, The J Report and JA White Papers.