Ajaline.com
With the dawn of 2011 on the horizon, we're finally starting to see the fine jewelry market jump on the e-commerce bandwagon. One of the pioneers of this movement is sure to be Ajaline.com, a fine jewelry flash-sale Web site set to launch early next year. Co-founder of Ajaline.com, Meeling Wong, plans to model her online business after the super successful e-commerce sites like ideeli and Gilt Groupe, but with a few small tweaks. For one, Wong is styling Ajaline.com to feature only three to five items each week. Reportedly, each flash sale will be open for three days, with a 24-hour preview. Discounts will range from 30 to 70 percent off retail, with prices from $500 to $50,000.
Wong wanted to deliberately showcase her wares in this way, stating “You guys think you can control the Internet. You can’t. You can control where you are and the way you’re presented.” As a former fine jewelry consultant, Wong said, “I was challenged in turning inventory,” she said, adding that as much as 20 percent of fine jewelry and watches go unsold annually in the U.S. “I’d say, ‘What’s all this sitting here? Why are you producing more goods when you have all these goods sitting here?’…I’m very aware of the kinds of inventory that brands carry.”
Co-founders Meeling Wong and Jim Conte
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Wong and her co-founder, another former consultant Jim Conte, have set up Ajaline.com's first sales to feature designs from Buccellati, Lagos and Temple St. Clair. “This site is all about jewelry,” Wong said. “They know who I am. They know that I’ve built brands and I know how hard it is to build brand equity, and you don’t want to lose your brand equity over just one sale.…They’re with similar brands…not next to Juicy Couture or Omaha Steaks.” Ajaline.com debuts February 1.
-Alia Rajput
Article and Photo Source: WWD
