Jared Jewelers is stepping up its multiyear journey to elevate its image and shopping experience with a sophisticated holiday campaign themed “Season to Dream,” and a store prototype launched Friday in Arizona.
“The work of elevating a brand means you elevate every touch point — the customer experience, the product, the store environment, all the collateral that follows the sale, the way you are in contact with your guests, the people in your stores,” said Claudia Cividino, president of Jared Jewelers and Diamonds Direct, which are both operated by Signet Jewelers. “It’s been a constant drumbeat for the last three-and-a-half years. Everything has to get elevated. There are no silver bullets when you’re doing this work.”
The prototype store, located in the Gateway Crossing strip center in Avondale, a suburb of Phoenix, displays an extensive collection of fine jewelry, engagement and wedding rings, watches, new and pre-owned luxury timepieces, and houses the Jared Design & Service Center where jewelry experts offer bespoke design consultations, restorations, maintenance and cleaning for jewelry and timepieces. Jared plans to roll out elements of the new format to new stores next year.
The holiday campaign, created by advertising guru David Lipman, showcases natural diamond jewelry and fine jewelry, and is centered around model Jasmine Tookes and her husband, Juan David Borrero. A 30-second video shows Tookes with a snow globe containing a miniature Jared store. She’s presumably dreaming about shopping Jared with her husband, trying on a couple of pieces before selecting a diamond ring, and happily holding a ribboned Jared gift box.
“The campaign shows what the Jared experience looks and feels like, in just a very direct way, and expresses the sense of joy that lives around the holidays and that moment of gifting,” Cividino said.
“Season to Dream” puts a spotlight on Jared’s Signature and Unspoken collections as well as a new collection for holiday called Constellation.
Cividino said the Jared gift box “is one of the heroes in the campaign. Of course, it’s always about product. But it’s also about the gestures that surround the product when you give that gift. We’ve done so much work at a brand level to elevate every aspect of Jared, and that is what you will see come to life in this campaign.”
Tookes, who created a Jared gift guide featuring natural diamond tennis bracelets and gold styles for men, said: “This campaign reminded me of the importance of showing the people we love how much they mean to us. Whether it’s a meaningful piece that marks a milestone, celebrates a memory, or simply says ‘thank you,’ jewelry has a unique ability to capture emotion and become part of someone’s story.”
The Avondale store prototype has a glass facade, unlike other Jared stores. “You can look inside, so the brand feels approachable. You can see all the product,” Cividino said. “In terms of our price point, we’re also very approachable. We’re approachable in terms of the services we provide. We have a design and service center in every store so you can get your watch or your jewelry fixed, or if you can create something that’s customized.”
With the prototype, “We’ve also really changed the experience at the bridal counter. It’s less formal and very unintimidating,” Cividino said. “The category has performed extremely well.”
At 4,300 square feet, the Avondale store is smaller than the average Jared store, which typically covers 6,000 square feet.
“It feels intimate and open,” Cividino said. “The selling is much more side-by-side versus behind the counter.” The store is designed with a polished concrete floor, distressed brick walls, and an exposed ceiling.
“We really took the building down to its roots, to its studs,” Cividino said. “It’s somewhat unadorned, very modern, yet very sophisticated.”
The prototype, she added, is the model for “a neighborhood store. It wouldn’t be the model for a flagship store, but it starts to pave the way for Jared to be accessible inside of a mall, if we decide to go down that road.” Typically, Jared stores are off-mall.
The Avondale facade features Jared’s 18-month-old logo, referred internally as the “love knot,” which is designed with eight interlocking “Js,” representing Jared Jewelers four times. “It’s called a love knot because it’s symbolic of the bond that we have with one another, with our customers, and with our local communities,” Cividino said. Jared’s jewelry consultants wear love knot pins on their lapels.
Elements of the prototype will be incorporated in future stores, including the one scheduled to open in Summerlin, a suburb of Las Vegas, next January. The concept will be similar, though the Vegas unit will have a café and outdoor seating.
“We see the potential to grow the scope of Jared — no question,” Cividino said. “Next year, we’re opening in Beaumont, Calif., which is close to Los Angeles; in Cumberland, Georgia, and in Buckhead in Atlanta.”
Separately, Jared has been streadily renovating stores, with about half the 230-unit fleet expected to be redone by next year. “The store footprint isn’t changing in these renovations, but the renovations are comprehensive,” said Cividino. “We’re refinishing flooring and ceilings, all the fixtures are changing, and the color palette changes. It is a comprehensive renovation.”
