JimmyCast

Podcast: Make Sure You Open the Dang Box

Writing the check for that new training service is just the beginning of the improvement process.

Published

4 years ago

June 30, 2019

Jimmy DeGroot

Or listen on your favorite podcasting platform with our RSS link.

OPEN THE BOX. That’s the central theme of the latest edition of JimmyCast from management and sales consultant Jimmy DeGroot of the Jewelry Marketing Institute and co-host Doug Meadows of David Douglas Diamonds in Marietta, GA.

By “opening the box”, Jimmy and Doug are talking about jewelers’ tendency to grasp for things — a training course, a new technology, or a hot line of jewelry — but then not do what they have to do in order to ensure that the new purchase positively impacts their business.

Says Jimmy, discussing his own professional focus of training: “A lot of time people regard training as a pill, and as they write the check, they think “This is gonna fix me, this is gonna fix me.” But then those jewelers get the training package back to their store, and they never open the box.

The key lesson for jewelers? Be more discriminating when you write those checks. If you do invest in a service, be absolutely sure that you are going to use it with 100% commitment — that you “open the box” and use it to the best of your ability. Writing a check is only the first, and by far the easiest, part of the process.

Jimmy concludes: “Even if you use it, and it’s a failure, at least we’ll still learn lessons from it.”

The episode also covers key events in the professional careers of both host and co-host, as well as the development of their personal relationship in which Jimmy calls a “warm, fuzzy hugfest”.

click to Comment(Comment)

Up Next

Podcast: Hear Secrets of Cool From the Only Full-Time Employee of America’s Coolest Small Jewelry Store

Don't Miss

Podcast: Doug Meadows Shares the Ups and Downs of His Life as a Jeweler

Jimmy DeGroot

Jimmy DeGroot is a jewelry store manager who has been in the business for over 20 years. Now he spends his time training teams around the world at jewelrystoretraining.com and sharing marketing advice through his blog site at jewelrymarketingguy.com. Sign up for training videos here.

Time for More “Me Time”? Time to Call Wilkerson

Rick White, owner of White’s & Co. Jewelry in Rogers, Ark., knew it was time to retire. Since the age of 18, jewelry had been his life. Now it was time to get that “me time” every retailer dreams about. So, he chose Wilkerson to manage his going-out-of-business sale. White says he’d done plenty of sales on his own, but this was different. “Wilkerson has been a very, very good experience. I’ve had the best salespeople in the history of jewelry,” he says. “I recommend Wilkerson because they are really the icon of the jewelry business and going-out-of-business sales. They’ve been doing it for decades. I just think they’re the best.”