The British Jewellers’ Association has recently launched a survey amongst its membership to gauge the appetite for the promotion of a British jewellery campaign.
This has long been a ‘quiet’ agenda item for the BJA and a gentle groundswell from many sectors of the membership now provides the perfect foundation to research how far such a project can be taken.
The challenge is to include both jewellery design and manufacture; fully appreciating that British jewellery designers and companies will sometimes find it more expedient to have selected lines and collections manufactured overseas.
“At the 2014 UK jewellery awards, I made the heartfelt statement that we design some of the best jewellery in the world and make some of the best jewellery in the world” said Simon Rainer, BJA CEO.
“I am increasingly encouraged that the huge investment made by British jewellery manufacturers in new technology now means that there is almost parity with overseas production costs, particularly in the area of fine jewellery. Now really is the right time to get behind the membership to promote all that’s best about British jewellery and to provide jewellery retailers with a wonderful USP” he added.
The survey is the first step in what could be a very exciting journey for the BJA membership and the next stage (dependent on the survey results) will be to decide whether the BJA takes on this project alone, or aligns itself with the current generic campaigns, in addition to initiating regional design/manufacturing and retail promotional campaigns.
Further details and the survey can be found at www.bja.org.uk
