5 Free Stud Earrings

5 Pairs of sterling silver gemstone studs ($7 wholesale value) will be included with ALL orders placed by Wednesday at midnight (or until I run out). This is my way of saying thanks for your business and for letting me take a few days off! My family and I are enjoying a, so far, rainy vacation on beautiful Lake Winnepesauke in New Hampshire. The website is open for business, but I will not be shipping orders til I get back this weekend.

New Arrivals

I have 30 sets of the stud earrings to giveaway, if I reach the limit before Wednesday I will post the info on the blog. Otherwise, just write “5studs” in the COMMENTS section when you place your order and I will include.

Have a great week and thanks for being my customer

– Aaron

Tags: free earrings

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Can you keep a secret?

I just updated the “Secret Page” on Wholesalegemshop.com with 12 designs that have been discounted by 40-60%. I do this every so often to move certain items quicker and just as a favor to my best customers. I can’t figure out why a few of these items are slow sellers, especially the dolphins, but I figure 50% off should help. Be sure to read the terms and instructions on that page.

One more thing – I pride myself on getting your orders out quickly. But once a year my family and I take a break and are pretty much off the grid for a week. Next week is the week. I don’t really trust anyone else to serve my customers so if you need anything in a hurry, please get your order in by Saturday (August 21, 5pm EST). Otherwise your order will be delayed by a few days. I really apologize if this is an inconvenience! But as you probably know, such is life as a small business.

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Thanks for the donations!

We raised enough through the recent fundraiser to sponsor one of the children for the first year. Did not go quite as well as I had hoped, but this is a good start.

Tags: Charity, sponsorships

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Let’s Help These 3 Kids

We Can Make a Difference for Theese 3 Kids … 10% To Charity All Day Friday & Saturday! … With your help. Three years ago, I was matched with three needy children in Nepal (by Edwon): Prabin, Dipesh & Saraswati. With a very modest donation they were able to go to school for the first time. Three years later they are thriving! But they still face many challenges and it will be dificult for me continue to support them alone. You can  help by donating $5, $10, $25 when you place your next order. In addition I will donate 10% of your order value on Friday & Sat. (July 30-31) to this cause if you write HELPKIDS in the comments section when you checkout. This is Prabin getting his scholarship to go to school. Without our help these kids may lose out. The next time you place an order, please consider Read the rest of this entry »

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We bought 3 Arsenic Filters. Thanks!

Thanks to all of you who placed an order last month for part of our 10% to charity days. Together we raised enough to buy 3 arsenic filters.

Tags: 10% to charity, arsenic filters, Charity

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10% To Charity Through Wednesday

One of the great ideas I received last was to donate 10% of sales to charity in honor of wholesalegemshop.com‘s 10 year anniversary. I think this is a great idea.

10% of every order placed tomorrow (Wednesday June 30 2010) will be donated to Filters for Families. Filters for Families is an organization I have been involved with for about 4 years. They are working to address an issue that is close to my heart – clean water for people in Nepal. I worked on this problem 18 years ago and the lack of clean safe water is still a systemic problem today. They are addressing a particularly horrific and ironic tragedy, perhaps a time-bomb.

Over the past 20 years there has been huge progress in bringing clean water to those in the plains of Nepal as well as other low-land areas including India and Bangledesh. 10′s of thousands of wells were dug supplying millions of people with bacteria-free, lean and what everyone thought was safe water supply. The terribly irony is that water from these shallow wells contain dangerously high levels of naturally occuring Arsenic. Arsenic poisoning is debilitating and millions and millions of people are being exposed every day. More irony. The solutions to this problem are very simple – a $22 arsenic filter made from local materials. Filters for Families is coordinating an effort in the plains of Nepal to build the systems/ train villagers and distribute these filters to as many people as possible. A truly worth cause and organization. You can learn more about their work on their website. www.filtersforfamilies.com For every $220 in orders tomorrow we will be able to provide one additional filter to a family. Have a great day!

Tags: 10% to charity, Charity, filters for families

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15 New Gemchip Bracelets Added

See All Gemchip Bracelets These natural gemstone chip bracelets are on an elastic string so one size fits all. They are vibrant, stylish and very affordable. I sell them in packs of 5, which averages out to just $1.29/ bracelet. My customers typically retail them for $3-$5. The low price point items are crucial to have in your line this summer to be sure you have something for every budget. Early next week I will be adding some new pendants and earring designs, so please check back at that time as well. Thanks, as always, for your business and I hope you have a great weekend

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10 Years in Business – How did this Happen?

My story. The short version.

Somewhere around this time 10 years ago I launched my first attempt at an e-commerce business. The year was 2000. I had been importing and wholesaleing jewelry from Nepal where I served in the Peace Corps (1991-1993) since 1994. This was just a hobby at the time but helped me pay my way through grad school (MBA in non-profit management from Boston University, 1996).

My non profit career ended abruptly. After four exciting years of serving as Executive Director of an NGO in Boston working to improve public high schools by engaging students and parents, my organization disintegrated before my eyes. It was a heart wrenching experience. I was fortunate to receive about 3 months of severence and used this time to launch an e-commerce website (www.silvergemshop.com) and simultaneously started selling on eBay.

Back in 2000 eBay was the place to be. I could sell as much as I wanted – whatever I listed sold within days! I learned to code and programmed custom checkout software which eBay and few 3rd parties offered at the time. My efficiency allowed me to sustain the ebay business for a full time income for about 4-5 years. In these early years I was operating out of my 4′x25′ porch. Not even a four-season porch (and I lived in Boston!).  I did my best to insulate it, but it was always cold, drafty and so very narrow. I had so much stuff crammed in there!! During that period my retail website (silvergemshop.com) saw very little traffic and I did not know a thing about SEO at the time.

Every year life on eBay became challenging. More businesses and individuals selling similar jewelry drove prices way down. eBay also raised fees constantly and became more and more autocratic and restrictive. Around 2004 I think, I started wholesaleing through my silvergemshop website. From 2004-2005 I weened myself off of eBay. But ironically the garantuan customer database I generated through ebay (20,000+ customers!) enabled me to directly market to them and channel significant traffic to my website.

In 2006 I established Wholesalegemshop.com.  The learning curve for ecommerce is not too bad, but the industry is always in flux so you need to stay on your toes. For a time I was spending $1000′s of $/ month on Google Adwords and this was the prime way I generated traffic to wholesalegemshop.com. This worked great for about 2-3 years. But like ebay, everyone else caught on – bids on the best keywords went crazy and conversion rates plummeted. So I learned SEO to generate my own traffic. I am #1-#2 for Wholesale Silver Jewelry and have been as high as #7 for wholesale jewelry.

2008-Now has definitely been the toughest period.  Everyone’s business has suffered and I am no exception. Some of my customers have gone out of business. But many are still doing ok. The key to success of the savvy ones is to keep experimenting – with new products, new promotions, marketing strategies, financing, etc. And I am still gaining new customers daily. Believe it or not a recession is a great time to start a new business (if you have a good business plan) because it is much easier to negotiate with vendors for favorably terms and you are forced to start realistically. Only place to go from there is up.

The most enjoyable aspects of my job have been the ‘change’ and helping small businesses get established. By Change I mean, this industry is never stagnant. You constantly have to learn and evolve to stay in business. No sitting back on your laurels.  And of course I thoroughly enjoy meeting and helping new small business customers get their dream businesses underway. Some go all out – go right for the place on main street. Others just do this for supplemental income. Ironically, I am one of the most fashion challenged guys you’ll meet. I’m good at designing jewelry but that is about it! It’s funny where life takes you.

My three boys are 3,7,9 years old and I forgot to mention this is the reason I started this venture to begin with. It has been a blessing to be able to manage my business in such a way that I can spend a lot of time with my kids as they grow up. It’s hard to believe it has been 10 years. I am going to mark this anniversary with some special events and promotions throughout the year so stay tuned.

And most importantly, thank YOU for keeping me around for 10 years. Going forward I will continue to do everything I can to provide you with excellent product for your business and any advice or information I can give to help you succeed. Where will we be in 10 more years? I am sure it will be nowhere we can even fathom!

– Aaron

10 Years ago,

Posted in Just Fun!, Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

Free Amber Ring with Every $60+ Order

I still have some of these rings left for this promo so I figured I would extend this. Place your order ($60+) by 6pm EST tomorrow (GMT +4) and receive this amber ring. Enter FREEAMB in COMMENTS section. I added even more new ring designs today. Over the past 15 years these rings, which have been made by the same artisans during this period, have been my all time best sellers. Why? Great quality, natural gems, and a wholesale price point that will fetch you a 3x markup. Most are between $5-$6. I added about 100 new wholesale rings in the past few days.

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And the winner is…

This weekend I completed for the second year the North Face 50 Mile Endurance Challenge in Bear Mountain, NY. This was a 50 mile trail race. It went much better than last year. Weather was perfect. Scattered showers in the morning then cloudy to sunshine in the afternoon with low humidity.  I felt good for 40 miles. Then for about 5-6 miles my knee was really hurting, but that’s what you get for running 50 miles in a day. I finished 61st out of about 175 runners. Time= 11 hours 40 minutes. Twenty five minutes better than last year. I enjoyed the experience this year, compared to last year just struggling to make it through and not sure if I could do it.

Most people think this is absolutely insane. The course is rugged, steep, rocky and slow to run on. But when you get out there, it’s the classic Hemmingway ‘man vs nature’ thing. Your sole focus is meeting the challenge, putting one step in front of the other and not falling on your face. You can’t get much more in the moment.  At one point in the race, around mile 36 three other runners and I were cruising along and suddenly noticed there were no orange trail marker ribbons (our color to follow for the race) on the trees. We panicked and it took us just a minute or two to find the markers up ahead. It may not be a big deal on any other day, but on THAT day, backtracking 1/2 mile or spending 5 minutes getting back on track was not part of the plan. For that split second that little orange ribbon was all that mattered in the world. It seems kind of silly but in a way it’s kind of a good thing to get caught up in something so simple, so primal, that all other worries in your life fade to the background, if just for a little while.

So, there was a little contest. I asked my customers to guess my place and finishing time for $25 website credit for each winner (time and place). The time winner is Deborah Dennany who guessed my time: 11 hours 45 minutes. The place winner is Rhonda Goodwin who nailed my place at 61! Thanks to everyone who wished me luck and a good race. Now, I guess I got to go back to work

– Aaron

Posted in Just Fun! | 2 Comments »

$50 Wholesale Jewelry Contest

One thing that separates my business from those of my competitors is that I do my best not to be a faceless jewelry wholesaler. So I don’t hesitate to share personal things to let my customers know who they are partnering with.

I happen to be a fitness fanatic. On Saturday I will be running a 50 mile trail race in the mountains on the banks of the Hudson River in New York. I ran this race last year in a whopping 12 hours 4 minutes. Last year I really enjoyed the first 3 hours, but after that it was rather hellish. So, of course, I am back again. I am planning to reduce my time significantly.

Make the closest guess at my finishing time and I will take $25 off your next order. Whomever guesses my place (total of about 200 runners) gets $25 off. Just reply to this email with your guesses. Must have your guesses in before Saturday 10am EST. I will announce winner on Monday.

And, be sure to see the re-stocked wholesale amber jewelry on the new arrivals page. These are some of our most popular items but quantities are low, so look quick if ou are interested.

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Wholesale Jewelry Displays – photos

These two photos are from Margaux in Finland. Margaux writes: The shop (Loki-Art) that sells my creations had a lot of wall space so I decided to use a canvas-style display. I wanted to create one that was simple yet colorful. Basically I got some packing boards used for shipping paper from a local printing office, sawed that to a manageable size. At home I have a lot of leftover curtain fabrics so I used that to cover the board like a canvas. The contrast in the print was a very sharp black and white so I reversed it to let the earrings stand out. The woman silhouette I found off the internet and printed out on craft paper. The earring cards I crafted with stamp and circle punch.

As promised, I am posting the first batch of jewelry display photos.

This is just to show some practical examples of how you can display your jewelry, whether you purchase it from Wholesalegemshop.com or elsewhere. All these photos were taken by my customer Tammy Mounce.

If you have any photos to share please forward them to me (send me a note through the website and I will tell you what address to send them to).

Don’t forget, I am going to choose one display that I like the best (based on aesthetics/ design/ functionality/ creativity) and the winner will receive a $50 credit on Wholesalegemshop.com. You don’t even have to be a current customer to enter. But the contest is just open to jewelry re-sellers.

Here is what Tammy wrote about her designs:

Here are some cheap display ideas that I came up with and built. Not very fancy but they help with theft and give a nice nature feel to my scheme. Plus all my materials were free! Yes, they are made with real trees right from my back yard….  I’m also carving up a wood bust (old walnut tree wood is beautiful) with a really long neck  that thickens in size so I can put several different size necklaces on it at once.  I love nature!!!

Thanks Tammy!

And here is one more photo from our Silver Peace brand:

Tags: jewelry displays

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Verity Cast – Jewelry Artisan – Great Designs!

Today I  am featuring Verity Cast – one of my new customers who is also a very talented jewelry maker. About 20% of Wholesalegemshop.com customers are also jewelry artisans and many of them fuse our finished jewelry with their own creations.

This is actually a very smart strategy because it allows the artisan to create a product with greater overall value – economically and artistically. For better or worse, most wholesale jewelry these days is made overseas and imported. But that by no means implies the local artists is finished! Those that embrace the opportunities our global economy provide can thrive. And Verity is a perfect example of this.

Being able to purchase finished jewelry, quality, sterling, natural gems – at REAL wholesale prices (we do, but check carefully from other suppliers) allows artisans who have a flare for design and some basic jewelry-making skills – but maybe not full-blown silver-smithing – to create amazing things. (boy that was a long sentence!) To learn the complex art of a silversmith and source all your own raw materials, is cost and time-prohibitive for most small business owners.

To see more of Verity’s collection go to this link. And if you have pics of designs you have created using our jewelry, send me some pics and maybe I will feature you next

Posted in Jewelry Artisans, Jewelry Making, Just Fun!, Sourcing | No Comments »

65 Wholesale Rings $5-$9

wholesale amber ring

I just added over 60 new wholesale rings to the site. This line of rings is our all-time best seller and they are a great value priced, mostly, under $7 each. The artisans that make these rings have been with me for the longest – some since 1994! They are ingenious silversmiths who take great pride in their work.

Recently I have been many requests for more sizes in each ring. So this time I am stocking each ring in at least 3 sizes.

So take a look and stock up on these best-sellers. These small rings do great in the Spring & Summer.

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50% Off these Amber Necklaces

I added a few new items to the “Secret Page“. The Secret page is accessible only to my customers who have ordered at least $250 in jewelry previously. You meet the criteria. This is the only page on the site which requires login.

“Secret page” prodcuts are temporarily marked down up to 50% of the normal wholesale price. In this case I decided to add these amber beaded necklaces because I feel they are an under valued product. These really are stunning and a remarkable value (at the regular wholesale price). If you have not purchased any of these in the past, please give them a try. I am sure you will be thrilled with them. Please be sure to read the terms on the secret page.

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