Many business owners had to pivot their business models during the pandemic. While retail spaces relied heavily on online sales, jewelry wholesaler Nikki Smith was able to bring her online business to a physical space. With a successful online business and her jewelry in over 800 retail stores, it is a wonder that Smith even needed to open a store. However, on January 21, 2022, Smith opened the doors to her first retail location at the Dallas Farmer’s Market.
In an exclusive interview with The Dallas Express, Nikki shared her experiences and journey as a business owner and jeweler.
For Smith, making jewelry started as a pastime. Eventually, the hobby took her from her job as a buyer of baby clothes for JCPenney to becoming a jewelry wholesaler.
“I actually started making jewelry to wear to work, and I would sell it to the ladies, who all thought it was so cute, fun, modern, and dainty,” Smith says. “So I created it out of a need for myself, and then people kept buying it and buying to the point where I ended up with my own jewelry brand.”
Once she decided to step out on her own, Nikki got her name out there wherever she could.
“I had started my business doing pop-up shops every weekend to start the brand. I would set up at festivals, farmer’s markets, and holiday shopping events to sell some pieces and gain my first customers,” Smith explains. “Once we started [sales] online, I missed that piece of communicating with clients [and learning] what pieces they liked, seeing them try pieces on, and seeing what pieces sat unnoticed and unsold. I decided to open a store because it helped me connect with customers and see their buying preferences — it is how we make most of our decisions, [through] customer’s feedback.”
When asked about how she selects her designs, Smith says she pays close attention to what’s popular.
“I love to dream up pieces that I think are just really cool and on-trend,” she says. “I actually scour online and stores for materials I love.”
From stones to metals, Nikki takes inspiration from the pieces she likes and recreates the necklace, bracelet, or chain in her signature dainty style, usually in gold.
“I came from a background at JCPenney, where reading analytics was super important. We really design into what’s selling. So 80% of our sales come from gold. So we started doing a lot more gold, just honestly, based on the market. That’s kind of what our customers were showing us that they wanted,” says Smith.
Luckily, Smith has a built-in test group, as her employees are college-age girls who are always looking for the hottest looks.
“A lot of the girls who work for me are younger, and they’re very edgy, they’re very cool. We are starting to realize that some of the pieces aren’t cool anymore, [but items] that we sold a ton of we should keep in our rotation,” she explains. “So we’ve had to learn that it’s not just what you like, but it’s actually looking at the data [and analyzing], ‘What do your customers want to see from you?'”
Building a jewelry collection is similar to building a wardrobe, says Nikki. It is easy to walk into a store and want one of everything or become overwhelmed by the selection. Smith’s advice? Start simple.
“The basics end up really awesome and can be personalized based on how you layer them. I’m all about like, if you love rings, pick your favorite plain gold ring. The next time you come, pick a silver one and wear it with that, and next time you come, stack a sparkle gem ring with the gold ring and just kind of add to your collection as you go,” advises Smith.
For beginning jewelry collectors, Nikki Smith Designs has a lot of interchangeable pieces that can be layered and are as simple or complex as the one who is wearing them.
Smith says it was never the plan to become an entrepreneur. Six years later, she has hundreds of retail partners and over 13,500 followers on social media.
Still, while Nikki has found success in the jewelry space, there are some things she wishes she had taken into consideration opening her storefront.
“If I had to pick something [that I wish I had known], it would be to know that there’s a lot of expenses and to charge what your products are worth, not necessarily what you make them for,” explains Smith. “Bringing on employees and having the margin to cover their salaries is scary for business owners because you want to pay your employees and pay them well.”
Smith’s additional challenge was delegating.
“Learning how to delegate is huge,” she says. “It’s important to grow because you aren’t going to be the best at all of the jobs. It was really hard for me to pass things off. I had to learn that people can actually do things better than you, and that’s actually wonderful. [I had to] be okay with giving away some of the pieces of the business and letting other people do them and do them better than me because they had more time to focus on [them].”
With the time she saves by delegating tasks to other members of her team, Nikki can focus on Nikki Smith Designs’ expansion plans.
“If I can expand my footprint in stores, I love that piece of the business. I love servicing stores and helping them become better, so I want to continue down that path. We love our store,” says Smith. “We are like, ‘Let’s do this again.’ So I’m all about slow growth [and we] want to keep it going because we have a really good thing.”
