International Jewellery London is an integral event for those in the jewellery trade. Going strong for 65 years, IJL has an established community of traders and buyers. Whether you’re an emerging designer or an established brand, our new venue at Alexandra Palace provides the perfect home to be inspired, discover trends and network – unlocking the doors to the worldwide jewellery industry.
IJL exhibitor Mark Milton is well-established, having been a jewellery creator for over three decades, and his collections both reflect and celebrate his experience. Every piece is cleverly designed with an in-depth attention to detail. We spoke to Mark to find out more about his business and experience of exhibiting at IJL.
Give us a little bit of background about your business; what is the focus and where does your biggest inspiration come from?
Our expertise and focus lies in fine jewellery distribution and in the design and manufacture of gold jewellery. We have lots of experience and lots of friends, great customers and top-notch suppliers from all over the world as I suppose you might expect for a business that was founded in Hatton Garden in 1947 and has stayed in the family since then. We take inspiration from all of these friends to produce and offer extensive yet carefully curated ranges, usually from stock, of beautiful affordable designs produced in precious stones and metals to very high standards of finish and quality.
What is your main challenge and what are you doing to overcome it?
Our main challenge is to remain relevant to the market when the spend that was available for commercial fine jewellery is shrinking because of competing products in other mid-market and luxury fields. We are also competing against alternative lower cost materials since gold has risen so much in price to become more exclusive. To overcome this, we are doing our best to spoil our customers for choice and to make selling gold jewellery as easy as it possibly can be for our customers by providing them every assistance and exemplary service.
As a business, what is your main ambition now, your next objective?
Our main ambition and next objective are one and the same – keep gold jewellery at the centre of our existing customers’ thoughts (and windows) – and maybe add or welcome back a few more customers with the same ambition and objective.
You’ve exhibited at IJL before – what are the benefits you’ve experienced and reasons for coming back?
Main benefits: taking some Christmas orders (our season is short and we have a lot of customers in a large area to get round in this time) and signing up new customers.
Would you share some of the results and outcomes from attending IJL last time?
We managed both of the above last time – though less than in some previous years – we were happy. Usually when we sign up a new customer, they tend to come back for more in later years – this was the case with last year too.
What nugget of advice would you give to a company thinking about exhibiting at IJL for the first time?
Don’t expect too much, or any written business, the first time. Talk to as many different people as possible in an open and positive way, you never know where that business is going to come from!
Want to know more? Come and meet Mark Milton at IJL this September.