Unfortunoff

I was walking along the delicious stretch of Fifth Avenue this chilly afternoon doing some window shopping and stumbled into Bergdorf Goodman’s jewelry department. It’s always such a pleasure to be in there among some of our favorite jewelry designers: Yossi Harari, Kara Ross, Buccellati, Siegelson, as well as peek at what the knock off artists Jude Frances & Jill Alberts are doing (which of course we already saw at Leslie Greene & Christian Tse’s booth in Vegas 3 years ago.) After I put together my wish list and passed it on to my husband we exited the store at the 57th street exit next to the soon to be new home of Fortunoff.

I was horrified to see the “Coming Soon” window graphics in the Fortunoff’s window. It was most likely produced by one of the two industry marketing companies known for their multiple pieces of shitty looking jewelry with terrible photography placed next to each other on a boring background with no attention to good graphic design. I might as well have been looking at a Kay’s Jeweler or Zale’s window, not the new Fortunoff that will be housed next to the always impeccable, must stop and look, en vogue Bergdorf windows. I know that the consumer who shops at Fortunoff will probably never step foot into Bergdorf and vice versa, but the least Fortunoff could do is take a look at what their new neighbors are doing and take some hints from them. Who knows maybe they’d fool the BG customer to come in the store and even buy something. If the people who make the marketing decisions for Fortunoff took the time to walk up Madison Avenue they’d see the mouth watering “Coming Soon” artwork for the new location of one of the cities most spectacular collections of fine jewelry, Stephen Russell or they could see the plain but still well done Graff marketing or why not take a cue from Tiffany, Cartier or Winston? Anything would be better than making your window look like it belongs in National Jeweler Trade Ad or hanging from the ceiling at the JCK Show.