While there are numerous jewelry store chains, there’s nothing quite like Tiffany.
Tiffany is a luxury jewelry retailer that sells everything from fragrances to stationery.
Because it labels itself as a luxury brand, you can expect the prices at Tiffany to be quite high.
However, because so many other jewelry stores often sell similar things, you may wonder what it is about Tiffany that makes it expensive.
Why Is Tiffany So Expensive? (10 Reasons)
While you can find rings and other jewelry pieces for under $500 at Tiffany, the company is best known for its incredibly expensive products.
Rings and other jewelry pieces can cost around $10,000 and quickly increase from there.
Certain factors like the cost of materials, the brand’s reputation, and its famous retail locations are some of the reasons the company is expensive.
Let’s look at these factors in more detail.
1. Long History
Tiffany opened its doors in the 1830s.
It started selling luxury jewelry and has never looked back.
Considering that the company has been active for almost two centuries, it’s obvious that it’s doing something right.
It has a wealth of experience that few other businesses can claim.
When your business has gone through different periods of human history and still comes out on top, it can be difficult for other businesses to compete with you.
All that time also means you’re able to set a firm reputation for your business’s products and services.
All these factors contribute to Tiffany’s high prices.
It’s been around for so long that people come to expect expensive prices from the company.
It’d be more surprising if Tiffany started to produce jewelry that was low-budget.
Because it has a reputation for being expensive, it’s able to keep its expensive prices.
People with smaller budgets may come to a Tiffany store to look around, but they don’t plan on actually shopping there.
Tiffany knows who its clientèle is.
It’s built up that clientèle over the years.
Because Tiffany has been around for centuries, and it’s known for being expensive, it’s able to continue to be expensive in the future.
It’s simply what everyone expects.
2. Iconic
When it comes to jewelry, nothing is more iconic than a Tiffany blue box.
When you see that famous blue box, you know that you’re about to reveal something amazing.
Tiffany is expensive because it’s iconic.
There are only a few things in the world that people automatically recognize across the world.
A blue box from Tiffany is one of them.
It’s a cultural icon.
Because it has so much power, it’s able to set high prices.
People who have the right budgets want to experience the iconic moment for themselves.
They want to either receive a Tiffany blue box or give one to someone that they care about.
They want to see the recipient’s face when they see the blue box for the first time.
It’s a sort of experience that you can’t get anywhere else.
Some people are willing to spend a lot of money to connect themselves to something as iconic as a blue box from Tiffany.
Whether it’s a special gift for someone or an engagement ring, presenting the blue box is an experience that few people get to share.
Tiffany made sure that it was iconic by setting high prices on its products.
Certain products don’t become as iconic if they’re not expensive.
When the masses can get their hands on the item, then it loses its special status.
It just becomes something that everyone can have.
The product doesn’t become iconic so much as just a popular item.
To ensure that its blue box, and products, remain iconic, Tiffany sells its products at high prices.
3. Brand Name
When you buy a Tiffany product, half the price you’re paying is the brand name.
Everyone who has a passing interest in jewelry knows about Tiffany.
Because Tiffany has been around for so long, it’s been able to make its brand known as the go-to luxury jewelry brand.
Even if the recipient of your gift doesn’t particularly like the gift, itself, there’s a good chance that they’re still going to enjoy it because it came from Tiffany.
It’s the fact that you shopped at Tiffany and bought something for them that really matters.
When it comes to brand names, they’re always more expensive than generic brands.
That’s because there’s some sort of connotation that a brand name means a better quality item.
Even if two products are exactly the same, many people will think that the brand name is better than the generic brand.
A large part of that is marketing.
The brand has a larger budget to market itself better.
It’s able to show off its product in an alluring way that makes people interested in it.
Generic brands rarely get the same sort of marketing attention.
As such, the consumer only really knows about the brand name.
Since the generic brand is unknown to them, they’re less willing to buy it.
It’s too much of a risk financially.
They feel safer buying the brand name because they’re more familiar with it.
Brands also spend time building a reputation for themselves.
If a customer has a problem and is vocal about it, then the brand works hard to fix the problem.
It shows the other customers that the brand is willing to listen to them.
As before, this shows that the brand is a safer option for consumers than generic brands.
Tiffany has proven itself to be a reliable brand that can make products better than generic brands.
Because of that, anything with the Tiffany name associated with it is going to be expensive.
4. Experience
When you shop for a Tiffany jewelry piece, you don’t do it online.
Tiffany wants you to come to their stores.
That’s because shopping at a Tiffany store is an experience in itself.
No matter what store you go to, you’re met with an elegant building.
It may even have several stories devoted to all kinds of different products.
Each area is impeccably decorated.
Everything is luxurious and lush.
The experience, itself, is also relaxed and formal.
It isn’t like shopping at a national chain jewelry store where the clerk is trying to push you to buy something.
You don’t feel rushed or hassled in a Tiffany store.
Instead, you’ll have a few experts who are available to help you choose an item or explain certain things about an item.
For example, they can tell you everything about a piece and likely how it was made as well.
When you walk into a Tiffany store, it’s like walking into the upper echelon of society.
You’re basically having a taste of what it’s like to live as a super wealthy individual.
That isn’t an experience that you can get anywhere else.
There’s something special and unique about shopping at a Tiffany store.
Because of the incredible experience, you can expect that the company is going to add that to the price of its jewelry and products.
Tiffany knows its stores are special.
They try to make each buying experience at their stores something to remember.
Tiffany is expensive because you’re also buying a unique and memorable experience in the store.
5. Expensive Retail Rental Lots
In most cases, you won’t find a Tiffany store in your local shopping mall.
Tiffany stores are in the most coveted areas when it comes to retail.
Its primary store is on 5th Avenue in New York City.
Fifth Avenue is home to many luxury stores with some that are almost as old as the city, itself.
Tiffany also has stores in the following metropolitan areas:
- Paris, France
- Sydney, Australia
- Toronto, Canada
- Vancouver, Canada
- Shanghai, China
- Beijing, China
- Chengdu, China
- Chuo-ku, Japan
- Dubai, United Arab Emirates
- London, United Kingdom
- Beverly Hills, United States
- Chicago, United States
- San Francisco, United States
These locations have one thing in common.
They’re all at the heart of their respective countries.
Each city is known to have a huge population.
It’s also associated with tourism and wealth.
A lot of wealthy people live in some of those cities, and that’s exactly whom Tiffany wants to target with its products.
These areas aren’t just strategic, however.
They’re also reasons Tiffany has expensive prices.
It takes a lot of money to open up a store in one of the most coveted areas in the world.
New York City, for example, has a ton of businesses that would love to open up a store on 5th Avenue.
It’s a high-traffic area that sees both local and wealthy residents and tourists.
Because there’s a lot of demand for a small area, the rent for that land and its property taxes are relatively quite high.
To cover the costs of its real estate, Tiffany needs to make a lot of money.
They do so through high prices on their products.
The cost of operating in extremely popular places is one of the main reasons Tiffany has such expensive prices.
6. Foreign Manufacturing
Tiffany is also expensive because it implements foreign manufacturing.
Tiffany also has several crafters in the United States.
Both add to the price of their products.
When it comes to foreign manufacturing, Tiffany often faces higher labor costs.
Many of its factories are in European countries like Italy.
In those countries, workers get fair pay, and they also often get a lot of benefits.
Tiffany has to pay those fair wages and provide those benefits if they want to employ workers in that country.
There are also import and export taxes that they’re going to need to pay to move materials and products around.
Since this adds to the cost of operation, Tiffany makes its money back by charging high prices on its products.
Having some workshops in the United States can help reduce some of the costs, but it doesn’t ease the expense too much.
That’s because crafters in the United States also expect a fair wage.
While Tiffany doesn’t necessarily need to ensure they have the best benefits, the company also wants to make sure they’re able to hold onto the best crafters in the industry.
To do so, they need to offer benefits that the crafter wants.
Healthcare and other expenses can be expensive in the United States, so those are costs that Tiffany takes on.
While they do save some money from not needing to import or export anything, they’ll still face transportation costs, too.
All these costs end up making their operations a bit more expensive.
To cover them, Tiffany has a high price on its jewelry and other products.
7. Expert Craftsmanship
A big expense that Tiffany faces is its expert craftsmen.
To make the sort of classic Tiffany jewelry that the company sells, they can’t hire just any jewelry maker.
They need the best of the best.
These are crafters who have honed their skills and have a unique eye that enables them to make beautiful pieces of jewelry.
They also need to have incredible attention to detail.
If even one thing gets overlooked, it can completely ruin a piece.
Workers who fit that criteria aren’t always easy to find.
Even worse, Tiffany isn’t the only jewelry maker looking for such crafters.
It has to compete for a small pool of talented workers with other jewelry companies.
To ensure they’re able to get the ones that they want, Tiffany has to offer decent wages and benefits.
If another company offers something better, then there’s a good chance that the crafter might go with the competition instead.
As such, Tiffany might splurge now and then to ensure they get their hands on a talented worker.
This makes the cost of doing business a bit more expensive because they need to continue to pay the worker.
If the worker ever decides that they can get a better offer elsewhere, then they might leave.
Tiffany has to continue to ensure they’re happy and spend money on them to keep them with them.
The company knows that without gifted workers, they don’t have the products to sell that are worthy of the Tiffany name.
Tiffany is expensive because its labor costs can sometimes be high.
8. Materials
Jewelry companies face high costs when it comes to buying materials that they need to make jewelry.
Tiffany has a reputation for using the highest quality of materials, too.
Whether it’s gold, silver, or gemstones, they always get the best.
That’s because they know that their customers expect the best.
Since Tiffany looks for premium materials, they’re unable to buy things cheaply.
Even if they buy in bulk, the expense is likely huge.
To make up for that expense, they have to sell the finished product at a much higher price.
They also know that the product will likely last a long time since they’re using premium metals and gemstones.
Should the individual ever sell the piece, they might even be able to sell it for more than what they paid for it.
That’s because the prices of gold and gemstones fluctuate.
Tiffany is expensive because it uses the very best raw materials to make its products.
9. Expensive Diamonds
If Tiffany has a reputation for anything, then it’s for its incredible diamonds.
When you see a Tiffany diamond, you can usually tell it comes from the company.
That’s because Tiffany puts a lot of work into harvesting, cutting, and refining the diamonds it finds.
It doesn’t do business in imperfect diamonds.
It wants the very best.
Those diamonds are not cheap.
Because they have to sell a good number of jewelry pieces each year, that also means they have to spend a good amount of money on perfect diamonds each year.
Diamonds are expensive, on their own, because they’re finite gemstones.
There are only so many of them in the world that are natural.
Since all the other jewelry makers want to get their hands on perfect diamonds, too, it becomes a bidding war.
Tiffany may end up spending a lot of money to get their hands on perfect diamonds.
That cost then gets added to the price tag of the piece that features that diamond.
10. Innovation
A final reason Tiffany is expensive is that it’s a company that continues to innovate itself.
It used to sell only jewelry, but you can also find products like stationery and watches at their stores, too.
Even those items tend to be on the more expensive side because Tiffany tries to use the highest quality materials possible.
Tiffany also encourages its jewelry makers to come up with new designs that change the jewelry world.
One of its famous innovations was the lock bracelet.
It featured a gold or silver bracelet that you can twist and connect with another’s.
It took the jewelry world by storm and similar jewelry pieces started to trend.
This makes Tiffany expensive because they’re the ones who set the trends.
They set the standard.
Because they set the standard, they’re able to put a high price tag on their products.
Conclusion
Tiffany is a famous jewelry store that sells luxury jewelry, watches, and even fragrances.
It focuses on using the best materials to make its products which drives up the cost of doing business.
To cover those costs, Tiffany sells their products at expensive prices.
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