Goldsmith Family Jewellers closing down sale in Longridge
A Lancashire jeweller, which is closing its doors after 34 years due to retirement, has described an “absolutely phenomenal” first three days of trading during its retirement sale.
Philip Goldsmith of Goldsmith Family Jewellers in Longridge, near Preston, told Retail Jeweller that there was a queue of over 150 people outside the store half an hour before it opened for the first day of the retirement sale, which kicked off on Saturday (August 17).
Goldsmith, together with his wife Barbara, took the decision to run a retirement closing sale with White House Consulting, after reading about other successful closing down sales the company has run.
“Once I decided I wanted to retire, I did consider selling the business,” he explained. “But there wasn’t much appetite for it, and I had read about White House Consulting in Retail Jeweller, so I met with them to talk about doing a closing down sale.”
Goldsmith said he was impressed with the team and set up at White House Consulting and made the decision to go ahead with a retirement sale which they would promote and manage for him.
“A lot of people asked me why I wasn’t just doing the sale myself, but the experience of the team and their marketing reach is far beyond anything we could do alone,” he explained.
Since the sale started on August 17, Goldsmith said there has been a queue outside the shop every day and he estimated that the business has taken almost a year’s turnover in the first three days.
“It has completely surpassed all of our expectations and we have been absolutely blown away by it so far,” he said. “The team at White House have been superb and are so professional.”
Goldsmith admitted that, while he has been impressed with the results so far, the sale was slightly bittersweet as he was sad to be retiring after so many years in the trade.
“Customers have been coming in and thanking us for our long service to Longridge for the last 34 years,” he explained. “It is nice to be able to give something back to them by doing this sale and offering them a discount on jewellery to thank them for supporting our business.”
Karl Massey, Managing Director White House Consulting, added: “The successful start to the sale is testament to Philip and Barbara’s hard work over the last 30 years in a local community where they were both valued and trusted.
“Our role now is to keep the momentum going for the next seven weeks and whilst it will slow down we have techniques to ramp up the interest through the middle and at the end, helping them go out with a healthy pot to enjoy their retirement.”
Summing up, Goldsmith concluded: “I am sad to be saying goodbye to the trade but, it felt like the right time for us to retire and, thanks to the sale, we can now look forward to our retirement.”
Please note, this article has been taken from Retail Jeweller’s ‘Lancashire Jeweller reports “phenomenal” success in first three days of retirement sale’ article. Published: August 2019.