We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Emily Duffelmeyer. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Emily below.
Hi Emily, thanks for joining us today. Owning a business isn’t always glamorous and so most business owners we’ve connected with have shared that on tough days they sometimes wonder what it would have been like to have just had a regular job instead of all the responsibility of running a business. Have you ever felt that way?
I don’t really think about achieving happiness in my work. Happiness does not seem like the right unit of measurement. The questions I ask myself instead are, “Is this work meaningful to me?” and “Can I *really* make a living doing this?” I don’t always have answers to these questions but the practice of asking them helps guide my decisions and forces honesty.
When I think about meaningful work, I think about a holistic definition of “success” based on financial health, product quality, and customer engagement. When I achieve “success” by all three measures, I feel like my work has purpose and that I am on the right track. When the balance is off, I know it is time to refocus and seek clarity. Doing periodic vision work with Lois Weinblatt of True North Visionaries has been very helpful to me during the “blergh” times in the life of the business.
As far as the question of “Can I make a life doing this?,” I often find myself reckoning with the awkwardness of being both the boss and the employee of a business. There are many times when what is best for me personally is not what is best for the business, or vice versa. Wishing for a “regular” job comes from feeling the strain of that personal/professional tether, mostly. Although I struggle, logistically and morally, with the changing landscape of retail and e-commerce, I think that small businesses like mine are needed now more than ever. We are all hungry for more heartfelt interactions with each other, in life and in business, and I feel called to stick around and be a part of that positive wave.
Emily, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
I always thought that I would be an academic because I grew up in a house with professor parents. I studied archaeology, geology and languages in college and, although I was a great student, nothing that I learned really lit me up or stuck with me. I buzzed around for a year or so after graduating and then got a job at Zingerman’s, a beloved cluster of businesses in Ann Arbor. They practice Open Book Finance and offer heaps of training to employees so, over the course of five years with them, I essentially learned how to run a business. Around the same time, I met a woman – Lauren Naimola of Dear Golden Vintage – on the cusp of starting a vintage clothing business and we became fast friends. The combination of seeing the enormous positive impact that Zingerman’s had in the community AND watching Lauren’s business grow made me very excited about entrepreneurship. Vintage and antique jewelry was somehow the obvious choice, perhaps because of my fundamental interest in history (and rocks!). At any rate, it never crossed my mind to sell anything else.
I sell vintage, antique and modern jewelry with a focus on both rare collectibles and wearable heirlooms. Meaningful adornment is something that everyone understands from a very young age: we humans love to keep special objects close to us and jewelry is a wonderful way to do that! I started with a shop on Etsy in 2010 selling mostly small baubles. I grew the business slowly as I also grew a family, keeping a steady pace and learning as much as I could along the way. A big moment came in 2018 when I renovated a 1939 storefront in Lansing’s historic REO Town as JJV headquarters. When you visit my website or my shop you will find curated accessories from the Victorian and Art Deco periods (roughly 1840-1940), incredible antique engagement rings for every budget, and thoughtful collections of daily-wear vintage and antique-inspired jewelry. Our line of wax seal jewelry – the beloved Cachet Collection! – is a favorite of mine as our Georgian-style droplet earrings (a collab with Beth Bjeweled) as seen on a certain musician now touring the U.S.
I think of myself as a preservationist first and a tradesperson second. Selling jewelry is the means by which I preserve the jewelry and the stories that it tells. In other words, being a retailer is the “how” not the “why” of my business mission. My reverence for history and objects of the past is really the heartbeat of the business. Shepherding antique jewelry through the marketplace and into new homes is a privilege and a joy.
What am I most proud of/what do I want people to know? I take all of my own photographs with very few exceptions!
Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?
I would like to say that it is my fabulous inventory or my clever social media presence, but I think it is simply the way that I treat people. The learning curve in this work has been quite steep for me but the guest service piece has always felt, happily, very intuitive. To me, transactions are really little dances in a relationship. Shopping for jewelry can be quite an emotional, vulnerable experience and I am very protective of my customers as they explore their options and come to their decisions.
There are thousands of places to buy jewelry – it is a big, sparkly world out there! I am never going to have the biggest diamonds, the best website, or the most locations and that is OK. To me, success means having a young woman buy an $80 locket with me in 2013 and come back for an heirloom piece ten years later (which has happened many times!) Success is when my JJV couples share photos from their weddings and then stop by the shop a couple years later to introduce me to their new baby. Success is when someone writes to me and says, “I have been saving up to buy myself something special to commemorate ___ and I want it to be from your shop.” Success is when someone sees my logo and has a buoyant and positive association.
How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?
Oh my goodness, so many pivots! And usually at the last moment and after much resistance. I like the visual of the point guard picking up her dribble and pivoting to pass, shoot, or call time out. This is the reality of life as a small business owner: constant assessment, decision points, and experimentation. I make micro and macro adjustments with the purpose of extending the range and reach of the business, adapting to a changing marketplace, and renewing my own passion in the work. For example, in 2015 I realized that if I really wanted to make a living with this work I needed to start selling higher-priced items. This meant prioritizing acquisitions of “fine” jewelry, in particular diamond and gemstone rings, and elevating my brand collateral (packaging, logo, etc.) to offer a better buying experience at a higher level. It was a big investment but it paid off: Most of my revenue today comes from fine jewelry + bridal pieces and my most rewarding professional relationships are with colleagues and dealers who trade in this same marketplace. A more recent pivot example was my reluctant, but ultimately beneficial, shift from prioritizing acquisitions to pursuing consignments. This came about when I realized that my inventory level was more than sufficient to maintain operations and that purchases beyond that threshold were causing me heaps of cash flow stress. Since I choose to operate without debt, I approached my favorite dealers to discuss consignment as a solution. To my delight, consignment has turned out to be a win for everyone. It gives me more financial flexibility and broader opportunities for sales, it helps move product for my dealers, and – best yet – it creates a more compelling product mix for my customers.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.jeanjeanvintage.com
- Instagram: @jeanjeanvintage
- Other: An interview about being a mom + business owner: https://greaterlansingareamoms.com/meet-a-mom-emily-duffelmeyer-of-jean-jean-vintage/ and https://www.forbes.com/sites/bethbernstein/2022/08/05/jean-jean-vintages-eclectic-mix-of-antique-and-vintage-jewelry/?sh=4e5643a4e69f
- STORE ADDRESS: 1136 S. Washington Ave., Lansing, MI 48910
Image Credits
Personal photo courtesy of the Lansing State Journal.