Oftentimes it is difficult to evaluate whether an executive is truly adhering to her duty to put the well being of her company before personal gain. This is not the case for Deb Besemer, former CEO of Gemvara, however. After recommending that Gemvara make the shift from selling jewelry to small retailers to selling jewelry direct online, Besemer stepped down as CEO, explaining that her skills no longer fit with what the company needed. (Image courtesy: http://bit.ly/bDHY22)Besemer will still remain close to Gemvara, severing as its chairman of the board. While Gemvara searches for a replacement CEO, co-founder and former CEO, Matt Laurzon, will reassume the role. “There’s zero doubt Deb is a world-class leader and company builder,” Laurzon said. “But in terms of the experience building a consumer company, we thought having that in place at the top of the company would be very important.”
It was only March of this year that Paragon Lake Inc, a Lexington, Massachusetts startup, rebranded itself as Gemvara and announced the launch of its direct-to-consumer website (www.Gemvara.com). According to its site, the name Gemvara was inspired by the ancient Sanskrit word “vara,” meaning “wish.” This plays into the company’s concept that every price of jewelry it sells “is available as you wish: customized to suit your style.”
The Gemvara website includes an easy to use tool that provides customers the ability to design their own custom jewelry and purchase it through the site for lower than retail store prices. The specific price for each customized order is based on the unique design, precious metal, and jewels selected by the purchaser. By providing a wide selection of base designs created by experienced artists, the Gemvara website provides customers with a “jumping-off point,” so novices do not need to worry about producing an unattractive piece of jewelry.
“The closer we can get to the consumer, the better experience that we can offer in terms of having customer support be direct, connecting the designers directly with the consumers, offering more aggressive price points in the value associated with that, (and) being able to merchandise more freely,” acting CEO Laurzon explained.
While Gemvara will no longer take on new retail customers, it will continue to service those “mom and pop” jewelry stores it was working with before the company revised its business model.
Shifting Besemer from her role as CEO to chairman of the board was just the most recent change of a string of position changes at Gemvara. Just weeks ago, the company took on Dan Marques,
previously of VistaPrint, as its director of online marketing. Cheryl Kremkow, formerly editor-in-chief of Modern Jeweler magazine, also recently joined the Gemvara team as the company’s head of merchandising. (Image courtesy: http://www.gemvara.com/)It will be some time before it’s clear if it was wise for Gemvara to transition from the retail supplier market into online, direct sales. Still, it’s reassuring to see a high-ranking executive like Deb Besemer willing to step down to ensure that the best person for the company can assume her role and give Gemvara a fighting chance.
[Sources: http://bit.ly/9Fm4eH, http://bit.ly/bDHY22]
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