In the Loupe
In the Loupe
The 2024 EDGE Workshop: Recapped ft. Ross Cockerham
Michael sits down with Ross Cockerham, CEO & Co-Founder of Punchmark, who recently got back from The EDGE Workshop in Connecticut. They discuss what was covered at the workshop, what Ross presented on during his allotted time, and what we can learn from this workshop to improve our own Punchmark Client Workshop.
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Welcome back everybody to In the Loop. What is up everybody? My name is Michael Burpo. Thanks again for listening to In the Loop this week. I'm joined by my boss, ross Cockrum, the CEO and co-founder of Punchmark. He recently attended the Edge Conference in Connecticut and, in case you have never heard of the Edge even living under a rock, they are the point of sale system for the jewelry industry. More or less A lot of our clients are using them and they integrate very well with our Punchmark websites, and Ross went there one to give a presentation and be a sponsor for the workshop, but also to get a chance to hear what's going on with the Edge and to learn a little bit more. But also to get a chance to hear what's going on with the Edge and to learn a little bit more. I wanted to sit down with him because he's just got back from the event. I wanted to hear what he learned and how it went, so please enjoy.
Speaker 2:This episode is brought to you by Punchmark, the jewelry industry's favorite website platform and digital growth agency. Our mission reaches way beyond technology. With decades of experience and long-lasting industry relationships, punchmark enables jewelry businesses to flourish in any marketplace. We consider our clients our friends, as many of them have been friends way before becoming clients. Punchmark's own success comes from the fact that we have a much deeper need and obligation to help our friends succeed. Whether you're looking for better e-commerce performance, business growth or campaigns that drive traffic and sales, punchmark's website and marketing services were made just for you. It's never too late to transform your business and stitch together your digital and physical worlds in a way that achieves tremendous growth and results.
Speaker 1:Schedule a guided demo today at punchmarkcom slash go. And now back to the show. What is up everybody? I am joined by Ross Cockrum, ceo of Punchmark and co-founder. How are you doing today, ross? Doing good. How about you, mike? I'm doing so well. I'm so excited to get a chance to speak with you. We're going to talk about a little bit about the Edge conference that you just got back from. What just yesterday, I think you got back.
Speaker 3:Yes, sir. Yeah, I was only there for a couple days, but it was an awesome event and went by in a pretty quick time frame.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it was in Connecticut right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's in Shelton, connecticut, at the Edges headquarters, and they have a really, really cool corporate campus. They got this really nice. They occupy the second floor of this building and they have an awesome auditorium and it's just a really, really nice spot. And then on that same campus, so to speak, just a stone's throw from their building, is a really nice Tuscan-style Italian restaurant where we do all our little schmoozing and wine and dining, and so it's a really, really cool setup and a lot of fun so Sounds awesome, my God.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I remember talking to Lenny, who's the I think the director of education or chief of education, and he was talking about how, yeah, they have like a conference center right in their space and it's like man, a conference center right in their space and it's like man that makes logistics pretty easy and makes everything super smooth. We should we're going to get our own conference center, I think.
Speaker 3:Right, I know it only costs about $30 million.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know pocket change right. So tell me a little bit about what was covered at the Edge conference.
Speaker 3:So they do a really good job. First of all, they run a tight ship and back in the first few times I used to you know, be there and be one of the speakers you know the vendors and partners I'd speak for 25, 30 minutes. But now they have so many partners involved there's like 16 partners and you've got five minutes and they and Lenny puts a five minute clock in the back. It's been introduced so that it's not like spread out for the whole thing, so like intros in the beginning. They cover so many different topics, from how to look at your reports, how to move inventory quicker, quicker, and then even down to the leadership stuff, like how to hire, how to keep talent, how to do team building events, how to, you know, give spiffs to your top salespeople.
Speaker 3:It's really action packed. There's a lot of various, you know, tidbits of information that are not only valuable to every retail jewelry store owner but to myself too. I'm taking pictures of, like their leadership stuff and hiring, and you know what I mean. So it's really really good. I commend them on they've done it enough, but I commend them on a job well done and everybody is super charged up.
Speaker 1:So yeah, how many? How many clients do they have attend? You said like a 16 partners, but how many? Um, I guess jewelers do they have usually.
Speaker 3:They had about 120 registered and I think maybe 110 showed up and you always get a couple cancellations or whatnot. So by just over a hundred, um, but yeah, a lot of people in that room and you know the the, the level at which they operate with the stuff that they cover. It's so intensive that you'd think that people would just be like, oh my gosh, I'm ready to go home. But the way they do it, their program, their formatting of how they handle everything is super well done, so that everybody's just high energy. It's surprising how much stuff they cover and how engaged everyone is from start to finish in three full days.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean nothing worse than presenting and having you know, low energy crowd or just a crowd that's not super tuned in, because then it's like you're fighting an uphill battle, I think, and it's just like can really be a slog, but having people like totally tuned in, it's amazing how much easier it is. Do you find that a lot of the times? I mean so in case people don't know, I'm sure that they do, but the edge is a point of sale system, hyper tailored to the jewelry industry. It's more or less like the de facto jewelry jewelry POS at this point and one of our biggest partners and our integration with them is one of our leading features. Do you find that they are talking more about technology when they have these things, or is it more about, like, how to run a successful jewelry business? Because I feel like sometimes the edge as like a leadership organization, it kind of straddles both of those trains of thought.
Speaker 3:For sure, it's absolutely both, and you know Dick Abbott is a believer of. You know they give every retail jewelry store owner this tool. This is a tool, but it's how you use the tool. Data is just data, but it's how you use the data. So their techniques and processes and kind of you know sort of governing level thought process that sit on top of the technology is also taught. So how to turn quick inventory, why, why should you turn inventory rather than having a piece sitting in your showcase for 800 days, right? So they talk about kind of the science, if you will, behind it, but clearly it is highly technological and it's very how-to some of it where, like Lenny will really really go through several different sections of their software on how to create tasks for other employees and pop-ups for customers when they come in.
Speaker 3:Oh, by the way, regina, your ring is ready. I mean, they have so many things you know that you think about. This is the backbone of a lot of retailers retailers operation where every single day, this is the tool that they use to manage their entire business, from inventory to accounting, to people, to sales. You know all of it. And even sending postcards and then swiping the credit card and the point of sale. So you just think about how many intricate parts of that. So, yes, it's very, very technical, but there's also some high level things that they teach that are really pretty big takeaways for a jewelry store owner.
Speaker 1:Yeah, One of the things I always notice is they always are talking about order your fast sellers or order your sweethearts, Because that's like the number one thing every successful jewelry store does is they are reordering every single time that they sell their their best stuff, so that's always, always stocked. Um, are there any other like tips that you you feel are like kind of banging down the door for for retail jewelers? I feel like one of ours is on our end is oh, you need to be updating your website and logging in and like just making sure that your website is good. And my new one is you should be looking at your website on your phone occasionally, because that's where so much of the shopping is done. Are there any other of those like super important tidbits that you keep seeing kind of get brought up year after year at these conferences?
Speaker 3:Yes, yeah, I mean I see a lot of the same things come up and for lack of me explaining all the high level cliff notes to make sure that nobody needs to register for next year you know, Dick Abbott would hate me if I did that- I'm not going to give away all the secrets, but I will say that a common theme that Dick Abbott says is GMROI gross margin, return on investment and so he it's kind of like the EBITDA word for product specific, you know, return on investment and so you look at that being thrown around on how your margins should look, how many vendors you should have.
Speaker 3:A lot of times the top, I don't know you have like like seven vendors and only two of them are moving inventory and then the other five have duplicate inventory, like you're saying, like hoop earrings, it's like by seven vendors. Why are you doing that by seven vendors? So they have a lot of little like you know extra, like common sense things, ways to operate your business. And I love how Dick Abbott talks about every one of your categories as if it's a stock that you've invested in.
Speaker 3:It's a really good frame of mind, a lot of the things that they teach there. But, yeah, absolutely In addition to the fast sellers, which is a we're in a fast seller, turnaround inventory kind of thing nowadays, it's a state of mind. In addition to that, they have a lot of like extra you know, tools and tips that they, that they give to everybody and you watch everybody kind of like shaking their head like, wow, this. I don't know how I've been operating my business without the. You know what I mean. So extremely valuable stuff there.
Speaker 1:And I saw the sister company to the Edge, the Edge Retail Academy. I affectionately referred to them as ERA because they're one of our clients as well. We do the website for the Edge and we also do the website for Edge Retail Academy. I saw that they were presenting as well and the Edge Retail Academy Academy. In case people haven't heard of them, I guess there's a free shout out to them. They do data and metrics and statistical reporting based on data that is pulled from the Edge POS kind of community. I guess it for lack of a better term they are pulling from the wealth of data and knowledge because of the market penetration that the edge POS system already has, that they're able to take that consolidated amount of data and then pull really interesting information out of it. And I saw that they were presenting.
Speaker 1:The one thing I'm curious about and I don't know I mean, then again, we are working in websites, not necessarily in the jewelry I'm curious about how the effect of gold is on the jewelry industry right now. Did that get brought up at all? Because gold is the highest it's ever been. It's very, very, very valuable and I sometimes wonder like when I spoke with Vincent from Arezzo in a recent retail roundtable. He was like you know what it's kind of like the price of gas. It costs what it costs and you can't even get mad at it because you know it's going to be that cost whether you want to pay it or not. So you kind of have to like work through it and just try to. You know, rise to the occasion. Did they mention anything about, like, the current market dynamics going on in the jewelry space?
Speaker 3:Yeah, for sure, it's always brought up, in fact, you know, when people talk about their margins.
Speaker 3:Sometimes jewelers realize that their margins are getting thinner and thinner and they're like why? And it was because they're not updating the pricing, uh, on a regular enough basis to reflect and catch up with the price of gold fluctuating? Um, even some jokes being cracked on, like how someone would uh order a custom piece of jewelry with, you know, alternative metals and a little little bit of gold on it, right? So, just because it's like it's such a commodity, um, but uh, but yeah, I mean, when pricing is a science, you know, and and if, if you, if you can price your stuff, well, um, they have it figured, figured out, they have it from a standpoint of, you know, pricing your diamonds versus lab grown diamonds versus platinum gold, and then your alternative metals and then other pieces that have gold in it but maybe aren't necessarily gold-centric, if you will Forward. Yeah, like our partner of ours, imperial Pearl, who's one of our premium vendors, they never have to really change the prices, the costs of their products, because they do use gold, but it's predominantly pearls, and so you know pricing across the board. You take those strategies and you just apply it to wherever you can. But ultimately you want to be your. You want your margins to be as healthy as possible, and you know the price of gold can really affect that.
Speaker 1:So yeah, and I saw even it comes down to like service, just like using, for example, the Geller Blue Book. I saw on one of the different Facebook groups someone was like, oh, are you getting the new Geller Blue Book version? And someone was like, heck, yeah, because you know the price of gold has changed so much, I need to know what I'm supposed to charge for. You know, a extra extension in a chain or things like that of that nature.
Speaker 1:I guess I don't really 100% understand how like is that gold just going to keep on rising in price for forever and ever and ever, essentially? Or is that kind of one of those things that jewelers because the value of gold increases? Is it okay to like hold on to, for example, slow sellers that are predominantly gold because they end up being more or less like a ward against inflation and they are essentially like accruing value purely because of what they're made of? Does that make sense? It's just like one of those thoughts that I've had, that like it's almost maybe. It seems like it would be okay to have gold slow inventory because the value of it is actually going up. If they had bought it, for example, two, three years ago, it's probably quote unquote worth more now than it did when they actually bought it. Does that make sense? Is that right?
Speaker 3:worth more now than it did when they actually bought it. Does that make sense? Is that right? Sure, well, in a way. I mean the question is, is it worth more as a gaudy piece that no one purchased or is it worth more as melted gold? And so this is why sometimes they scrap it down and send it to the refinery, and that's why the whole cash for gold thing took off like 10, 12, 15 years ago. And so, yeah, I mean, a lot of times they will melt it down, repurpose it, create something brand new or just, you know, scrap it and make money from the refinery.
Speaker 3:But yeah, I mean, I think there is, there is somewhat a merit to that. You know the goal. You could talk. I'm no stock trader commodity. You know economics major, but you know it's quite possible that Guru is the word you're looking for. There's a balance also for how valuable the dollar is, which you know what I mean. You see how inflation has been affected in the last three years specifically. So maybe that's part of it as well, because you're relating our dollar to something that is a fixed asset. So, yeah, I don't know, it's it, there's, there's a lot there, but who knows, who knows how far it'll come back down, if it does come back down, or if it'll stay and just continue to climb forever. You know it's a good question.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't know. All right, everybody, we're going to take a quick break and hear a word from our sponsor. All right, everybody, it's time to select the winner of the In the Gem Loop giveaway presented by Pickup Media. We're giving away one of our gem loops. You've heard the ads for it. I've entered all of the submissions into this wheelofnamescom. It's a pretty cool feature online. I'm about to spin it for you right now, and here it's spin, and the winner is going to be oh wait for it, it's going to be Trevor Williams with Late Souls Jewelry. Oh, he was a guest on In the Loop and his favorite episode was William Jones from Sissy's Log Cabin. So I'll be reaching out to you shortly. Thanks everybody for participating and if you're interested, you can always go to pickupmediacom to learn more about the gym loop or order your own. Thanks, everybody, and now back to the show. And we're back.
Speaker 1:So, ross, you mentioned that you gave a quick presentation. I mean, five minutes is you've got to be like a rap god to get through that. It sounds like a very short amount of window. I mean, I think that the shortest window I've ever done a podcast in. I think we have like only a handful of episodes that are less than 10 minutes. What can you cover in five minutes? What were you trying to cover?
Speaker 3:You know I just try to encompass, you know a full gamut of what Punchmark does and how our partnership can benefit people. The keywords that I use, which is one of my biggest visions for our integration and our customers who integrate, is omni-channel solution. You know stitching together the digital and physical worlds right. So, looking at, you know everything from. I always say, as a jeweler, you need to be more digital in your store and more personal on your website, and by that I mean in your store you're collecting email addresses, you're, you're doing those kinds of things, and by that I mean in your store you're collecting email addresses, you're doing those kinds of things. And online you're maybe using the online chat to help someone go from you know a piece through the cart to checkout confidently. And you know I even shared Scott Stambaugh's. You know shop this case. You know picture and things like that.
Speaker 3:So I really had I'm very long winded, in fact, funny story I was I had the pleasure of riding a golf cart with Dick Abbott the day prior and Dick was like you know, hey, yeah, so you're, you're talking, we're doing all the vendors tomorrow. You know the five minutes things. You know every he's like you know you're, you're a pretty decent speaker, ross, you know. But uh, you're, you're just a little, you're just a little long winded. I'm just dying. I'm like, thanks, dick.
Speaker 2:Thanks for telling me how it is, so.
Speaker 3:so anyway, the pressure was on and you know I had just had a baby and and uh, so I hadn't really. Um, I was recycling a lot of content from last year when I was actually over a little bit, and you got like the if you ever see a night at the Apollo, you got the guy who, who, who, gaps you off the stage with the big hook, pulls you off.
Speaker 3:It's kind of what Lenny was was doing last year. So this year I ran through my slides and there was actually a pretty funny debacle about my slides being completely messed up, so I had to think on my feet and get through it like extremely quickly. But I got a lot of laughs and it ended up being pretty fun at the end. But, um, but yeah, five minutes is very, a very short time and you got to just keep it straight to the point. Um, try to get your core stuff out there and not not go on tangents like like I like to do.
Speaker 1:You know it's. It's really interesting though it's uh, this is one of those events I always think of. It's not necessarily about the sales Same thing with I mean, I'm going to tie this into our client workshop and comparing to that but one of the things I find fascinating is that Punchmark is increasingly attending these things that are not necessarily sales events. They are more like I'm stopping, I'm preventing myself from using the term networking because I think it's way overused at this point but they're more like. I consider them like deposits. It's like we're making a deposit in the community and we're making a deposit into the industry and trying to better it as a whole and raise the C-level as much as possible. I find that attending those not even myself attending, but you guys going, or the ones that we've had Brian attend, or even Tommy going to them, even though he is a sales rep are one of those things that it's about.
Speaker 1:Just lots of touch points, just like how, with a jewelry purchase, a lot of the time people don't just come in, they just buy a tennis bracelet right off the rack. A lot of the times they are looking at you online. They're considering the purchase. They're actually bouncing around, they might add it to their wishlist and there's, like you said, through an omni-channel experience. It might result in a sale online or a sale in the store, but it might have originated on the opposite one.
Speaker 1:I guess I want to just kind of wrap this thing up a little bit with talking about how we can improve our client workshop, because this is crazy, but the punch bar client workshop is going to be in April. Usually it's in April and we already have started planning for it. I mean, I think we are we're picking out our venue and I see messages all the time talking about like where should we have the welcome reception and things like that. Were there anything from the Edge workshop that you want to take inspiration from or that you thought they did so well that you would like to kind of bring it back? Is there anything that we do really well that you notice that not a lot of people are doing Anything like that?
Speaker 3:You know, yeah, I want to lean very heavily into like the how to side of it. I think from our workshop we want to keep it high level and it's not high level I mean we do really get into it some of the technical stuff. But to really look at our sort of menu as to what we're talking about, what we're covering, and you know, as you know, we always do a survey and we ask our clients what they want to learn about. So we're obviously going to use that information. I think what we could learn from the edge.
Speaker 3:They do a really good job with keeping the metronome going. Their timing is impeccable. Now, like they they're really really good program wise, like their program direction, whereas we'll be like I don't know why this, uh, this presentation is not loading, and like that'll happen for five minutes and it's just five minutes of downtime, that it's completely unnecessary and avoidable. So, um, certain things like that and that and that just comes with the territory of experience. You know, like we're a little wet around the ears. That was only our third one or fourth one, third one, so this will be our fourth coming up. So hopefully we'll be a little bit and it's just small things, it's not like we're way behind the eight ball, so to speak, but yeah, there are a lot of little things like that that I'd like to implement.
Speaker 3:I think we do a really good job with our partners, the things we do. Well, I would say we don't have a time limit on our partners. We have like a 30 minute, so we kind of let them spread their wings and then we make sure that they have an educational angle, which is what I really really like about ours, whereas when you're there as a vendor, you only have five minutes to talk and that's literally your 30 second elevator pitch you know, elevator pitch you just gotta you just gotta get out there and it's punch Mark and blah, blah, blah, you know.
Speaker 3:So, um, so that's kind of like what I like better, we have a little bit more breathing room, but I want to keep that. I want to keep, you know, encouraging our vendors or even making it mandatory at some point our sponsors to come in. And yes, they're sponsoring the event, but if they have an educational angle, they're going to be remembered so much more and so, and they are, and we've got we've seen the feedback, we've seen the surveys about the speakers, the sponsors themselves, and I thought that was, I thought that was a win, especially Craig McBean, not to single anybody out, but we had so many pieces of praise about that and about his values speech and, yeah, it was good. So I think more of that we'll keep that going. I think we do.
Speaker 3:Diana and Jason, they both do a really good job. Picking out the venues, choosing the food, the wining and dining is almost as important as the content and the stuff we're doing giving people opportunities for networking and letting their hair down a little bit and, just, you know, connecting on a human level, because what I find you made mention of these educational summits, as I like to call them workshops, conferences that don't have any buying involved, and it reminds me of school. You know back when I was going to college. You know you're around people who are all engaged and everyone's like literally activated, your brain is at, you're ready to absorb information, and when you're in that mode, conversations are always so good, the what you can contribute to a conversation is always so good, whereas, like in the buying environment, it's like so tell me, tell me what punch Mark is is all about Give me your, give me your spiel.
Speaker 3:And then you're like on the spot and you're like well, frank, let me know what I mean. It's it's kind of like, all right, I'll let you know, I'll let you know. And then in this case, it's just that you don't even talk. People ask me what punch mark does at these types of events and I I tell them a little bit and then I change the subject back to you know other family and lifestyle and what you know, running and all the other things I like doing, because I just want to get to know people, you know. So.
Speaker 1:Yep, no, I'm with you. I think that those kinds of things, it's about making these like little deposits into the community and into the, into the industry. I think that's one of the things that the edge does really well is they're just very much trying to focus on making, uh, independent jewelry stores stay in business and and and and proliferate as best as possible. And sometimes it's like I feel like, uh, us and and the edge and a couple of our partners, it's like I'm almost like dragging the the horse to the water. Sometimes I'm like, no, you guys need to adapt to the digital age. It's not a question anymore. Like you can't, I'm sure, like imagine what the edge had to go through with forcing people to go from handwritten books and SKUs to now a digital POS. It's probably along the same lines of what we've had to do with going from people having either no website or like a website that they didn't ever look at for years at a time, to now it's like okay, no, you have to have your products on there. So I think, in a way, I almost sympathize with them a lot more. So, definitely with you on that For sure, ross. I think that's probably where we'll leave it.
Speaker 1:I just want to do a little recap on what's going on with the Edge conference. It sounds like a really good time. I'd love to go to it one time. It seems like it's all focused on learning and just getting better, and I like those kinds of environments. I think it's very inspiring and everyone's fired up. I think that's probably where we leave it. Next week is going to be episode 200 of In the Loop, so that's always exciting 200 baby. So I think that we'll call it here. We'll have this be a nice little short episode. I appreciate you, ross. Thanks so much for coming on Likewise.
Speaker 3:Thanks for having me bud.
Speaker 1:Heck, yeah, all right, everybody. That's the end of the show. Thanks so much for listening. This episode was brought to you by Punchmark and produced and hosted by me, michael Burpo. My guest this week was Ross Cockrum, ceo and co-founder of Punchmark. He also produced the music for this. Pretty cool. This episode was edited by Paul Suarez. You can leave us feedback on punchmarkcom slash loop or send us a text via the text me link in the show notes below. We'll be back next week, tuesday, with episode 200. Thanks, see you next week. Bye.
