Renaissance Fine Jewelry, Brattleboro, Vermont

As a jeweler, Caitlyn Wilkinson, owner of Renaissance Fine Jewelry in downtown Brattleboro, manages one of the largest collections of antique jewelry in New England, as well as contemporary rings, pendants, bracelets and other adornments.

“I’m completely passionate about antique jewelry,” Wilkinson confessed.  “I’ve specialized in it, and I work with estate jewelers all over the U.S. and Europe.”  Her expertise includes gemological testing, appraisals, buying and selling, and trading and identifying vintage pieces.

In 2003 with start-up funds from both parents and a co-partnership with her mother, Wilkinson launched Renaissance Fine Jewelry in a Main St. storefront with roughly 1,000 sq. ft. of space.  In 2008, a U.S. Small Business Administration loan through Chittenden (now People’s United) Bank enabled her to move toward sole ownership of the business.

Despite the global recession, which has put a strain on so many small businesses, Renaissance Fine Jewelry has prospered, enjoying steady growth every year since its founding.  According to Wilkinson, the business has grown 40% in just the past year.  With a keen ear to her clients’ needs, along with aggressive advertising and extensive use of various media technologies, Wilkinson said she viewed the recession as an opportunity to grow. 

“There was no point where I could sit back and do things the old way,” she said.  “During hard financial times, many people drop advertising, and that’s the one thing you shouldn’t cut.”   Wilkinson also believes her penchant for networking and creative collaboration with the store’s master jeweler, a wax model maker, and a laser operator for gold repairs, has helped secure her success.  Her advice on starting a business is to “be passionate and surround yourself with people who are already successful in the field.”

            Despite intense local competition, Wilkinson also feels the business is thriving because she and her six employees love people as well as jewelry. “The key to building a great company is bringing in others who share your vision,” Wilkinson said.  “We have fun every day at work, we love working together, and we’re all intensely interested in what we’re doing.  We want to make our clients happy because that’s what makes us happy.  Because of that, we’re deeply concerned about quality.”

            Much of Wilkinson’s work as a jeweler involves the custom design of engagement rings or the reworking of estate jewelry and other precious gems.  “Emotion plays a huge role in the jewelry industry . . . people often bring in their family pieces, which are priceless emblems of their personal history.  For instance, to make a single, gorgeous ring, I might combine a grandfather’s wedding band, a diamond from an aunt, and the engagement ring sections from a mother’s ring.”

 Wilkinson is moving into a new location in Brattleboro this spring. She worked with the SBDC on her loan package development and says, “Everyone I worked with at the Vermont Small Business Development office was supportive, friendly and informative. They genuinely cared about the project and worked hard to help us reach our goals. We were able to purchase our new building by the end of the year thanks to their extra effort.”

Note: This story was excerpted from a longer story by Kate Harrington for the SBA.