Jewelry Makers Elisha & Andreas Argentinis Use Customization to Attract Customers

Andreas had no experience in jewelry making when he teamed up with his wife Elisha to take her fledgling Etsy shop to the next level. Friends called them crazy, but he knew they were on to something big. 

Six years after he took the plunge, we chatted with Andreas to find out more about how he transitioned to running a successful jewelry business and what he's learned along the way about setting attainable goals.

Name: Andreas Argentinis

Business: Metal Pressions

Started: 2009

How did you create your awesome job?

My wife Elisha and I moved to Savannah, Georgia from Connecticut 10 years ago, right before the economic downturn. My family had a business here, so I moved back to help them out, thinking I’d stay for three of four years before moving on to something else. 

After the economic crash, it became almost impossible to find good work in the small town of Savannah, so when the time came for me to make a career change, I had to go it alone.

My wife was making jewelry and selling a few pieces on Etsy alongside her full-time job. She’d wanted me to get involved with the business early on, but I never had the time. But in 2008, I started to look at what she was doing and saw massive room for growth.

There are thousands of custom jewelry makers on Etsy, so I knew that if we were going to turn this into a really successful business, we’d need to differentiate ourselves. We did this by improving our customer experience and offering something that no one else could — we found and developed a program that allows our customers to have complete control over their designs so their pieces can be more personal and as unique as they want.

No one else was offering full customization at the time, so it was this point of difference that convinced me it was a good business idea to run with. Everyone said we were crazy — I’d worked in web development and marketing and my wife was in pharmaceuticals — but no one said it was a bad idea. 

Six years later, we’re in a really strong position and the business is doing well!

When did you know your business was going to work?

We got our first boost of momentum on Father’s Day. Elisha made a simple design on a guitar pick that said, "Daddy you rock."

I scoffed at the design initially, thinking it was corny. Well, Etsy picked it out and featured it in an email. We got 80 orders in one day. 

That happened at a critical moment for us, giving us the cash flow we needed to invest in developing more products.

What has been the biggest surprise so far?

I like to write down my goals. In the beginning, I had modest ones — like "get to $50k in sales" and "become a competent jeweler." Because I plan for everything and keep a close eye on what I'm trying to achieve, nothing has really taken me by surprise. 

Occasionally, we get caught off guard due to the trials and tribulations of running a small business, but I think our ability to react and adapt is what makes us successful. 

Even when I find myself trying to solve a problem at 3am, I like the challenge.

How do you price your products?

We started from our garage, so we were able to price low because we didn’t have the additional overheads that come with running a business. Now we have a workshop with employees, so our prices need to cover a whole lot more. 

The biggest lesson I’ve learned in pricing is to find a happy medium. We started too low, then went too high as we tried to enter the wholesale market, so we had to adjust. We analyze and re-adjust our pricing processes all the time.

What does a typical day look like for you?

In the beginning it was just me and Elisha, staying up until 3am to get everything done. I still make jewelry when we get overwhelmed, but we employ a full-time jeweler and apprentice now, which means I can spend most of my time working on marketing and improving customer engagement online.

The best thing about running this business is that it allows us to take care of our kids. Elisha and I take our children to school while our staff gets things going. We both fell into our roles naturally — in the beginning, Elisha wanted extra freedom to raise our kids, so she focused purely on stamping and design and I managed the day-to-day operations. 

Now that our kids are older, Elisha can spend more time developing new products and working on growing the business.

If you could go back in time, what’s the one thing you’d do differently in starting your business?

One thing I wish I'd done was develop our first site in HTML5, rather than in Flash, which was on its way out. Having to create another website cost us a bit of money, but it also taught me some valuable lessons. 

Although they can cause a lot of grief, every mistake I’ve made has taught me a valuable lesson at a bargain price.

What would you like to learn today from a network of other small business owners and self-employed professionals?

We’re always looking for new ways to reach our customers. We’ve got a great site, a smooth running operation and we provide great customer service, but we have a traffic problem. As we look to expand, we need more exposure. 

Does anyone have advice on how we should go about getting more exposure online? We’ve tried bringing people in-house, which didn’t work, so any tips you can offer here would be great!

Do you have tips for Andreas that will help him bring more visitors to their jewelry website?

What tactics have you used to drive more traffic to your website? Are you focusing on SEO, online ads or social media? 

Or, do you have a perspective to share with Andreas as someone who purchases products like his online? 

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