Sometimes the most interesting parts of lawsuits are the exhibits included with them. And a May 7 motion in Pandora’s lawsuit against Chamilia contains a survey by IUM AS that measures consumer awareness of different jewelry brands. 

Pandora included the survey to prove that Swarovski has higher brand recognition than Chamilia, to bolster its case against the new co-branded items in question. But I’m guessing this information will interest many in the industry:

The survey measured the aided (prompted) awareness for leading jewelry brands among females 18 years or older. Here is how they stack up: 

Rolex                   84 percent

Tiffany                 83 percent

Cartier                 67 percent

Swarovksi            55 percent

Pandora               55 percent

De Beers             41 percent

Monet                 40 percent

David Yurman      11 percent

Chamilia              7 percent

For unaided (non-prompted) awareness, Tiffany scored 13 percent, leading the survey to declare it “the strongest jewelry brand in the U.S.” Pandora scored 4 percent, Cartier and Monet were at 3 percent, and everything else barely registered.

As far as aided awareness among males 18 years or older, the numbers broke down like this:

Rolex                           82 percent    

Tiffany                         72 percent

Cartier                         57 percent

De Beers                      47 percent

Pandora                       36 percent

Swarovksi                    34 percent

Monet                          27 percent

David Yurman              10 percent

Chamilia                      7 percent 

For unaided awareness among males, Tiffany again scored highest, with 13 percent, against Rolex’s 10 percent. But the survey also takes note of how much better De Beers did among men than women, and adds:

Among men Rolex is as strong a brand as Tiffany. This signif[ies] that men think about a Rolex watch as jewelry.

It’s interesting to compare the results with the consumer brand recognition survey JCK did in 2008. Back then, Pandora wasn’t the factor it is now, and the leading names in unaided recall turned out to be Zale, Tiffany, and Kay. (Neither Zale nor Kay appear to be polled in the Pandora study.) Still, this quote struck me:

“When we ask people where they feel they get good value for their money, the No. 1 answer is always Tiffany,” says David Sisson, former director of market intelligence for DPS. “It’s all about the brand perception, and consumers believe in the little blue box.”

True then, true now.

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