Costume Jewelry a Fine Niche for Graham

Jessica Graham honed her eye for antiques and collectibles as a child working a flea market booth in Bentonville with her paternal grandmother.

Odds and ends. Junk and treasures. Graham saw it all. What emerged, however, was an enduring love of costume jewelry, the catchall that includes rings and brooches, necklaces and lockets, bracelets and pendants.

Not considered fine jewelry because it’s made with rhinestones and alloys, not diamonds and gold, costume jewelry is meant to be worn, not necessarily handed down from generation to generation.

Graham, owner of Mae’s Emporium at 352 N. West Ave. in Fayetteville, began repairing old jewelry while studying art at the University of Arkansas. She refined her talent for retail working at high-end boutique Masons, and selling jewelry at “trunk shows.”

Over time, she amassed a huge collection spanning more than 100 years of history, from the 1870s to the 1980s. What to do? Open a storefront. The 385-SF shop just north of Dickson Street came up for lease in 2008, and Graham seized the opportunity.

Since then she has built a core clientele, ranging in age from 35 to 60, and is considered the state’s premier expert and dealer in vintage costume jewelry. With a collection that ranges from the gaudy to the refined, Graham’s clients usually find what they’re looking for.

“She wants to buy something that she won’t see on a friend,” Graham said. “They want unique, visual pieces.”

Graham has a vast inventory of merchandise stored at her home. But to keep her quota of adding at least 16 new pieces a week to her collection, she is constantly on the lookout for more goods. She visits nearly 30 area flea markets, works with a handful of pickers, takes regional trips, and a few times a year travels as far as California, Massachusetts, and New York, in search of jewelry.

“I like to get my hands into it,” she said. “You have to get out of town and find it.”

Graham said she does not worry about name brands or the content of gold and silver. She finds pieces that she likes, that her customers will like, and leaves it at that. She does, however, restring necklaces, reset stones, and polish all items that come into her possession.

It all adds up to six-figures a year in sales, enough to finance what Graham calls “a hobby that pays for itself.”

She reads international and domestic versions of Harper’s Bazaar to stay on top of trends, and every six weeks the store is turned over, both in décor and in merchandise, to keep things fresh for the customer.

During the holidays she is open Wednesday through Saturday, but throughout the remainder of the year, it is Wednesday through Friday, with appointment-only hours on Monday and Tuesday.

According to New York-based Persistence Market Research, a global firm, costume jewelry is a worldwide industry with its largest markets in the United States and Europe. Double-digit industry growth is underway in places like Brazil, Russia, India and China. The Asia Pacific region is the largest producer of costume jewelry, and according to Persistence, is poised to soon overtake North America as the largest global consumer of the product.

But none of that means a whole lot to Graham. As a dealer of vintage jewelry, most, if not all, of what she sells is American made, and she is not interested in what’s currently being manufactured overseas.

“It’s just not made the same,” she said.

While some of Graham’s products can go for as little as $8, a Victorian piece from the 19th century can sell for as much as $650. Lockets, popular as gifts, are her most popular item and tend to bring the best prices.

With shows like American Pickers and Pawn Stars spurring interest in vintage wares, consumer interest is high. But one day, sooner or later, all the good stuff will be picked. Scarcity, of course, drives up the price, and that’s not a bad thing for people like Graham.

She has been in the business long enough to know the market turns in cycles. Right now, gold is in and silver is not. Bakelite, an early plastic, has been up and down. Most importantly, she started out before the Great Recession, weathered the storm, and is now enjoying the recovery.

One thing’s for sure. Graham, married and a mother of two, has no plans to stop selling costume jewelry anytime soon. She loves the little spot between Dickson and the UA campus, and Fayetteville has just the right vibe for her business.

“I’ll be in this building until it falls down, until people don’t want to come anymore,” she said.