Indonesia Study Tour 2017 – Day 5 (John Hardy)

The final day of our Indonesian study tour saw us head north of Denpasar, Bali to John Hardy, a fine artisan hand craft jeweller. With such an interesting visit there are numerous elements to comment on. In this post I intend to give an overview of the John Hardy business, brand and culture.

The Business and Brand:

Canadian born artist and jewellery designer, John Hardy saw an opening in the market when visiting Bali in the mid-1970’s. He spent time learning local Balinese techniques and capitalised on an opportunity 1975 to found the company. Still as true today as it was in 1975, all items remain hand made in house from design through to manufacture. This all takes place at the Mumbal site in Bali. Accredited by the Responsible Jewellery Council (RDC), only the finest materials are sourced from around the world to produce the items, such as gem stones and reclaimed gold and silver.

As the John Hardy site in Bali is a bonded facility (excluding the retail area), all items are exported to the US. More specifically to New Jersey in New York, and subsequently distributed from this further bonded facility around the world to their own stores as well as 600 luxury retailers. A small percentage of items return to Indonesia where they have two sites, one of which is the retail outlet on site at the Mumbal production facility. The US is their largest and most important market, items are sold in high-end stores such as Lane Crawford, Bloomingdales and Nordstrom. As with many major luxury brands the items never go on sale to maintain the luxury brand. Having recently opened their flag ship store in Soho, New York in December 2016, the John Hardy ambition is to grow their market share of the luxury jewellery market further.

With distinct geographical and consumer taste differences across markets, John Hardy have a wide range of SKUs tailored to market requirements, for example in Hong Kong and China they sell a high variety of gold and traditional based items, that in comparison to modern, contemporary silver items in the US.

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Culture:

It was clear from when we first arrived on site and met the team that John Hardy have an unwavering commitment to quality. Not only that, they have impressive ethical and responsible practices across all aspects of the business. This too was our first-hand experience while touring the site, from design through to the end customer in the retail outlet. Overall a great visit.