At the St. Johns Town Center...

As of Wednesday afternoon, the facade of Jacksonville's new Tiffany & Co. store at the St. Johns Town Center was still receiving its finishing touches. Its display windows were masked, workers stood on scaffolding and its twin steel doors etched with an Art Deco design hadn't yet admitted any customers.

But tonight, the place will bustle for the first time with an invitation-only reception to introduce what is perhaps the nation's most-esteemed jeweler to Jacksonville.

The store has opened in Jacksonville as it has done in dozens of other markets -- with little fanfare. The retailer relies on its brand cache and clientèle and has grown from a single fancy goods store in New York City in 1837 to 225 worldwide. Besides its reputation for quality in its jewelry, Tiffany & Co. brings a considerable amount of history with it. Past customers, for example, include Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt, Jacqueline Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson, just to name a handful. The jeweler has discovered precious stones, invented an engagement ring setting used globally, designed the New York Yankees' logo, the seal on the dollar bill and the Super Bowl trophy. The store's Tiffany Blue is even color-trademarked.

And with a quiet ribbon-cutting Friday morning, a Tiffany & Co. store will be open in Jacksonville for the first time. Its staff of 20 includes sales associates trained in the company's culture of knowledgeable accessibility, store director Kyle Wilkinson said.

A Tiffany box containing two decks of playing cards is $30, the least expensive item the store carries. At the other end of the spectrum is a 3.38-carat diamond set in a platinum ring band. That ring will set you back $122,500.

In between those price points, there's a good amount of variety. In one display case, a $2,800 diamond-studded and platinum palm tree charm glints in the store's halogen lighting alongside a diamond-speckled peace sign. The store also sells "Return to Tiffany's" collectible charms for around $100.

Roy Thomas, owner of Jacob's Jewelers, a Jacksonville jeweler since 1890, said there's enough room in Jacksonville for local jewelers and the new store. Thomas also said Tiffany appears to do well in its current markets and that it is expanding aggressively.

The company's third-quarter report bore that out. At the end of the third quarter, year-to-date sales in its stores in North and South America increased 12 percent over the year before to $997.5 million. The chain opened six new stores through the third quarter and, as of October 31, operated 225 worldwide -- 93 in the Americas, 56 in Japan, 49 in Asia and 27 in Europe. That's 10 more stores than this time in 2009.

The Jacksonville store is the chain's ninth in Florida since 1991 and is the 82nd in the United States.

By: Florida Times-Union

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