Alvarez discovered her love of art early. “When I was a little girl, I liked to draw, and today I have a lot of fun designing and creating jewelry. I think it awoke the latent child artist in me.”

She adores her job. “The silversmith’s art runs through my veins and I love it…For me, my art is a fusion of fantasy and reality.”

She struggles with the high price of silver. “The rising price of silver is seriously affecting my work.”

And she relishes being a Mom. “Motherhood is greatest challenge in life and my greatest satisfaction.”

Sound familiar anyone?

As a result of our 6-8 week production schedule, we have not actually received any inventory at the lower prices. We decided to lower prices anyway because we understand that in this difficult economic climate every cent counts. We hope these lower prices help you launch a fabulous holiday season!

New Tree of Life Pendant

New Leaf Charm

New Puzzle Piece Charm

Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook

Sandberg feels that women need to “lean in” to career opportunities. She notes that women often underestimate themselves or even feel like frauds. She thinks it is wiser for women to grab opportunities to advance as high as they can before they have children, rather than holding back and settling for less demanding positions. Whether or not you agree with her, she makes a powerful argument. While she does acknowledge that there is often a tradeoff between likeability and success for women her overall message is clear: Have Confidence!

You can read more about Sheryl Sandberg in The New Yorker
or watch her talk on TED.

“I sit and draw the mask creatively, and come up with the colors that will make it stand out. I’m also good at observing nature and this comes to bear when I have to sit and come up with designs after the mask has been carved. Although my masks have cultural references, I try to enhance the looks. In Ghana, mask are seen to have spiritual beliefs attached to them, so most people wouldn’t like to even hold them. But with the new coloring and designs, people are now comfortable with masks and are ready to learn more about the history associated with them.”

Ahianyo may not realize it but she has a lot in common with mask carvers in Bali who have their own village, Mas. I used to love sitting with friends while they painted their masks with intricate designs. I tried a few myself and made a total mess of it!

Ahianyo’s masks are for sale at Novica.

Nyoman Nadri creates robes, bed covers, pillowcases, sarongs and shawls in Bali, Indonesia. She specializes in Batik, a resist dying technique that uses wax to create intricate designs. In doing her work, Nadri is inspired by people’s needs. Her customers come to her and request the kind of motifs they desire, and bed cover or sarong sizes they need.  Selling through Novica has given her access to a larger market and allowed her to hire more women to work with her.

“Novica has had a positive impact on my family, as well as with the families of the women working with me. It means that we can have hope. We make the batik robes and we know that by selling them through Novica we can have a steady income to provide for our families”

Nadri will use her loan to stock up on white textiles and dyes for her batik work.

Batik Robe

Despite the similarities, the element of design is a key difference between our company and theirs. Zappos sells the same shoes everyone else sells while Nina Designs creates new designs that are unique to our company. Our silver pendants and jewelry parts also become part of larger creations, facilitating our customer’s own creative vision. That lead us to a key insight. While the goal at Zappos is to Deliver Happiness, at Nina Designs we strive to Deliver Inspiration.

What do you deliver?

Peep toes from Zappos

Peep toes from Nina Designs

Get the right people on the bus in the right seats.
- If you’re in doubt, don’t hire, keep looking.
- The moment you feel you have to tightly manage someone, you have made a hiring mistake.
- Whether someone is the right person has more to do with character traits and innate capabilities than with specific knowledge, background or skills.

I recently heard a presentation by Kerrie Halmi, who is often consulted by large companies to improve their hiring processes.   I think her advice is golden:

1. Cultural Fit – Anyone who is a poor fit won’t last. Reference your company values, does the candidate share them? This does NOT mean, “Are they just like me?” You want variety, different types of people. (At Zappos they have a whole department dedicated to making sure that new hires are a good cultural fit).

2. References – Spend more time on this. There are ways to persuade people to talk even when they say they can’t comment. “Kristin gave you as a reference, can I talk to you for a few minutes about her?” Take the time to draw out the conversation and ask probing questions. “What would be the best way to manage Kristin?” Listen VERY carefully. “Oh, that’s interesting, tell me more.” Ask open ended questions. “Our culture is very focused on initiative, how do you think Kristin will fit in?”

3. Continuously Recruit – Never get to the point where you are desperate to hire. Always be on the look out for new talent. Stay in touch with anyone who might be a good fit.

Halmi pointed out that a bad hire will usually cost you 1-3  years in gross salary if you tally the time, energy and money spent to correct the situation. She strongly recommends taking your time and waiting until you find just the right person. This is the same advice I heard from Lulu Lemon CEO, Chip Wilson, who counsels, ” Interview someone at least three times to see who they REALLY are.” Most people put up a good front on the first interview but by the third character flaws start to show. Wilson made another good point, “If you hire one good person, they will bring three good people with them. If you hire one bad person, they will bring ten people with them.”

In our experience here at Nina Designs, we have learned to trust our instincts. Even a small twinge of uncertainty is usually a sign that a candidate is not a good cultural fit. It is tempting to compromise when you are stressed for time but don’t give in. You WILL find the right person for the job and with the right people on the bus, you can go anywhere!

The Proud Members of the Nina Designs Team

Though many of the businesses in the book have since tanked (Circuit City, Fannie Mae), we have found the hedgehog concept very engaging and thought provoking. To discover your own hedgehog concept, explore the intersection of three circles:

1. What are you passionate about?
2. What can you be best in the world at?
3. What drives your economic engine? For instance, sales per customer? Sales per region? Sales per product category? etc.

The hedgehog concept is so named because the hedgehog does one thing really well, better than any other animal. It rolls into a tight little ball as a defensive mechanism. Figuring out your hedgehog concept is not a quick exercise but an ongoing conversation that can lead you to unexpected places. Let me know if you have yours pinned down. We are still working on ours!

All orders placed before August 9th at 5pm will be processed at the lower prices. However, effective immediately, all back orders and special orders will be at the new prices. Existing backorders will remain at lower prices.

We are pleased to be able to offer a lower cost alternative in our new bronze line, available in natural and silver plated finish. They will remain at current pricing and are not affected by the increase on sterling silver and gold plated styles. Our gold plated bronze will be available in several weeks and will have pricing tied to the metals market just like the sterling silver.

Please note that orders will be processed and pulled as we normally do: orders with expedited shipping (UPS Overnight, 2-Day, and 3-Day) are pulled before UPS Ground and Priority Mail orders. UPS Ground and Priority Mail orders are processed in the order received. This is important to keep in mind because we may run out of stock on some items and backorders will be at the higher price.

We understand these are challenging times. We are working hard to present options to help you, our valued customers, continue to thrive in this economy. Thankfully there are still many women who can afford to invest in heirloom quality jewelry made from precious metals. For those who love our designs but can no longer afford them due to the increased costs of sterling silver, we are excited to present our new bronze line. We have fifteen new bronze styles expected in the next few weeks, and more are in the pipeline.

We hope with these various options, we have something that will work for you. Thank you for your business and understanding.

Nina Cooper