Tiffany: Buying the brand, buying the history

It all started at September 18^th, 1837, when just two men and 1.000 US$ invested all on store on the 259 of the Broadway, New York. These two men were Charles Lewis Tiffany and John B. Young. At the beginning it sold stationary items and on its first day Tiffany and Young closed the doors with sales of 4.98$. Since that day Tiffany became one of the best well-known corporations of jewelry and silverware.

It quickly gained reputation and in 1845 came out the first “Blue Book”. The Blue Book is the catalogue of Tiffany’s products and it still exists in our days. However, it was in 1861 that became popular for the general public when the president Lincoln offered a Tiffany’s bracelet to his wife, Mary Todd.

After that, it was the dream of every woman to receive a small blue box with a white loop: The “Tiffany Blue Box”. This box is so important that the tiffany employees have to take a formation to learn how to do the loop perfectly. Tiffany also has registered the blue of the box as “Tiffany Blue”.

After 1861, a lot of others references to Tiffany & Co. were made in pop culture by stars as Marilyn Monroe, in films as James Bond: Diamonds Are Forever, in books as Breakfast at Tiffany’s  or more recently in series as the Ugly Betty and Glee.

Since the use of Tiffany’s products by famous people, it became a “must have” by all important people. Still today, a lot of people exhibit their Tiffany’s to gain respect and to show wealth.

In 1940, the Tiffany’s store in NY moved to the current address in the 5^th Avenue. Tiffany’s has 64 stores in USA and 103 international stores.

According to Forbes Magazine, Tiffany is the 1597^th biggest public company of the world, the 1264^th in profit and the 1058^th in Market value. It is estimated that Tiffany as a annual profit of 265.7 million dollars (2009).

References:

© 2012 Time Inc, November 4^th, 1940, Carriage Trade: Tiffany Moves, The Times Magazine, last viewed on 21^st April of 2012, http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,764971,00.html

2012 Forbes.com LLC™, Scott DeCarlo, April 2012,The World’s Biggest Companies, The Forbes Magazine, last viewed on 21^st April of 2012, http://www.forbes.com/sites/scottdecarlo/2012/04/18/the-worlds-biggest-companies/

Mundo das Marcas, May 2006, Tiffany & Co., last viewed on 21^st April of 2012, http://mundodasmarcas.blogspot.pt/2006/05/tiffany-co-luxo-e-glamour.html

Wikipedia®, April 2012,Tiffany & Co., last viewed on 21^st April of 2012, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiffany_%26_Co.