IDEX Online Research: Millionaires: The Best Jewelry Customer

Jewelers worldwide know that their best customer is a high-income, wealthy individual. They know that wealthy people spend substantially more on jewelry – disproportionally more by a substantial amount – than less wealthy people.

In the US, the typical high-income household with $150,000 or more in annual income spends four-to-five times more on jewelry than lower-income households. Those households, which represent just under 8 percent of all American households, have an average net worth of more than $500,000.

But what about the super-rich – those people with at least $1 million of net worth? In the US, roughly 1.5 percent of the total population (adults and children) – about 3 percent of all households – have a net worth of over $1 million dollars, according to a new study by Capgemini and RBC Wealth Management. That means those consumers are prime marketing targets for the jewelry industry.

The global jewelry industry has focused on the US market, because it accounts for roughly half of all jewelry and diamond sales worldwide. When it comes to the number of millionaire households, the number one position is held by the US, which has almost twice as many millionaires as the number two country – Japan.

In 2014, the Capgemini and RBC Wealth Management data showed that the global “high net worth” population expanded by 6.7 percent, and their total net worth increased by 7.2 percent.

What’s behind this growth of the super rich? Strong economic growth coupled with solid equity market performance helped boost the net worth of the super-rich. In addition, there were an estimated 920,000 new millionaires globally in 2014.

High Net Worth Individuals By Country

There is wide disparity in estimates of the number of millionaires globally. In part, this is due to how millionaires are defined. The Capgemini / RBC report defines them as having investable assets of $1 million or more, excluding the primary residence, collectibles, consumables and consumer durables such as automobiles. Note, too, that the Capgemini / RBC report counts “individuals” while others count “households.” There could be more than one high net worth individual in a household, but in the case of shared assets, they count as one individual.

Most data sources show that there are just over four million millionaires in the US market, but at least one source shows almost seven million American households, if the value of the primary residence is included.

Here is the latest data from Capgemini / RBC:

The number of millionaires by city is shown on the table below, though the data is from 2012, since there has been no recent update. Jewelers who are considering opening stores in these markets could be well-positioned to capture super-rich customers.