Jim Martin to retire by end of the year

The gleam in Jim Martin’s eyes get as bright as the diamonds he’s showing when he starts talking about the variety of gems, settings and history of his inventory.

Martin’s approach behind the sales counter was inspired by a California billionaire whom he met at a gem show in Tuscon.

“When people come in your store, it should be an adventure,” Martin said. “You should be able to go from one case to the next and talk about all the different stones, where they’re from, what they’re about.”

Martin said enhancing the customer experience and entertaining them is what it’s all about.

“If you just stand there and say, ‘What do you want?’ that doesn’t work,” he said. “You’ve got to know a little bit about it. It makes it interesting. It makes it fun.”

It’s almost hard to believe Martin is willing to walk away from the business after so many years — though he’s not walking all that far.

Martin will retire roughly by the end of the year, but will still be around by appointment for estate sales, an area he particularly enjoys.

“There’s things that people bring in that have been laying in a safe deposit box for 40 years and they’ve never touched it,” he said. “There’s a heck of a market for that.”

At 65, Martin feels it’s time to step back.

“I’ve got two new hips, and I’ve had other surgeries,” he said. “You never know how much time you’ve got left. I enjoy golfing, and I have an 11-year-old daughter.”

His father, Herb Martin, had a jewelry store on Franklin Street that he opened in 1960 after years of working for others in the business until he saved enough money to open a store of his own.

Jim Martin began working for his father in 1974, fixing clocks and other time pieces.

After a stint in the Marine Corps, Martin decided he wanted to follow in his father’s footsteps.

“I decided that’s what I liked,” he said.

Father and son bought out Rob Thimke’s jewelry business at 148 S. Main St. in 1988 and became partners, relocating the Franklin Street business to the location it has had since then.

In the early 1990s, Herb Martin was diagnosed with colon cancer. Jim Martin bought him out in 1998.

Herb Martin passed away in 2003.

Martin’s Jewelers has had its share of competition on Main Street over the years, but it’s the only one still standing.

“We do our own work, our own service work. That means a lot,” Martin said. “When a store has to take it in and send it out and get it back, they don’t make any money until they put their mark-up on it. We do our own, so we can keep our prices down.”

Martin said some of the other jewelry stores that had come and gone were focused mainly on consignment work.

“There’s no money in that,” he said. “I own what I have.”

A large part of the equation is inventory, picking and choosing the right items to sell, Martin said.

“It’s a guessing game, but it usually averages out pretty good,” he said.

“You go with trends. You see different things in magazines, see what different companies are promoting and you try and reach a happy medium. And you have to look at your area,” Martin said. “Just because it sells in Milwaukee, doesn’t mean I could give it away here. Then again, I sell things here that other stores can’t.”

What Martin has truly enjoyed is creating offerings specifically for his customers.

“I buy blank castings and we set our own stones,” he said. “When you do your own work, you can be a little more creative, you can do what you want.”

For some customers, Martin has to be especially creative.

“I’ll make something for them, but they better not see somebody going down the street with the same thing,” he said. “I have a number of ladies like that. If they buy a ring, it better be the only one.”

Martin has catered to customers on tight budgets, like couples looking to spend a couple of hundred dollars for wedding rings, and those willing to spend a lot more.

“My best deal in my life, I sold a 5-karat diamond, $120,000,” Martin said. “That market exists. There’s money around here. Legend Lake people. I get some from Green Bay. There are still people who enjoy nice things.”

Martin said he has seen numerous occasions where a husband and wife will have a trade-off of sorts.
“The husband will go out and buy a new gun, so she can buy a new ring,” he said. “That’s been going on for years. There’s a lot of that.”
After 27 years on Main Street, Martin has seen a lot of changes in Shawano’s downtown — not just physical changes like the renovation that took place about 10 years ago, but changes in attitude as well.

“It’s evolved,” he said.

Martin was on the Business Improvement District Board in 1988, at a time when most new ideas were still being met with resistance.

“There were ideas, but … somebody would say, ‘Hey, why don’t we try this?’ and somebody would say, ‘Oh, that will never work, never work.’ That went on for quite a while,” he said. “I think we’ve evolved to a younger crowd where people want to try things. ‘Let’s try this.’ That never happened years ago.”

Martin said some business owners were too proud back then to go to their neighbors with suggestions that could help the entire business district

“It’s changed totally, so that’s a good thing,” he said.

Martin was on the BID board for for 14 years and served as president for about five or six years.

He left, he said, to make way for younger members and to keep the board from getting stagnant.

Martin has been involved in other community organizations, such as the Shawano Lake Lions, where he just finished his third term as president. He is also a member of the American Legion and Vietnam Veterans.

Martin will have plenty of interests to keep him busy in retirement, from building a cabin on 80 acres he now owns and restoring classic cars, to overseeing some rental properties and, of course, fishing.

Martin’s office is adorned with photos from some of those fishing adventures, which include hauling in a 150-pound tarpon in Costa Rica; something he said he would never do again.

“My arms still hurt,” he said.

Martin said he will retire by the end of the year.

He is confident he is leaving the store in good hands. It will be managed by Joel Darling, who has been part of the operation for years, along with longtime employees Stephanie Kroening, Natalie Poels and Roger Luchterhand, who Martin called “the best clocksmith in Wisconsin.”