Overview of typesetting jewelry — the main competitors of PANDORA > read on the site Braslety.com.ua

Today, let’s talk not about the PANDORA brand, but about the very phe­nom­e­non of type­set­ting jew­el­ry, which are sim­i­lar to design­ers. First, you take the base — a bracelet, and then fill it with a vari­ety of charms to your lik­ing. Such jew­el­ry is called type­set­ting or mod­u­lar. This idea was born in ancient times in the coun­tries of Scan­di­navia, but it acquired a mod­ern look in the last 45 years and con­tin­ues to devel­op and be in demand today. There­fore, today I sug­gest that you look at an overview of type­set­ting jew­el­ry and ana­lyze the main com­peti­tors of Pan­do­ra.

Today’s largest com­pa­nies that occu­py a large share of the mod­u­lar type­set­ting mar­ket come from Den­mark. And since many peo­ple are inter­est­ed in this top­ic, I decid­ed to review Pan­do­ra-like brands of mod­u­lar prod­ucts that are its com­peti­tors. Some brands you know well, but some you will hear about for the first time today.

Some com­pa­nies, includ­ing Pan­do­ra, ini­tial­ly began their jour­ney as a brand of type­set­ting jew­el­ry, and they are the basis of their col­lec­tions. And many com­pa­nies — giants of the jew­el­ry busi­ness, which have been suc­cess­ful­ly oper­at­ing for more than a decade (or even a cen­tu­ry), at one time also felt the demand for a niche with inlaid jew­el­ry and expand­ed their assort­ment at this expense.

That is, glob­al­ly, those about whom I will write today can be divid­ed into two groups. Those that pro­duce pre­dom­i­nant­ly inlaid jew­el­ry and they are the basis of their per­ma­nent col­lec­tions, and those who have long been known on the mar­ket and use them among their entire assort­ment.

The first ones I con­sid­er are the fol­low­ing brands: Troll­beads, Chamil­ia, Red­bal­ifrog, Ohm, Soufeel.

And the sec­ond ones are: Tiffany, Swarovs­ki, Thomas Sabo and many oth­ers.

You can read about the his­to­ry of Pan­do­ra here.

Let’s take a clos­er look at each jew­el­ry com­pa­ny and see what all these brands have in com­mon. We will iden­ti­fy the fea­tures that make these brands stand out to buy­ers. We will also com­pare prices and find out how these brands are rep­re­sent­ed in the world and where you can buy these jew­el­ry in Ukraine. And most impor­tant­ly: are the beads of dif­fer­ent man­u­fac­tur­ers suit­able for each oth­er and what mark­ings do man­u­fac­tur­ers use to pro­tect them­selves from fakes.

TROLLBEADS

The Dan­ish brand Troll­beads can be safe­ly called the ances­tor of all mod­ern brands of stacked bracelets and charms. The his­to­ry of this brand begins in 1976. The first charm in the form of a troll gave the name to the brand (the brand com­bines the words troll and beads — troll beads, lit­er­al­ly). Cur­rent­ly, brand stores are open in more than 40 cities around the world and on all con­ti­nents. The col­lec­tion con­tains over 600 beads. In my opin­ion, it is Troll­beeds that is the main com­peti­tor of Pan­do­ra today.

There are many sim­i­lar­i­ties in these brands, but if you look close­ly, there is still a dif­fer­ence. One of the main dif­fer­ences in the con­cept of Pan­do­ra’s Troll­beads bracelets is that you must pur­chase the bracelet’s chain and lock sep­a­rate­ly. There are a lot of options for locks and bracelets, the choice is very large. The design of charms is very inter­est­ing and unusu­al.

Anoth­er impor­tant dif­fer­ence I would call rhodi­um. Troll­beads jew­el­ry is not rhodi­um plat­ed, unlike Pan­do­ra, where all prod­ucts go through this pro­ce­dure. Rhodi­um­ing gives more shine and radi­ance. At Troll­beeds, sil­ver jew­el­ry looks nat­ur­al, like the sil­ver we are used to.

For many years, the Troll­beads col­lec­tion con­sist­ed exclu­sive­ly of bracelets and charms, but then the range was expand­ed to include rings, ear­rings, neck­laces and pen­dants. Today, in addi­tion to all of the above, the col­lec­tion was sup­ple­ment­ed by: a men’s jew­el­ry line, hair orna­ments, tiaras. Troll­beeds jew­el­ry is made from sil­ver, gold, pre­cious stones, among which there is also amber. The range of the two com­pa­nies is approx­i­mate­ly the same.

Anoth­er impor­tant dif­fer­ence I will men­tion is the carv­ing that is found on most Pan­do­ra bracelets and charms, but Troll­beads jew­el­ry does not have it. That’s why Troll­beads charms and beads don’t fit Pan­do­ra bracelets — they just won’t fit through the threads on the bracelet! The excep­tion is the so-called uni­ver­sal charms Troll­beads. Their open­ing is slight­ly wider, so they can be worn on a Pan­do­ra bracelet. But any­way, if you decide to buy a Troll­bids charm for a Pan­do­ra bracelet, it’s bet­ter to do it in an offi­cial store so that you can mea­sure it. Well, Pan­do­ra beads fit on the Troll­beads bracelet with­out any prob­lems.

You can deter­mine the orig­i­nal or fake by the brand­ing that the man­u­fac­tur­er puts. These are the let­ters LAA 925 s — for sil­ver items. For gold, LAA 750 g is placed.

If you com­pare prices, Troll­beads prod­ucts will be slight­ly high­er in price than Pan­do­ra.

Troll­beads is offi­cial­ly rep­re­sent­ed in Ukraine and opened its first store. You can get to know the brand bet­ter and see the entire range on the web­site: trollbeads.com

CHAMILIA / CHAMILIA

The brand was found­ed in the USA in 2002, and since 2013 belongs to the glob­al brand Swarovs­ki. The name trans­lates as Chameleon — an ani­mal that can adapt to the world around it. The prin­ci­ple of mak­ing jew­el­ry is the same as in Pan­do­ra — there are many mod­els of bracelets and charms for them. The com­pa­ny today is one of the largest com­pa­nies in Amer­i­ca and in their mar­ket is prac­ti­cal­ly not infe­ri­or to Pan­do­ra.

By com­par­i­son, Chamil­ia charms and pen­dants are small­er and lighter in weight than Pan­do­ra. Most charms and bracelets are mutu­al­ly com­pat­i­ble, but there are mod­els that are not com­pat­i­ble (about 5%).

Of course, if you look at the bracelets, then there are analo­gies with Pan­do­ra and oth­er brands. For many years, Chamil­i­a’s hall­mark has been an exclu­sive Dis­ney-themed jew­el­ry deal, but for sev­er­al years now, Pan­do­ra has also been releas­ing these themed col­lec­tions.

The brand’s prod­ucts are made of sil­ver, gold, rose gold, sil­ver plat­ed. Also, as you already under­stood, you will not find Swarovs­ki crys­tals in Pan­do­ra’s Prod­ucts. All prod­ucts of this brand are marked with the Chamil­ia, Cham logo or the let­ter C. Sil­ver is marked with a 925 mark.

If you com­pare the prices of Chamil­ia and Pan­do­ra, then the first one will be a lit­tle cheap­er.

There is no rep­re­sen­ta­tive office of Chamil­ia in Ukraine. Web­site: https://chamilia.com/

REDBALIFROG / REDBALLIFROG

Red­bal­ifrog is a rel­a­tive­ly young brand. It is dif­fi­cult to geo­graph­i­cal­ly attribute it to any coun­try. Judge for your­self: the inspir­er and own­er of the brand lives in Aus­tralia, the crafts­men who make the jew­el­ry by hand are based in Bali/Indonesia, and most of the stores that sell are locat­ed in the US and Europe. Con­fus­ing, right?

The his­to­ry of the com­pa­ny began in 2007 and con­tin­ues to this day. In my opin­ion, this brand of inlaid jew­el­ry is more sim­i­lar to Troll­beads: both in the exter­nal design and the con­struc­tion of the bracelet. The lock and the base of the bracelet must be pur­chased sep­a­rate­ly.

All jew­el­ry is made of 925 ster­ling sil­ver. They do not use gold or oth­er met­als. Here are the mark­ings on the prod­ucts.

Pric­ing is slight­ly high­er than Pan­do­ra’s.

There is no rep­re­sen­ta­tive office in Ukraine, but there is only 1 store that sells prod­ucts of this brand among its assort­ment.

Web­site: http://www.redbalifrog.com/

OHM / ОМ

The his­to­ry of OHM jew­el­ry began in 2008 in the USA. Now the brand is pop­u­lar not only there, but also in Euro­pean coun­tries. Stores are opened in Ger­many, the Czech Repub­lic, the Nether­lands and in many oth­er coun­tries and con­ti­nents. The com­pa­ny spe­cial­izes in the man­u­fac­ture of jew­el­ry: bracelets, charms: clip-on ear­rings, ear­rings, rings, locks for bracelets. There are also acces­sories (main­ly a vari­ety of box­es and stor­age sys­tems for charms and bracelets).

In Ukraine, these dec­o­ra­tions are prac­ti­cal­ly unknown, but in oth­er coun­tries they are a sig­nif­i­cant com­peti­tor to Pan­do­ra.

Charms, pen­dants and oth­er OHM beads are ful­ly com­pat­i­ble with PANDORA and TROLLBEADS bracelets. There­fore, fans of stacked bracelets can com­bine these dec­o­ra­tions on their bracelets.

In the man­u­fac­ture of OHM jew­el­ry, 925 ster­ling sil­ver, gold, and 14 carat gold plat­ing are used. To deter­mine the orig­i­nal­i­ty, OHM puts a 925 sil­ver mark and the brand logo on each piece. The bracelets and mura­no are still marked with the name of the OHM trade­mark. New col­lec­tions are released once a month.

Pric­ing is about the same as Pan­do­ra’s. There is no offi­cial rep­re­sen­ta­tion in Ukraine, as well as shops.

Web­site https://ohmbeads.com/

SOUFEEL

Soufeel jew­el­ry comes from the most dynam­ic city in the USA — New York. The brand has exist­ed since 2009 and offers a wide range of bracelets, charms, rings, ear­rings, watch­es and oth­er relat­ed prod­ucts. The imag­i­na­tion of cus­tomers can cre­ate lim­it­less com­bi­na­tions of jew­el­ry.

The very con­cept of com­pil­ing is very sim­i­lar to Pan­do­ra, espe­cial­ly for bracelets. And it is dif­fi­cult for us to fig­ure out who was the first in new ideas. Here, look at the bracelets below, what do they remind you of?

But it is worth pay­ing trib­ute to this brand and has its own char­ac­ter­is­tics that make it unique and in demand among buy­ers. The main thing is the per­son­al­iza­tion of jew­el­ry. They have a large selec­tion of prod­ucts that you can put your pho­to on or engrave. Many mod­els of ready-made bracelets, with places for a pho­to or an inscrip­tion. Many options for neck­laces with names. To order, you just need to upload the desired pho­to to the site and wait for your order. Every­thing is sim­ple.

The com­pa­ny’s prod­ucts are made of 925 ster­ling sil­ver, gold, rose gold and gild­ing. Swarovs­ki crys­tals are also involved in the pro­duc­tion. Charms come with­out inter­nal threads, but most prod­ucts are inter­change­able with oth­er brands. Jew­el­ry is very sim­i­lar to pan­do­ra beads. All jew­el­ry is stamped with soufeel logo and 925 proof. Pric­ing is cheap­er than Pan­do­ra.

The brand is not offi­cial­ly rep­re­sent­ed in Ukraine, there are no stores.

Web­site: https://www.soufeel.com/

TIFFANY / TIFFANY

The his­to­ry of Tiffany — one of the most famous brands has almost 200 years. The first US store opened in 1837, and the com­pa­ny now owns over 400 stores world­wide.

Tiffany sells not only jew­el­ry, but also inte­ri­or items made of sil­ver, crys­tal, and porce­lain. The range includes watch­es, per­fumes, leather goods and sta­tionery. The brand has long been famous for lux­u­ry items that are in the homes of the rich­est fam­i­lies in the Unit­ed States and oth­er coun­tries.

The col­lec­tion of this brand has a lot of bracelets and more than 200 pen­dants — charms. But, as in the case of Swarovs­ki, I would not say that they are very sim­i­lar to Pan­do­ra. Only the gen­er­al con­cept can be called sim­i­lar: a bracelet and a choice of pen­dants for it. I have not seen such a vari­ety in charms. There­fore, in my opin­ion, these brands do not com­pete so much with each oth­er.

Tiffany pro­duces jew­el­ry in sil­ver, gold, rose gold. Lots of gem­stone jew­el­ry.

The com­pa­ny is dif­fi­cult to mark their prod­ucts for pro­tec­tion against coun­ter­feit­ing. Of course, a sam­ple of this mate­r­i­al is applied to the base met­als, for sil­ver it is 925, for gold 750 and so on. But Tiffany has some col­lec­tions released by famous design­ers who put their sig­na­ture on each prod­uct. There­fore, care­ful­ly look for infor­ma­tion about the cor­rect label­ing if you are think­ing about buy­ing, espe­cial­ly if it is not in the com­pa­ny store.

The pric­ing pol­i­cy is much high­er than Pan­do­ra.

In Ukraine, Tiffany is rep­re­sent­ed by one bou­tique in Kyiv.

Web­site: https://www.tiffany.com/

SWAROVSKI / SWAROVSKI

A world-famous com­pa­ny for the pro­duc­tion and sale of crys­tal jew­el­ry. The his­to­ry of this brand began in 1895 and con­tin­ues to this day.

The range of the com­pa­ny is impres­sive — a huge selec­tion of bracelets, from ready-made solu­tions to those that can be filled to your lik­ing. But of course, their main focus is the pro­duc­tion of crys­tals, using patent­ed tech­nolo­gies that go back cen­turies.

To com­pare two brands — Pan­do­ra and Swarovs­ki, in my opin­ion, is not entire­ly cor­rect, after all, they are dif­fer­ent. And if you decide to col­lect the his­to­ry of your charm bracelet, then you will most like­ly look at Pan­do­ra, Troll­beads, Red­bal­ifrog or Ohm. Yes, of course, Pan­do­ra and Swarovs­ki com­pete, but still they devel­op in dif­fer­ent styles.

There are a lot of bracelets in the Swarovs­ki jew­el­ry col­lec­tion, but as ready-made solu­tions. Yes, you can hang charms on them — pen­dants, but their choice is now small, about 50 pieces. And as you can see, they are attached to the bracelet with a cara­bin­er.

Bracelets, as well as pen­dants for a pan­do­ra bracelet, are made of rhodi­um-plat­ed sil­ver, gold, rose gold, and gild­ing.

Web­site: https://www.swarovski.com/

THOMAS SABO / THOMAS SABO

The Ger­man jew­el­ry brand Thomas Sabo is today one of the lead­ing man­u­fac­tur­ers of pre­mi­um watch­es and sil­ver jew­el­ry.

Found­ed in 1984 and today cov­ers 85 coun­tries. The col­lec­tion of jew­el­ry has more than 1200 items. 925 ster­ling sil­ver jew­el­ry is pre­ci­sion craft­ed with fine stones and is renowned for its expres­sive design. The brand uses 925 ster­ling sil­ver, 18-carat pink, yel­low and white gold, dia­monds and pre­cious stones when work­ing with stacked jew­el­ry.

If you draw an anal­o­gy with Pan­do­ra and look at the design of bracelets, then you will be sur­prised how many sim­i­lar mod­els are found! This is a clas­sic bracelet and open ban­gles.

The col­lec­tion con­tains both charms famil­iar to us, and charms — pen­dants that have an inter­est­ing design solu­tion — each such pen­dant for a pan­do­ra bracelet comes with a cara­bin­er — that is, it can be attached to absolute­ly any bracelet.

And the spe­cial edi­tion Kar­ma Beads is very sim­i­lar to the Pan­do­ra Essence col­lec­tion.

Pric­ing is about the same as Pan­do­ra’s.

Thomas Sabo jew­el­ry in Ukraine is rep­re­sent­ed by two stores locat­ed in Kyiv.

Web­site: www.thomassabo.com

RESULTS

Here’s a review I’ll get. What do you think about this or that brand, are they sim­i­lar to each oth­er? Who bor­rows ideas from whom?

Soon I will tell you more about the main com­peti­tor — Troll­beads jew­el­ry. This is a rather inter­est­ing brand, and undoubt­ed­ly it deserves a sep­a­rate sto­ry.

And if you still have ques­tions or you need advice on where, how and with what max­i­mum dis­count you can buy jew­el­ry — write your ques­tions under the post — I will answer.