Blue Nile sold four items worth $1.8 million to a single customer, and also sold an $187,000 diamond to a customer over a mobile device, CEO Harvey Kanter announced on a conference call following the release of its financial results. 

He added that the company now gets half its traffic via mobile devices. 

The e-tailer announced that sales rose 6.9 percent to $105.8 million in the third quarter, but net income tumbled more than 40 percent to $1.7 million as the company kept margins low in the face of volatile diamond prices.

“Sales of diamond jewelry continue to be challenged by price inflation and volatility,” said chief financial officer David Binder on the call.

Blue Nile is looking to leverage its data history to determine the best ways to react to volatile diamond prices, he added. But Binder said the company had seen diamond prices fall a bit, with “that relief coming from diamonds coming out of the grading labs and coming onto the market.”

The results met Wall Street expectations. The company also expects fourth-quarter sales, including the holiday, to rise an impressive 19 percent.

“With engagement being the largest event in the fourth quarter, we think we will see an uptick on that,” said Kanter. “The introduction of Zac [Posen], the expansion of Monique [Lhuillier’s] offer, the new designers we have added.… We believe the water is flowing our way.” 

The company also revealed that two jewelry designers—Sloane Street and Lisa Jenks—are joining its Designer Collective.

Non-engagement sales disappointed executives, falling 1.7 percent, yet wedding band sales rose some 20 percent. U.S. engagement net sales rose 5 percent to $60.8 million. International net sales soared an impressive 25 percent to $21.5 million.

Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly reported the amount of Blue Nile’s largest mobile sale. 

 

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