Adornis.com

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Adornis.com was an online jewelry retailer created during the 90's dot-com boom that later collapsed.

Adornis.com
Formation1999[1]
TypeOnline jewelry retailer
HeadquartersIreland: Moyne Park, Tuam, County Galway, Ireland[2][3][4]
USA: Suite 265, 411 West Putnam Avenue, Greenwich, Connecticut 06830, USA[5][6]
Location
Official language
English
Founder
Declan Ganley[7][1]
Key people
Sean Ganley, Jeanne Daniels,[8] Roy Albers,[8] Marion Davidson[9]
Websitewww.adornis.com

Origin[edit]

Adornis.com, Inc.[5][6] was an online jewelry retailer[7] launched by Irish entrepreneur Declan Ganley[7][1] with co-founder Sean Ganley, brother of Declan, in 1999,[1] part of the dot-com boom[1] of the 90's. The company was funded through Ganley's private equity firm, the Ganley Group,[2] with $30m in equity funding, $30m in debt financing and a personal investment by Ganley of $5.5m.[8] The French investments firm Richemont Investments SA,[10] (a division[10] of Compagnie Financiere Richemont AG[2][8]) paid approx $5m[10] to own 20%[7][10] and the Irish internet firm Nua Internet Services[8] owned 10%.[7] Ganley owned around 40%,[2] with the remainder owned by three American hedge funds.[2] Adornis.com was a winner of Forbes magazine's 'Best of the Web' "Classic, contemporary and estate jewelry from less than $100 to more than $10,000. Browse or search by designer, product type, type of material and gemstone or price....Excellent product descriptions and multiple close-up views". Time magazine described Adornis.com as 'bauble central for luxury items' in Dec 1999.

Fate[edit]

It was valued at $25 million at one point[7] but collapsed and its stock was sold off to Overstock.com[7] for about $2m.[7] The remains were converted to Adornis.com Limited,[3] founded on 7 September 2001.[3] That company's latest annual return was filed on 31 December 2005.[3]

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c d e "Interview: Daire O'Brien: Prepared to take the broadband picture" The Sunday Times, January 25, 2004
  2. ^ a b c d e "Ganley denies Adornis has lost all its sparkle" Archived August 22, 2008, at the Wayback Machine Sunday Business Post, Sunday, November 12, 2000
  3. ^ a b c d Details for ADORNIS.COM LIMITED, company number E0347616[permanent dead link] at UKData.com Archived 2009-02-20 at the Wayback Machine
  4. ^ "CableBulgaria:Directors". Archived from the original on March 1, 2001. Retrieved 2017-04-05.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  5. ^ a b Adornis.com, Inc. Archived 2011-10-06 at the Wayback Machine at www.list-company.com
  6. ^ a b Adornis.com, Inc. Archived 2008-04-20 at the Wayback Machine at www.jigsaw.com
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h "Selling the Ganley jewels", Irish Independent, Sunday November 19 2000
  8. ^ a b c d e "Off-line Adornis lays off top staff" Archived 2013-02-21 at archive.today 8 November 2000, by Paul Drury, from www.electricnews.net Archived 2011-05-26 at the Portuguese Web Archive
  9. ^ "The Aesthetics of Luxury" Archived 2008-12-04 at the Wayback Machine, a moderated panel discussion on 13 July 2006 Archived 10 February 2010 at the Wayback Machine, accessed via luxurycouncil.com
  10. ^ a b c d "Richemont Investments SA acquires a minority stake in Adornis.Com", Thomson Financial Mergers & Acquisitions, Dec 16, 1999, accessed via www.alacrastore.com