San Diego jewelry makers have roots in Hawaii

By Margie M. Palmer | Downtown News

The largest indoor flower show in the world blooms in Philadelphia every March, and this year, the owners of San Diego’s Beach Glass Bingo traveled the 3,000 miles to participate.

The annual Philadelphia International Flower Show has been a tradition since 1829; since then it has evolved from a gathering of professional growers showcasing their prized plants to the largest and oldest indoor flower show in the nation. Many of the country’s premier landscape designers and florists are featured, turning the 10 acres of exhibit space into a floral fantasy world with exotic plants and designs.

Beach Glass Bingo co-owners Gene Allen and Rex Nockengust said they believe the theme of the 2012 show, “Hawaii: Islands of Aloha,” was why they were invited to participate.

“There is a marketplace that’s incorporated into the show,” Nockengust said. “When we applied [to participate], we were told there was a 10-year waiting list, but since this year’s theme was Hawaii and since we make stuff out of beach glass, we were able to get in.”

Nockengust and Allen started their business in Hawaii. “Gene and I had been living in New York before we relocated,” to the islands, Nockengust said. “When we got there we realized we were starving for artistic expression. We would go to the beach every day and started picking up beach glass. Eventually we realized that we had so much of it we should start doing something with it.”

With that, Beach Glass Bingo was born. The business partners, who are also a couple, said their venture had simple beginnings, with the two mostly making what they referred to as “surfer-dude necklaces.” As business expanded, they hired a sales representative and began attending trade shows.

As time passed, Allen said, they realized they were spending a lot of money flying to and from the mainland that moving to San Diego made sense. “We landed here in 2007 and shipped 38 flat rate boxes of beach glass with us,” he said. “We had an entire bathtub full in our studio in Hawaii. It was everywhere and we figured we’d need it.”

The couple was hopeful they’d continue to find beach glass along the San Diego coast, but quickly learned abundance was lacking. They have since hired three people in Hawaii to collect beach glass for the business.

“We’re at their mercy,” Allen said. “Many times we need pieces that are a certain shape and color in order to complete a piece of jewelry.” However, not being able to go to the store and buy materials, Allen said, forces them to be creative and “not make the same things over and over again.”

He said, “We need to use what we have.”

Beach Glass Bingo jewelry makes simple rings and earrings to intricate necklaces. Nockengust said some pieces take as little as 15 minutes to create, whereas others can take up to 15 hours, once they have the right pieces of beach glass.

“There is one necklace that we made that has nine pieces of glass,” Nockengust said. “It may take two months to find all the pieces that are just smooth enough and that are the right shape and size.”

Nockengust said while the majority of their business comes from sales at art and trade shows, they are also featured in downtown businesses. Currently, Silver Crossing, at the Seaport Village located at 823 W. Harbor Dr., carries a selection of their work. “They have been a huge support of us for a very long time,” Nockengust said.

Allen said the dynamic of working as both business partners and a couple works just fine. “We’ve been together for 21 years, and working together just really works for us,” he said. “We’re lucky that we’re able to be together 24/7.”