Hopefull Off Topic is the right place for this, Looking at prices of diamonds these days I'm trying to remember either an article or a book that I read a few years back. It was referring to (as I recall) not one of but the best and most sucessful marketing strategy even executed. It basically laid out the facts about diamond availability and how DeBeers (I think) led the way in proclaiming the scarcity of diamonds, in turn increasing the hell of the market value. Truth to this? I'm trying to find the article or book that I read this, I found it very interesting. I feel like this should be in Politics........hehe Josh
Its absolutely true. DeBeers has a virtual lock on diamond distribution and production in this country and most of the world. The prices of diamonds are kept much higher than the laws of supply/demand would keep them at. Their biggest worries these days are synthetic diamonds. Thats why there has been a big push towards putting down synthetics and claiming they are inferior, when actually they are probably superior from a look and quality standpoint. DeBeers was going after the "produced millions of years ago by mother nature, not last week in a lab by Sergei" angle. If you look more into the DeBeers racket you will see how amazingly successful they have been at creating and owning a market and a monopoly.
DeBeers I a very influential force in daimonds, but they are not what they once were. They still employ the worlds largest security force. Diamonds are coming from many places of the world now. Canada and Russia are producing many fine stones. In fact, a Russian in the business (can't remember his name) is trying to mobilize the govs and people in Africa to get more control of their diamond stock. Our store has many fine diamonds, but we don't have any from DeBeers. I think DeBeers is a very fine jeweler. I saw their Amsterdam facility and was very impressed. As for natural versus synthetic, I look at it the same way I look at a real Rolex and a fake. To each his own though.
I have to take issue with that statement. A real and fake rolex is completely different. One is an original design, made by a group of people who are craftsmen. Another is a knockoff that is not equal in function or quality to the original. In diamonds, tremendous pressure crushes carbon into diamonds. Whether that happens in the ground years ago or last week in a lab doesn't make a bit of difference to what you end up with. And actually, lab conditions can be controlled such that recently made diamonds are BETTER in quality than natural diamonds. To me, it's sort of like someone saying "yeah you can buy that new fangled synthetic oil, but it's just like buying a fake rolex, it's not the real thing". On the other hand, I can see why jewelers prefer "real" diamonds... I'd rather make 10% on a $20k sale than 10% on a $3k sale any day!
I thought it was 30-50%. This would seem to correlate with Costco selling theirs for 1/2 the appraisal value.
I wish I made 10% on my diamond sales. I'd have a Ferrari now instead of my 350z. (still love the z though).
When you guys talk about synthetic diamonds, we're talking about 100% carbon here, right? Nothing with Zirconium (not as strong as diamond, but very strong)? Hah, I go to UF, too, and have a 350Z (LeMans Sunset).
Kinda along the lines that I was thinking too, and yet the ingenious marketing done by larger companies as DeBeers is holding that fact out of the eye of the buying public more than it should, maybe. And I'm also talking about keeping Zirconium out of the picture, a REAL diamond, made from pure carbon (not sure how thats done) under pressure in a controlled enviroment. I don't really see a problem with that. Except that maybe there are no other "precious and rare" stones out there to take the place of diamonds.
