- Joined
- Dec 25, 2012
- Messages
- 3,488
Elliot86|1390583425|3600346 said:I have a rare opportunity to go as I am visiting a relative who works with a pro baseball team in Arizona! I am going to be on the hunt for moonstone and spinel.
Who is going and what is your mission?
Elliot86|1390656720|3600941 said:LOL I just had to report myself! My dyslexic brain spelled "Tucson" wrong. I was wondering why this thread title kept bugging me
There are over 40 venues, and most will require some form of ID. Most will want to capture your info for future marketing as well.minousbijoux|1390717163|3601360 said:So they sent you a wholesale badge? Is that how they make the distinction? Our local shows here would make you show your retail license in order to get into the Trade area, but that might just be too much at such a big show. I really don't know.
Tara,tara3056|1390805051|3601895 said:So this question might get buried in this thread, but if Roger Dery or anyone else who would know happens to read this:
My husband would like to go to the Tucson shows some year... not this year, but maybe sometime in the next couple of years? He is a lapidary, having taken up the hobby about a year ago. We have never sold anything that he's cut. The stones are usually too sentimental and, besides, he has plenty of jewelry-loving women right here in his family to gift his stones to (myself very much included!). However, as time goes on, he IS interested in beginning to sell some of his stones so he can offset the cost of the hobby and use the funds to buy more rough.
He has just applied for a state resale certificate and tax exempt cert (I'm not involved with the business-y stuff much, so I'm not sure if these are the 'official' terms). He doesn't believe he needs a federal EIN and plans to file taxes, *if* he moves forward, as a sole prop. with his SSN.
Would someone like this, who doesn't have much of a business yet, but who is definitely more "in it" than your average retail customer, be able to access interesting shows that have lots of rough available? For example, he currently buys rough from Hilmar Bosch, TMS, and New Era, among others. Would he have access to these kinds/quality of rough dealers if he were to go, or would he get stuck paying retail prices in only the large shows that are open to the public?
PrecisionGem|1390959654|3603025 said:Tara, one thing your husband will not see in Tucson is "massive amounts of rough", at least not high end faceting material. He would find material to cut, but don't think you are going to walk into a show and see booth after booth selling facet rough. Sometimes the best deals are made in the hall ways and parking lots, but these normally involve buying a parcel, not a few pieces.
Sometimes the only way to get some nice stones is to take the whole parcel. Last year there was a nice parcel of tsavorite, I'm sure Roger saw it or heard of it, but the price was a little under $100,000 and the dealer was not going to split it, or allow selection. For years I have been trying to get other's to go in on a sort of "buyers club" to purchase these kinds of things and then split them among 3 or 4 people. So far, I haven't had much luck with this.
tara3056|1391046159|3603865 said:Gene, I would have loved to see that tsavorite parcel. I bet it was pretty amazing.
Thank you for your reply and insight! Understand when I say "massive amounts of rough" that my definition is probably far different from yours LOL. We're used to getting just a handful of pieces to examine at home, maybe 15 tops at one time. Even seeing one dealer's inventory in real life would be overwhelming (and overwhelmingly cool!) for us! Take the number of stones on HB's plates, for example. That'd be insane for us to see IRL.
minousbijoux|1391020486|3603499 said:PrecisionGem|1390959654|3603025 said:Tara, one thing your husband will not see in Tucson is "massive amounts of rough", at least not high end faceting material. He would find material to cut, but don't think you are going to walk into a show and see booth after booth selling facet rough. Sometimes the best deals are made in the hall ways and parking lots, but these normally involve buying a parcel, not a few pieces.
Sometimes the only way to get some nice stones is to take the whole parcel. Last year there was a nice parcel of tsavorite, I'm sure Roger saw it or heard of it, but the price was a little under $100,000 and the dealer was not going to split it, or allow selection. For years I have been trying to get other's to go in on a sort of "buyers club" to purchase these kinds of things and then split them among 3 or 4 people. So far, I haven't had much luck with this.
Gene: in the whole parcel scenario you describe, how many kilos would that $100k parcel have been?
minousbijoux|1391117424|3604400 said:tara3056|1391046159|3603865 said:Gene, I would have loved to see that tsavorite parcel. I bet it was pretty amazing.
Thank you for your reply and insight! Understand when I say "massive amounts of rough" that my definition is probably far different from yours LOL. We're used to getting just a handful of pieces to examine at home, maybe 15 tops at one time. Even seeing one dealer's inventory in real life would be overwhelming (and overwhelmingly cool!) for us! Take the number of stones on HB's plates, for example. That'd be insane for us to see IRL.
I hope the prices are cheaper in Tucson than Bosch's though.
PrecisionGem|1391139072|3604732 said:minousbijoux|1391020486|3603499 said:PrecisionGem|1390959654|3603025 said:Tara, one thing your husband will not see in Tucson is "massive amounts of rough", at least not high end faceting material. He would find material to cut, but don't think you are going to walk into a show and see booth after booth selling facet rough. Sometimes the best deals are made in the hall ways and parking lots, but these normally involve buying a parcel, not a few pieces.
Sometimes the only way to get some nice stones is to take the whole parcel. Last year there was a nice parcel of tsavorite, I'm sure Roger saw it or heard of it, but the price was a little under $100,000 and the dealer was not going to split it, or allow selection. For years I have been trying to get other's to go in on a sort of "buyers club" to purchase these kinds of things and then split them among 3 or 4 people. So far, I haven't had much luck with this.
Gene: in the whole parcel scenario you describe, how many kilos would that $100k parcel have been?
I'm thinking it was around 300 cts. total.
Good tsavorite rough is very very very expensive the past few years.
tara3056|1391162430|3604848 said:Wow at the price on that tsav parcel... if it was 300 carats, that's about $300/carat rough and a cutter would have presumably had to sell it for $1200/carat finished (assuming 25% yield) just to break even - with no profit for their time and skill in faceting. I know top material can command big prices and good tsav (rough or cut) is only getting more expensive, but dang, this just makes the whole "things are getting scarce... prices are going up" thing really hit home! (Also makes me glad to have bought some tsavs when I did!)
$300/gram may have been feasible just a few years ago, but not now. I just spent 17 days in Africa with most of that time looking and researching fine rough. There were NO large parcels of Tsavorite rough to look at, let alone being able to buy it. Between us all, we acquired 6 pieces of Tsavorite rough, with the largest just over 2-grams.minousbijoux|1391189520|3605116 said:tara3056|1391162430|3604848 said:Wow at the price on that tsav parcel... if it was 300 carats, that's about $300/carat rough and a cutter would have presumably had to sell it for $1200/carat finished (assuming 25% yield) just to break even - with no profit for their time and skill in faceting. I know top material can command big prices and good tsav (rough or cut) is only getting more expensive, but dang, this just makes the whole "things are getting scarce... prices are going up" thing really hit home! (Also makes me glad to have bought some tsavs when I did!)
I actually think Gene might have been a little low on his estimation of the carat size of the parcel - there would have to be economies of scale in buying that much and it seems that top quality tsav is available in individual pieces of rough for less than $300 even now.
Well, there is actually 1,000 grams in a kilogram.Somewhere in the range of 300-600 cts makes far more sense - I was thinking kilos because I was thinking there were 22 grams in a kilo - some of us have challenges with our conversions Good thing I don't buy rough for a living!