Conflict Diamonds...a little reassurance please.....

[flowerladytoo]

Hi
I am pretty new to pricescope and have been reading and trying to learn for a few weeks now. Hubby and I have been visiting jewelers to look at halos....I want to get a good idea of the style I like before we take that plunge.

A couple weekends ago we went mall crawling. Visited probably 20 or more jewelers in and around Mall of America over a couple days. Boy were our eyes opened. The diamonds were, to put it mildly, mostly garbage, and nice halo rings were few and far between, and semi mounts pretty much non existent. When I asked about GIA certs etc, most places only had IGI (I think it was IGI). I was told IGI was superior to GIA, and I KNOW that is not true! Plus my eyes told me these diamonds were not good, many had black carbon visible, even the ones that were graded VS-2. Yuck!

I asked two salespeople at two different stores why they had so many I-1 or below diamonds...and so few SI or VS or above. Both gave me basically the same reply. I was told that the reason it''s hard to find VS or better diamonds in their stores is because they refuse to buy conflict diamonds...and if a diamond is a VS or better the chances are VERY HIGH that it is a conflict diamond. When I mentioned I had found a couple of really good internet vendors that have high quality stones, one of the salespeople got really huffy. She told us if we bought from those dealers, we would be contributing to the bloodshed caused from the sale of conflict diamonds. She then tried to talk us into buying a Leo Diamond. On the surface, this claim seems ludicrous. Why on earth would vendors like WF and GOG do that? From what I have read on here, both seem to be highly regarded and have good diamonds and strive to make their customers happy. It''s still bothering me though, after nearly 2 weeks, so I would like to hear others ideas on this. Oh the two stores are *sister* stores, so I wonder if this is what they teach their sales associates.

 

[Dancing Fire]

Date: 11/11/2008 1:58:35 AM
Author:flowerladytoo
Hi
I am pretty new to pricescope and have been reading and trying to learn for a few weeks now. Hubby and I have been visiting jewelers to look at halos....I want to get a good idea of the style I like before we take that plunge.

A couple weekends ago we went mall crawling. Visited probably 20 or more jewelers in and around Mall of America over a couple days. Boy were our eyes opened. The diamonds were, to put it mildly, mostly garbage, and nice halo rings were few and far between, and semi mounts pretty much non existent. When I asked about GIA certs etc, most places only had IGI (I think it was IGI). I was told IGI was superior to GIA, and I KNOW that is not true! Plus my eyes told me these diamonds were not good, many had black carbon visible, even the ones that were graded VS-2. Yuck!

I asked two salespeople at two different stores why they had so many I-1 or below diamonds...and so few SI or VS or above. Both gave me basically the same reply. I was told that the reason it''s hard to find VS or better diamonds in their stores is because they refuse to buy conflict diamonds...and if a diamond is a VS or better the chances are VERY HIGH that it is a conflict diamond. When I mentioned I had found a couple of really good internet vendors that have high quality stones, one of the salespeople got really huffy. She told us if we bought from those dealers, we would be contributing to the bloodshed caused from the sale of conflict diamonds. She then tried to talk us into buying a Leo Diamond. On the surface, this claim seems ludicrous. Why on earth would vendors like WF and GOG do that? From what I have read on here, both seem to be highly regarded and have good diamonds and strive to make their customers happy. It''s still bothering me though, after nearly 2 weeks, so I would like to hear others ideas on this. Oh the two stores are *sister* stores, so I wonder if this is what they teach their sales associates.

they''re feeding you a bunch of

 

[flowerladytoo]

LOL love the BS meter. It did seem like bull to us.

I thought it was illegal to bring conflict diamonds into the US to sell and what they said seems absurd. I didn''t realize until we got home and I did a little research that the two stores that claimed this were related.
I know this much...when we are ready to buy, I will ask advice here, and use a Pricescope vendor. I''m sure there have to be some decent places to diamond shop in the Twin Cities area, but so far we haven''t found them! My ultimate desire is to have modest sized antique cushion in a halo setting...and I was told by the same sales associate that scolded us, that they were out of vogue and trendy...and a Leo would sparkle SOOO much better and not go out of style like a cushion would! For some reason...I wasn''t deterred

 

[Paul-Antwerp]

I thought that we heard about every mall-horror-story by now, but this one beats all the previous ones, I think. Including the one where the saleslady claimed that ''Nil Fluorescence'' meant that the diamond was mined near the river Nile.

Imagine this, all diamonds are mined in various clarities, ranging from very clean down to industrial grade, with a majority of industrial diamonds coming out of the ground. And this saleslady claims that only the high clarities end up in the very few diamond conflict-areas still remaining. Does this also cover the rough diamonds where the inclusion is on the side, and the cutter carefully keeps that inclusion out of the stone and produces an IF?

It is truly sad to see how badly trained these ''professionals'' are?

Live long,

 

[arjunajane]

Oh dear me ....

Such a shame that your average joe the plumber will swollow this swill too..

 

[Regular Guy]

I suppose it''s whoever that carries the Leo diamond that told you this...so by way of that comment, you''ve already shared who said this. But I regard this as very bad practice...I''m trying to think of the legal word, but it''s failing me right now. Oh yes...slanderous. If you get the sales person''s name, and you want to mention the town...I don''t know why you wouldn''t want to put it here.

Obviously, I believe clarity and location issues to not be relevant to whether it''s a conflict diamond. I understand 95 - 99.9% are not, based on the Kimberly process, which covers all diamonds available through licensed vendors.

Sorry for your experience.

 

[girlie-girl]

Wow. Talk about telling flat out lies just trying to make a sale... I'm not even sure how to respond other than agreeing with RG that you should post up all the information on this sales associate and the store. LOL

I did go over to Whiteflash and found this page that talks about Conflict Diamonds and their policies etc. I also found this page on JamesAllen regarding their Confict Diamond policy. The other vendors most likely have statements such as these as well, but I had come across both of these pages recently and so they were the easiest to reference.

I hope this helps ease your mind.

 

[denverappraiser]

This is preposterous. Slanderous is a good word.

Just to be clear. EVERY diamond legally imported and sold in the US since 2002 has been conflict free. Similar laws are in place in every country in Europe, Canada, Japan and pretty much anywhere else in the world as well. Back alleys in Congo and Cuba may not be the best place to be buying a diamond if you’re concerned about the provenance but, frankly, there are other problems with this as well. The problem of ‘conflict diamonds’ has not been completely solved and there are some complicated dynamics at play but you can’t recognize a stolen diamond (which is fundamentally what conflict diamonds are) by its clarity, color, size etc. This contention is silly on it’s face and it tells you far more about the dealer using the argument than it does about diamonds.

Neil Beaty
GG(GIA) ICGA(AGS) NAJA
Professional Appraisals in Denver

 

[flowerladytoo]

I figured it was garbage, but I am certainly glad to hear that affirmed! We visited three different stores that had the *Leo* diamonds. Gosh they really push those things.

I wish I had gotten that salesperson''s name. I thought until we went halo shopping that only one store carried Leo''s.....Kays, and they did. We never even talked to a salesperson at Kay''s though because they were just plain unhelpful. We just looked in their cases because the sales associates didn''t want to give us the time of day. There were two other jewelers we visited that carried Leo''s and were running *specials* the day we came in. It was one of those stores that this obnoxious woman was at. One of the other stores recommended we visit Jarad''s because they carry VS quality or better diamonds and more semi mounts, but we didn''t follow up. After all the hassle with the b&m stores, we are sure we will buy online.

 

[purrfectpear]

Of course the entire story was BS, but seriously...lack of common sense?

Why in the world would diamond mines only sweat blood over good stones? So frozen spit is conflict free

I suspect the same amount of effort goes into taking out industrial, commercial and fine grade rough. It''s after it''s been sorted that difference in handling starts.

I thought I''d heard it all, but this really takes the prize

 

[Upgradable]

Knox Jewelers is in the Twin Cities and does beautiful work at reasonable prices. You can search Pricescope and get some good reviews. I''ll bet Brian would laugh at what you were told too! Good luck with a good vendor!!

 

[coatimundi_org]

Date: 11/11/2008 1:58:35 AM
Author:flowerladytoo
I was told that the reason it''s hard to find VS or better diamonds in their stores is because they refuse to buy conflict diamonds...and if a diamond is a VS or better the chances are VERY HIGH that it is a conflict diamond.

They might want to take that up with the Canadians.

I''ve never heard such crazy talk.