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custom design questions

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aneelcon

Shiny_Rock
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Dec 2, 2002
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Hi,

I cannot find a band to fit flush against my ering. The only band that works is a tiffany platinum band that costs way too much for too little platinum ($800 smackaroos). My setting is in white gold and I would prefer to have white gold since i heard about platinum wearing down other softer metals.

So I contacted J. Escobar and after several attempts of trying to get a quote or price range...I finally got one. $300-400 on a simple white band. My question is this. How often will a jeweler quote you and later give you a higher price? Is this price reasonable? I don''t want to start the process and see it''s only a couple hundred dollars less than the tiffany platinum band.

Does anyone here have a jeweler that does custom work in the bay area?

thanks again.....

tiffany.gif
 
here's the pic

tiffanyband_bent.jpg
 
Any custom work, no matter how simple, is still going to have a threshhold below which it isn't worth getting into for the jeweler.
With a very simple piece like this you find out exactly what that threshold is, and how busy their bench guy is that week. As such the quote may tend to vary more radically between different jewelers for this piece than for a more expensive one.

$300-400 is not a bad quote. Actually a very fair one for a B&M in the Bay Area. That being said you could very easily also find a quote for $200 or $600 for the same thing and it wouldn't surprise me either. Like I said, the price has very little to do with the ring itself in this case, more with the store and the week....


BTW - Did you pick this design to match your e-ring stylistically? If you wanted a design cue from the e-ring itself incorporated in it probably wouldn't cost anything extra.
 
I know I am changeing my quotes often, its seasonable, when things are slow I give people a better price than not, now is a good time to buy for a lot of jewelers as its the slow season, take advantage of it.
Walk up to a custom guy 2 days before xmas and give a 2 day deadline...heheheh, belive me I have had it happen all too often.
$300 to $400 still seems high to me for a simple white gold band, then again your going though a store, try working direcly with any number of designers, thats a fairly simple job to the right craftsman.
But what your bidding on is the time for the skilled labor to do it right, and how many middle men you want to have in the processes of getting it made.
 
I don't know what the right price is -- David and Griffin seem to have given good insight into the process above. But, if you get serious about going forward with Escobar ask for a firm quote. I've dealt with them before, and had very good results. They should be albe to give you a firm quote within some parameters I would think.
 
Thanks everyone. I just got back from a local jeweler (keepsake jewelry at the Bay St. Center in Emeryville). They just opened up in Nov so they don't have much experience at that site with custom work.

They quoted a lot less than J. Escobar...$200. The lady seemed nice and all but when I asked about some HOF stones she tried to correct me and say it's not arrows, they are fire...yeah whatever.

Anyways, I think I might go with them with that price. What kind of questions should I ask and what process should I expect?

What type of alloy? Nickel?
What experience does the bench guy have?
How many people will work on the ring?
They said it will take about a week.
What assurances can I have? Customer satisfaction? This will be my wedding band. I want it to be perfect.

sorry for all these questions. I just don't want to spend money and not be happy with the results. If I pay someone to do a job, I want it done right.

thanks everyone!
 
The price estimated already may be fair or may be a little to the high side. Truthfully, an estimate must be high enough to insure the needed profit is covered. Giving a really low estimate is miserable for the designer as the profit is too little for the time and effort. It is a no win situation, but generally getting an estimate is not saving the consumer any money. If anything, it might cost a few bucks more to get this protection on a price for a job to be done.

There is an old saying that there is no price that cannot be lowered provided the person getting the final product has no idea of what constitutes quality. A lower estimate does not make the final product identical to a more costly estimated one. It makes it for less money, but there may be a meaningful difference, too. That's why you spec out the finest details before you requerst estimates. In jewelry, this is nearly impossible. You are still buying blindly in most instances.

There is no simple solution to having a fitted ring made for the engagement ring. There are so many areas, even in this simple piece, for cost cutting to overcome good workmanship. Get a quality place to make it right the first time. Bite the bullet and don't shortchange yourself with the lowest bid. This is a ring that will last many decades. Just do it right, even if it is $100 more.
 
Thanks for the replies.

But the the store that gives me the highest quote necessarily better? It's almost like a 'pre-pricescoper' going into to Tiffanys because it's higher priced and therefore must have better diamonds. We all know that's incorrect.

My question is how can I weed out the good from the bad? what kinds of questions should I ask?

I just did a search on the white gold alloys and I think I better get Palladium versus nickel. what else do I need to be aware of?

eeks. this is a lot of work.
 
The price at this level is also dependent on how many people it will have to go through. Some stores have bench jewelers in house, some farm it out to others directly, and others still might send out all thier work through an agent - a one stop "go-to guy" for the store that sources everything from repairs to design to manufactured lines to loose diamonds, and handles all of the logistics. Sort of a concierge for managers of retail outlets who don't have the time to keep current on what turns out to be a very large rolodex of industry contacts.

While $300-400 might be a good quote for a jewelry store that doesn't make it's own jewelry, $200 might be a high price for a lone bench jeweler who owns a one man shop. It depends where you are shopping.

To give an insight into this, my agents usually add about 15% to my wholesale prices when delivering to stores. B&M's typically use triple key on most products (300% markup).
This equates to the following; $100 to agent = $115 to store = $345 to customer, say $360 with shipping.
Though it doesn't look like it, the store usually makes the smallest amount of net profit from these numbers, as they have a HUGE overhead to cover.
Inefficient, but a fact of life.

By comparison, if a lone jeweler with a small shop charges you $200, he might actually be offering more quality or product while still making out like a bandit, as he IS the source.
Without knowing more about the two stores involved, a fair quote is hard to judge. It's apples and oranges.
 
>But the the store that gives me the highest quote necessarily better? It's almost like a 'pre-pricescoper' going into to Tiffanys >because it's higher priced and therefore must have better diamonds. We all know that's incorrect.

>My question is how can I weed out the good from the bad? what kinds of questions should I ask?


BTW, no one at the retail level will tell you anything covered in the above post, how they operate, or who they operate through. There are very few direct questions you can ask that you will get a direct answer.

My best advice is play curious and ask to see how all this neat casting and stuff works. You can learn a lot, especially about the people.
Some places are more than happy to show off thier workspace and cool toys (um, I mean serious tools. um, yeah.) to prospective customers, some less so.
Some places have only a limited wax bench, many don't have workspace at all.

This can tell you a lot about the people you are operating with. One last thing. Never trust a perfectly organized and clean bench, tools, and especially floors! casting work = really scary mess. I have actually seen a "show bench". Crummy, huh?
 
Not to hijack this thread, but I just want to thank you, Griffin, David E. and David A, for offering good insight into the custom-design process. The information I have received from all of you in the last week or so has gone a long way in making me ready to proceed with custom rings made by local designer I just happened to stumble upon. After visiting his shop in Baltimore, all you have said, Griffin, is so true. The front of the shop was pristine and lovely with display cases all sparkly with beautiful jewelry. There was a large glass window with a view into the bench area that was in contrast to the front. Lots of tools and kind of messy with a few men hard at work. The owner happily showed me around and explained everything. It definitely went a loooooong way in making me comfortable with the entire process which is important when you are paying someone a lot of money for something not immediately tangible.




Thanks again,


DiamondLil
 
Ok I hope this question isn't considered a 'hijack':

Should you ask to see examples of their work?
There must be a difference between a jewelry designer and a jewelry (what?- craftsman? artisan?)
Can one of you guys with the neat toys explain your profession?
(Custom jewelry for dummies)

Thanks!
 
aneel...what's your progress? we had our ring made in aptos by a local jeweler designer there..and we like it alot..very substantial, but it was pricey (it had diamonds).




JE is a good company and I have heard they do good custom work. As you are already doing, I'd find out the questions to ask, because cheaper is not always better...just like expensive doesn't always mean quality. So I think you are on the right track. Find out what you need to ask and then go with the company who you trust.




Personally myself...I'd trust JE over some random company who sells HOF and says that HOF doesn't have arrows? Uhh okay. Are they going to play dumb about what metal goes into your ring? For another $100 or so, I'd use JE IF they fit your bill in terms of quality questions.
 
>Should you ask to see examples of their work?
>There must be a difference between a jewelry designer and a jewelry (what?- craftsman? artisan?)
>Can one of you guys with the neat toys explain your profession?
>(Custom jewelry for dummies)

It is difficult to define exact job descriptions, as there is a broad range of services and skills and many custom jewelers/designers fall across a number of them.

Some jewelers only do repairs, some add fabrication of commercially available parts and basic stone setting. Some do wax carving and will send out parts to be cast if necessary as they lack casting facilities. This actually covers the vast majority of consumer needs.

When you get into more advanced work you have any number of specialties, but most people will only need one - a goldsmith/master jeweler/etc.
A skilled goldsmith with a full shop can do almost anything he sets his mind to, including custom designs, though many would most likely take offense at being termed a designer. These guys are artisans through and through.
For most custom work, this is your best bet. If you find a good one, hold on to him, as they are all getting really old nowadays and harder to find.

What I personally do as a designer is a little outside of this, as I design not so much for individual pieces as for production. This is a different speciality entirely than making rings one at a time, with a different skill set and different high-tech toys.
When you see a store advertise thier "exclusive" bridal line, they had someone design it for them and cut the molds or masters, and work with the production facility that makes them. Whether it's a mall store or a single local B&M, someone has to do it. That would be people like me. I now also have a small production shop.

As I am quickly finding out, however, the stores that use me for whole lines are bugging me more and more over individual custom mounts. So are my freinds and relatives. Why? They can't get done what they want. Goldsmiths people have been using for years are retiring, losing thier sight, or dying. Younger folks haven't been apprenticing as often for many years now, and small corner goldsmiths have been driven out by the large B&M's. Online sales are killing them off even faster, though I can see this being the one thing that SAVES them in the end if they could just adapt to it fast enough.

Brutal fact, Goldsmiths are probably going to wind up being as common as blacksmiths or haberdashers in the next few years. I only know one goldsmith under 50 and he is 26 - with more work than he can ever handle.
I don't know how this will work itself out, if at all, but this industry is definitely in flux, and it looks like consumer choice is not going to be helped by it....
 
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