Hello everyone. I have been wanting to contribute to this thread for several months now. About a year ago I started the search for the perfect diamond for my wife, and without knowing any better I started at the Diamond Exchange jewelry chain. After stating to the sales team that I wanted a diamond around 1.5 carats I was shown a 1.5ct, E, SI2, fluorescent faint, polish and symmetry very good and dimensions of the following:
Depth: 61.4%
Table: 58%
Crown 15.6%
Pavilion: 41.7%
Culet: None
Girdle: Thin To Sl. Thick
After examining the MSRP sticker of $16,000 the store owner told me it was a steal at a little over $13,000 with an estimated replacement value of $21,000 through universal gemological services (UGS). Thank god I trusted my gut and realized I was in way over my head. I knew that I needed to go home and hit the books. And hit the books I did, for two months straight! Through research I found out about GIA, and with even more research I found out about AGS and how those two companies broke apart and why. However, I did not stop there, I wanted to know more. After countless hours of online stalking I finally came across pricescope.com, the most useful tool ever! I cannot thank everyone enough for your contributions to the diamond consumer and the science of diamond shopping. Thanks to you guys I dove in even deeper, learning the geometry and the physics or natural diamonds and the masterpieces or disasters they could become. I even utilized the Holloway cut tool to eliminate bad apples (also, I notice this is not free anymore) and Rhino's School of Rock for hours of video learning on youtube.com
Even after all this work I still did not feel like I had the leverage I needed in front of the extremely savvy sales persons, uniquely mounted lighting systems, pressure tactics, difficult to use diamond loops and the hidden diamond vault which you never knew the true contents of and how many quality stones were hiding in there.
So, I dug in even more! It was at this point that I discovered jamesallen.com. Never in a million years would I have thought of buying a diamond online, however after doing much research on the James Allen brand I found that they are indeed extremely reputable. I was going to simply buy my stone from them, utilizing their amazing 360 display software and zero pressure sales associate business model that they have. However, for some reason I continued to dig. This is perhaps the point in the story in which I truly became The Predator and the Diamond Sales teams became victim. I eventually learned that James Allen does not own the diamonds they display on their website. Rather they are displaying diamonds that are already in the marketplace through a type of mutually beneficial sales approach in which they display stones but don't have to physically hold the inventory (Essentially the diamond version of the MLS system for buying a house) After finding the perfect stone on their site I leveraged this information with my local jewelry store and insisted that they produce the stone and beat the price where I was going to buy online. So after months of work this is my result:
Round Brilliant
AGS: Ideal Cut
Light: 0
Polish: 0
Symmetry: 0
Color: H
Clarity: VVS2
Weight: 1.57
Dimensions:
Depth: 61.5%
Table: 55.6%
Crown: 34.5
Pavilion Angle: 40.8
Imperfections - See link and certificate (too good to be true).
https://www.jamesallen.com/mobile/l...color-vvs2-clarity-true-hearts-cut-sku-697051
Price - $13,000 (Even cheaper than James Allen listing, which I was able to accomplish by committing to a Tacori setting whose markups are high however nonnegotiable (similar to Apple products price/brand protection pricing model).
So I am dying to get feedback on my story and my journey to the perfect stone! Does everyone think I managed to get the purchase of a lifetime or have I oversold this experience a bit?
Depth: 61.4%
Table: 58%
Crown 15.6%
Pavilion: 41.7%
Culet: None
Girdle: Thin To Sl. Thick
After examining the MSRP sticker of $16,000 the store owner told me it was a steal at a little over $13,000 with an estimated replacement value of $21,000 through universal gemological services (UGS). Thank god I trusted my gut and realized I was in way over my head. I knew that I needed to go home and hit the books. And hit the books I did, for two months straight! Through research I found out about GIA, and with even more research I found out about AGS and how those two companies broke apart and why. However, I did not stop there, I wanted to know more. After countless hours of online stalking I finally came across pricescope.com, the most useful tool ever! I cannot thank everyone enough for your contributions to the diamond consumer and the science of diamond shopping. Thanks to you guys I dove in even deeper, learning the geometry and the physics or natural diamonds and the masterpieces or disasters they could become. I even utilized the Holloway cut tool to eliminate bad apples (also, I notice this is not free anymore) and Rhino's School of Rock for hours of video learning on youtube.com
Even after all this work I still did not feel like I had the leverage I needed in front of the extremely savvy sales persons, uniquely mounted lighting systems, pressure tactics, difficult to use diamond loops and the hidden diamond vault which you never knew the true contents of and how many quality stones were hiding in there.
So, I dug in even more! It was at this point that I discovered jamesallen.com. Never in a million years would I have thought of buying a diamond online, however after doing much research on the James Allen brand I found that they are indeed extremely reputable. I was going to simply buy my stone from them, utilizing their amazing 360 display software and zero pressure sales associate business model that they have. However, for some reason I continued to dig. This is perhaps the point in the story in which I truly became The Predator and the Diamond Sales teams became victim. I eventually learned that James Allen does not own the diamonds they display on their website. Rather they are displaying diamonds that are already in the marketplace through a type of mutually beneficial sales approach in which they display stones but don't have to physically hold the inventory (Essentially the diamond version of the MLS system for buying a house) After finding the perfect stone on their site I leveraged this information with my local jewelry store and insisted that they produce the stone and beat the price where I was going to buy online. So after months of work this is my result:
Round Brilliant
AGS: Ideal Cut
Light: 0
Polish: 0
Symmetry: 0
Color: H
Clarity: VVS2
Weight: 1.57
Dimensions:
Depth: 61.5%
Table: 55.6%
Crown: 34.5
Pavilion Angle: 40.8
Imperfections - See link and certificate (too good to be true).
https://www.jamesallen.com/mobile/l...color-vvs2-clarity-true-hearts-cut-sku-697051
Price - $13,000 (Even cheaper than James Allen listing, which I was able to accomplish by committing to a Tacori setting whose markups are high however nonnegotiable (similar to Apple products price/brand protection pricing model).
So I am dying to get feedback on my story and my journey to the perfect stone! Does everyone think I managed to get the purchase of a lifetime or have I oversold this experience a bit?
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