He sent me an email last Friday, I mulled it over, and I responded back with this yesterday.
"Thanks for reaching out. I appreciate your straight forward nature.
First, I am sorry that I didn’t communicate clearly that I still had the ring. I forgot that you knew that I was actively trying to sell it. It didn’t even cross my mind that you didn’t know that I had the ring. I’ve had so many conversations about this ring between My Lady and I, and friends that they all kind of blend into one. My lady echoes your frustration about that aspect of my communication, or lack thereof, so you are not alone.
I think in my mind when I asked about the trade-in policy when I purchased the earrings, I was thinking of the ring, and you were thinking of the earrings. Also, in all of our discussions, I never knew about the “twice the value” part of the trade in. I would have remembered that because at the time for me a 7k ring was a lot, so then me would have never thought now me would by a 5 figure ring.
I understand that your policy is consistent and the same across the industry. I think you have always shot straight with me.
I am mostly just disappointed for the following reasons:
1.Getting only 2,700 dollars for my ring means I wouldn’t have gotten as aggressive a price for the ring at a 7,000 dollar trade in value. I don’t think this is unique to your shop, I suspect this happens industry wide. From our conversation, my understanding was that you make a little less on the trade-in, when you resell it, and the value to your shop is the relationship. I understand that there may be other factors such as how aggressive your pricing was, but it appears that I’m getting trade-in value for the diamond. I know this because I priced trading it in.
2.Speaking of relationships. I felt like you and your dad treated me and my dad fairly the first time around. Being in sales, I understand what it feels like when people shop your number or beat you down on price when you know they want to go through you anyways. In fact, while I was shopping for earrings I found a pair of comparable stones for 50 dollars less. I liked yours better, and to honor what I felt was a budding relationship, I actively chose not to beat you down on price because I felt you had given me your best price, and I wanted your earrings more anyways. Given that, I felt a little disappointed that you got aggressive with pricing because I was “shopping around” rather than because we were “building a long term relationship”. Maybe that was just word choice. I was shopping to get ideas and so that I could understand what the market looked like today. I did that so I could feel good that I was getting a good price from you so I didn’t need to push you on price to see where we were at.
3.Lastly, had I known all of this going in, I would have sold the diamond to a friend who would have bought I, but whose budget was $5,000. Naively thinking I would get full value for trade-in, I held out. I know you need to make money on each transaction to feed your families and keep the lights on, but if I had all the information, instead of the slight of hand the industry plays I would have been a lot better off. That is disappointing."
"Thanks for reaching out. I appreciate your straight forward nature.
First, I am sorry that I didn’t communicate clearly that I still had the ring. I forgot that you knew that I was actively trying to sell it. It didn’t even cross my mind that you didn’t know that I had the ring. I’ve had so many conversations about this ring between My Lady and I, and friends that they all kind of blend into one. My lady echoes your frustration about that aspect of my communication, or lack thereof, so you are not alone.
I think in my mind when I asked about the trade-in policy when I purchased the earrings, I was thinking of the ring, and you were thinking of the earrings. Also, in all of our discussions, I never knew about the “twice the value” part of the trade in. I would have remembered that because at the time for me a 7k ring was a lot, so then me would have never thought now me would by a 5 figure ring.
I understand that your policy is consistent and the same across the industry. I think you have always shot straight with me.
I am mostly just disappointed for the following reasons:
1.Getting only 2,700 dollars for my ring means I wouldn’t have gotten as aggressive a price for the ring at a 7,000 dollar trade in value. I don’t think this is unique to your shop, I suspect this happens industry wide. From our conversation, my understanding was that you make a little less on the trade-in, when you resell it, and the value to your shop is the relationship. I understand that there may be other factors such as how aggressive your pricing was, but it appears that I’m getting trade-in value for the diamond. I know this because I priced trading it in.
2.Speaking of relationships. I felt like you and your dad treated me and my dad fairly the first time around. Being in sales, I understand what it feels like when people shop your number or beat you down on price when you know they want to go through you anyways. In fact, while I was shopping for earrings I found a pair of comparable stones for 50 dollars less. I liked yours better, and to honor what I felt was a budding relationship, I actively chose not to beat you down on price because I felt you had given me your best price, and I wanted your earrings more anyways. Given that, I felt a little disappointed that you got aggressive with pricing because I was “shopping around” rather than because we were “building a long term relationship”. Maybe that was just word choice. I was shopping to get ideas and so that I could understand what the market looked like today. I did that so I could feel good that I was getting a good price from you so I didn’t need to push you on price to see where we were at.
3.Lastly, had I known all of this going in, I would have sold the diamond to a friend who would have bought I, but whose budget was $5,000. Naively thinking I would get full value for trade-in, I held out. I know you need to make money on each transaction to feed your families and keep the lights on, but if I had all the information, instead of the slight of hand the industry plays I would have been a lot better off. That is disappointing."
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