Why is Solomon Brothers Diamond significantly cheaper?

[FitMi]

So I've been using pricescope to search for .73-.74 stones for my studs. Solomon Brothers is asking for $1892 which is much less than what ID Jewelry is asking for. Keep in mind, the specs are GIA cert, excellent cut, SI2, G color, excellent polish, very good symmetry.. ID jewelry is asking for about $600 more for similar specs..why is there such a difference?

 

[artdecolover71]

are you saying it is the same gia number? or no?
is there florescence in one stone? are all specs truly exactly the same? if so, maybe because NY overhead is higher?
I am sure the PS experts here will chime in!

 

[LaraOnline]

Each stone is priced individually within the grading levels.
Although stones are graded, they are not identical.
They are graded within a range, and the overall quality of the stone is reflected in the price charged by the wholesaler.
So to be really sure that a particular merchant is pricing stones more cheaply, you would need to price an individual stone.
Personally, I would prefer to pay a little more and go with a merchant I trust, and would feel happy to work with again, going forward.

 

[FitMi]

are you saying it is the same gia number? or no?
is there florescence in one stone? are all specs truly exactly the same? if so, maybe because NY overhead is higher?
I am sure the PS experts here will chime in!

I mean the same as in specs. The specs for solomon brothers appears to be slightly better. I will post thelink in a few min.

 

[TC1987]

What the cutter does with the proportions and the minor facets affects the appearance. Even though they have the "same" specs on paper, there might be something about the character of an individual stone that makes it really outstanding or perhaps, at the other end of the spectrum, a bit dark, or bland, or lacking fire or scintillation. Appearance affects pricing. You get what you pay for. Cutters and vendors know what they have. LOL

Also, on clarity, clouds throughout the stone will adversely affect performance. So read clarity descriptions carefully to see what is setting the grade.

 

[FitMi]

https://www.pricescope.com/diamond-search-results

let me know if you can see the comparison..

 

[Laila619]

I've noticed B2C Jewels and Solomon Bros both seem to have the lowest prices. Also, Ritani has excellent prices on diamonds too believe it or not. Significantly cheaper than James Allen or ID Jewelry when I was shopping.

 

[WinkHPD]

So I've been using pricescope to search for .73-.74 stones for my studs. Solomon Brothers is asking for $1892 which is much less than what ID Jewelry is asking for. Keep in mind, the specs are GIA cert, excellent cut, SI2, G color, excellent polish, very good symmetry.. ID jewelry is asking for about $600 more for similar specs..why is there such a difference?

Interesting question, lots of answers to it.

First lets look at available diamonds currently on the listing of a popular lister of all things diamond. Looking only at .73 - .74cts G-SI2 with GIA XXX.

There are, at the moment in time that I searched, seventy-two diamonds with those exact parameters. G-SI2 GIA XXX. When I add in Very good for symmetry and polish there are a total of eighty-five. Without a doubt, if I knew the cert number of the diamonds that you are looking at, they would be in this list. How do I know that you ask? Because dealers X and Y and many other diamond vendors on the net are primarily drop shippers. When you order the diamond from them they call up the diamond's owner and have it shipped directly to the client without ever seeing it or offering any advice about how the diamond looks except for possibly calling up the owner and asking. They commonly download the entire list of available diamonds and show them on their sites, allowing them to list tens of thousands of diamonds that they have never seen.

Going back to only the GIA XXX diamonds, with seventy-two to choose from how do you choose?

Is it only price? If so, good luck, and oh, by the way, you deserve what you get. Relying on GIA XXX is a joke. For what it is worth the spread between the bottom priced diamond and the top priced diamond, which are all equal on paper, is $1,092 at dealer cost.

Is it cut? Bring your spread sheet and some serious time to start analyzing diamonds. You are only getting rounded figures from the GIA reports, so even your best analysis will be a close estimation.

Is it by looking? Well, sure, it should be, but sorry, you can't. You are dealing with a drop shipper who only has some one else send you the diamond, and the one that they will ask will be the one that owns the diamonds, so probably no bias there?

So, back to your original question, why is X vendor more than Y vendor? Hard to say. You could be looking at two different stones and X vendor may actually be using the same or lower mark up for its stone than vendor Y, but unless it is the same diamond you just don't know.

I once sold a diamond on a Friday and had my client call me demanding a discount on Monday because he found it $400 cheaper on another site. I called the owner of the diamond and asked why so and so was listing it after it had been sold to me two weeks earlier. The owner was livid when I told him who the lister was. "I don't even sell to him, he is too slow to pay." It turns out this other vendor was listing diamonds he could not get at ridicules prices so that he could then direct his customers to another diamond because that particular one, that he did not have access to, was sold. My client did not like any of the alternatives offered to him and ended up keeping the diamond, especially since I told him truthfully that I owned that diamond and that he could find it any where he wanted to, but he could only buy it from me. It was a perfectly square princess with exactly the same length and width, very rare to actually find.

Long way to go to give you a partial answer, based on differing costs for the original diamond rather than grades on paper. THE GIA X grade is simply too wide and varied to allow us to know for sure why the diamond is more expensive. Some wholesale vendors will want higher markups, some will only sell better cuts, some will sell only cheap junk, and we have no way to know from which of these wholesalers that Dealer X and Dealer Y are listing the stones for. Chances are, if you search both sites you might find the same stone on both sites, but chances are you will not.

The truth of the matter is that GIA X simply does not mean anything about the expenses of the various cutters as they cut the various diamonds. Those who cut them better will almost always need to charge more for the finished diamonds because they cost more to make. Those who cut corners can sell them cheaper, but when you get down to detailed analysis, those diamonds rarely look as those whose cuts are done more deliberately.

If this is your one diamond purchase and you only care about whether or not it is "good enough" then you are the target market for the lower priced diamonds. If you care, then you are going to need to deal with someone who also cares, there are many here on Pricescope, but those diamonds are going to cost more than buying one from those who don't.

Wink

 

[MarionC]

This has long been a question of mine. Personally I stick with the vendor I trust and feel has given me great service, but the question has come up.
USACert often lists the same GIA stone for significantly less than other vendors.

 

[WinkHPD]

This has long been a question of mine. Personally I stick with the vendor I trust and feel has given me great service, but the question has come up.
USACert often lists the same GIA stone for significantly less than other vendors.

Service.

If you never have to look at the stone, you can sell it for a few % over cost and only have the owner send the diamond when you have been paid. You do not pay to ship it in so you can inspect it, or to send it back if it is not chosen. If you want to sell them for cost plus 5% or 8% or even as one short lived vendor did for $200 over cost you can. (Three guesses why the last one was so short lived, first two don't count. One bad experience and you are gone!)

If you bring in every stone, take photos, make a video, spend hours on the phone with a client, well it just costs more.

Wink

 

[hawk25]

Just to add, a few vendors (Good Old Gold comes to mind) were forced to require a small deposit to call in and analyse a stone (photography, ASET/IS images, etc) due to people asking for all these extra services, and then buying the stone from a drop shipper that sells the same stone for less.

I'm all for saving money, but to current and future diamond shoppers out there, please don't waste the time and money of vendors who provide these extra services so you can save a few dollars. Beyond the unethical nature of it, in the long run you'll be making it harder and more expensive for those who do want to shop at those vendors.

 

[MarionC]

This has long been a question of mine. Personally I stick with the vendor I trust and feel has given me great service, but the question has come up.
USACert often lists the same GIA stone for significantly less than other vendors.

Service.

If you never have to look at the stone, you can sell it for a few % over cost and only have the owner send the diamond when you have been paid. You do not pay to ship it in so you can inspect it, or to send it back if it is not chosen. If you want to sell them for cost plus 5% or 8% or even as one short lived vendor did for $200 over cost you can. (Three guesses why the last one was so short lived, first two don't count. One bad experience and you are gone!)

If you bring in every stone, take photos, make a video, spend hours on the phone with a client, well it just costs more.

Wink

and it IS well worth it, in my opinion. I noticed also that USA only gives you 7 days to look at a stone, then if you want to return it you pay to ship/insure. To be able to live with a diamond for a month or so to really get to know it is kinda priceless.
Thanks, Wink, for resolving any slight qualms I may have had.

 

[JulieN]

Try asking them for a picture.

 

[spicyitalian]

The price variations often have to do with the level of extra services the vendors provide.

 

[Candygrl]

If the stones are GIA IDJ will sometimes price match. Worth a try

 

[TC1987]

Try getting USA Certed to answer or return a phone call!

 

[denverappraiser]

I really like Wink’s answer above but I would like to add that the same thing happens at the next level up too. That is to say, the dealer you are shopping with isn’t the only value-add in the chain. Each cutter prices each stone they’re selling individually. Some are more of a pain to work with than others. They ship slowly, they have annoying payment terms, they list stones that don’t exist, they lie about the grading and so on. It’s just like any other marketplace. The cheapest price may mean the best deal, it may mean you didn’t ask the right questions and it may just mean the biggest liar. Some of the troubles you can have with sellers are actually coming from this level and one of the valuable things your jeweler is doing is choosing and working with their partner well. You don’t know these people, they do (well, they might). It goes a long way to making this a painless transaction. Buying from the guy who will work the cheapest and who is buying from the supplier who quote the lowest price on a particular spec does occasionally work but it *IS* sort of asking for trouble.

Solomon Bros is a reputable company. They’re in the niche of navigating this with you. They have a good return policy and if you’re unhappy for any reason they’re good at honoring it. They aren’t getting much support from their supplier so they can’t pass that support on to you. As you point out, that space where the cheapest prices are and if you don’t much care about the differences or you simply do it yourself by hiring the right appraiser and by being prepared to have several stones looked at, it is possible to get a deal that way.

 

[ChristineRose]

I'd also like to point out that there are some jewelers who will not sell you a stone without a setting, or will charge a fee if you buy a stone without a setting, or will generally try to make you feel bad if you buy a stone without a setting.

Diamonds prices are pretty much set from the retail vendors point of view so a lot of them play with pricing strategies. They attract different sorts of buyers and hopefully manage to make a fair profit in whatever market they are in.

By the way, I did your search on Solomon Brothers' own website and prices ranged from $1991 to $2987. I'm guessing you are looking at the worst diamond on Solomon Brothers' list.