How is the value of a diamond measured?
Hi Danny, can you tell me whether there is any truth to the common belief that online diamond dealers work off of smaller mark-ups than traditional retail jewelry stores? I’m seriously considering buying this 2.35 carat, I-color, SI-1 clarity, round diamond from Brian Gavin, but how do I know that I’m getting the best deal? While shopping for diamonds online, I found several sites which were offering the same diamond, but all at different prices… it doesn’t exactly instill confidence when it comes to knowing that I’m getting the best price! Can you tell me how the value of diamonds is measured? And would you choose this diamond? – Carl M.
Why do jewelry stores have different mark-ups?
It can be difficult to feel like you are paying a fair price for a diamond, and getting the best deal, when you see the same diamond being offered by several different jewelry stores and internet diamond dealers for different prices. It definitely pays to be a smart shopper and conduct your due diligence and research the factors that contribute to diamond prices prior to completing a purchase.
While it stands to reason that factors of diamond grading, such as diamond carat weight, diamond color, diamond clarity, and diamond cut quality, can affect the price of a diamond; there are hidden factors which can contribute to the price that a vendor charges for a diamond, including whether they are a manufacturer or a reseller of diamonds, and whether they buy diamonds for inventory, or bring them in on memo (credit) in hopes of selling them.
And of course, some online diamond vendors hope to sell diamonds based solely on price, without adding anything in terms of value, by simply listing the diamonds which appear in the international diamond database, at various mark-ups, it’s kind of like fishing… they throw out a list of diamonds, wait for customers to bite, and then have their supplier drop ship the diamond to their customers, and hope for the best.
We heard of a guy who ordered a $65,000.00 diamond from one of those companies last month, only to discover when he opened the box, that their supplier had shipped the wrong diamond; and by the time the mistake had been discovered, the diamond which he ordered had been sold to another customer by the diamond wholesaler. Talk about a bummer… and this is just the sort of thing that retail jewelers try to use to scare their customers out of thinking about buying a diamond online.
What retail jewelers don’t talk about with their customers, is the measures that vendors like Brian Gavin Diamonds goes to in an effort to ensure that our customers have an amazing experience while buying a diamond online, nor do they seem to have a valid explanation as to why we can sell diamonds of such incredible cut quality for a fraction of the prices which they charge for diamonds of similar description.
Why a Brian Gavin Signature Diamond is The Best Deal:
There are a lot of ways to measure the value of a diamond, and ensure that you are getting the best deal on a diamond, the easiest of course is to buy the diamond direct from the source, and the fact is that Brian Gavin Signature and Brian Gavin Blue diamonds are not available anywhere else… thus you can rest assured that you’re paying the lowest price possible for the 2.354 carat, I-color, SI-1 clarity, Brian Gavin Signature round diamond, because we’re the only vendor capable of selling the diamond.
But more important than that, is the fact that every Brian Gavin Signature diamond is manufactured to deliver the highest volume of light return, and the best sparkle factor! One of our clients recently told us that she’s positive that her diamond sparkles in the dark, and that didn’t completely surprise us, because it just means that the diamond is reflecting the little bit of light that is available to it in a room which is practically devoid of light… it’s the test of a diamond which is cut to the incredible standards demanded by Brian Gavin for the production which bears his signature.
And of course, the easiest way to determine whether diamonds offered by other companies are truly “comparable” to the super ideal cut diamonds produced by Brian Gavin, is to compare the characteristics of the diamond side-by-side, beginning with the proportions, the overall cut grade of AGS Ideal-0 on the Light Performance grading platform, the degree of brightness exhibited by the diamond in the ASET scan, the lack of light leakage indicated by the Ideal Scope image, and last but not least, the precision of the hearts and arrows pattern which results from exceptional optical symmetry. Brian Gavin provides all of the images you need to make an accurate comparison.
