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How The Internet Has Changed The Diamond Industry
With the recent passing of Rockdoc, who was a pioneer of consumer advocacy for diamond and jewelry buying on the Internet, I found myself thinking today how the Internet has totally and dramatically changed the face of the diamond industry.
In this recent blog entry on Excel Diamonds, I focused on the tremendous difference in pricing between the same diamonds and jewelry sold in the stores vs. on the Internet.
However, that is certainly not the only way the Internet has changed the face of the industry.
Here are a few more:
Transparency
Full disclosure of all products and policies.
Everyone selling diamonds on the Internet lives in the proverbial "glass house". They will either earn your business with full customer support, service and actual information; or they will lose the sale to the next guy.
As a result, no longer can a store sell a diamond to a savvy consumer who found the net, by showing a diamond without proper information and attribution related to the diamonds certification, cut precision and light performance. To be sure, many consumers will still opt to purchase their diamonds and jewelry from a local jewelry store, but often only after an exhaustive on-line research and education. This has forced jewelry stores to reevaluate and adapt to the changing market, by actually selling a diamond with real info. in addition to the romance and fluff (which are important too..)
Quality
Internet websites will typically have the ability to showcase far better quality diamonds than you will find in the typical jewelery stores. These are often loose diamonds with ideal cut diamond parameters and quality grading reports (GIA and AGS Diamond Certification). This is because most Internet savvy shoppers would never touch some of the frozen spit being passed off as "diamonds" in some of the mall (a.k.a. maul..;-)) stores. Stores make more money selling inferior merchandise to the unsuspecting and uneducated consumers who care primarily about diamond size and still make up the market share of mall/jewelry store clientele.
Selection
Diamond & jewelry websites typically work off listings of wholesale diamond databases of many thousands of diamonds they do not own. This method, although not without its own problems, also gives them the ability to offer a much greater selection of loose diamonds in all shapes, sizes, colors, clarities and cut qualities.
Build Your Own Ring
Most jewelry stores will sell pre-fab or pre-set diamond engagement rings, where the customer must be satisfied with the combination of all of the important diamond variables and even the selection of the actual ring setting.
Not so with internet diamond websites, who will typically offer their clients the ability to literally build their own diamond engagement ring from scratch. The customer will first pick the loose diamond and then the perfect engagement ring setting to go along with it. The completed engagement ring is then shipped to the customer in a beautiful presentation case.
The truth of the matter, is that many traditional "brick & mortar" jewelers who have seen the "writing on the wall", so to speak; have actually embraced the age of the Internet.
They have built their own websites for their clients and will offer many of the same services and opportunities as the Internet diamond websites.
Certainly, this creates a win-win situation for the traditional jewelery stores and provides customers with a great and way to shop for diamonds and jewelry within the traditional jewelry store framework.
The Flip Side.
Not everything is always "peaches and cream" with websites selling diamonds and jewelery.
1. Not all Internet websites selling diamonds are reputable.
2. Many Internet websites never actually see the diamonds they sell. This is a BIG problem.
The bottom line, just like with anything else is that proper research should be done before buying diamonds and jewelery.
In the final analysis however, there is little doubt that the Internet has had a tremendous and positive impact upon the diamond industry and will continue to do so for many decades.
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