Synthetic & Simulant Gem Nomenclature

Jewelry Discussion
21

Let me see if I get this corrrect:

Natural Corundum (which is aluminum oxide) is natural because it is
dug from the earth regardless of treatment.

Synthetic Corundum (which is aluminum oxide) is not natural because
it is dug from the earth and treated.

Is one more valuable than the other - absolutely since value is a
function of availability. Is one better than the other - depends on
what is meant by better.

Is it the MORAL DUTY of a jeweler to always present a "natural"
stone to a customer first? If the definition of moral is "ethical"
and you are adhering to the ethics of the Trade, the answer is yes.
Personally if I enter a shop and ask for something and the proprietor
tries to sell me the most expensive item without giving me my options
(or at least inquiring about what I am looking for), I am liable to
leave and go somewhere else.

Is the general public less educated than the average jeweler? When
it comes to jewelry the answer is yes. Is it the responsibility of
the jeweler to re-educate the public? This is a difficult question to
answer. If re-educate is explaining the options and differences -
then probably yes. If re-educate is changing the mind of the customer

  • then probably not. Each side of a transaction has specific
    functions and obligations to perform during the process. The customer
    needs to clearly relate what they want - the seller needs to listen
    to the wants, evaluate them and offer products to the customer that
    meet the wants he/she has expressed.

Business has a tendency to forget that the customer is what keeps
them in business. A couple of examples come to mind of where business
has done things to take advantage of the customer. The first is
coffee - when wqas the last time you saw a 16 ounce can of coffee? It
used to always come in a 1 pound can - not the same can is as low as
11 ounces yet the price was not reduced (when the first size
reduction took place, the explanation was that the grind required
less coffee to produce the same strenght). The second is happening
now (and has been for about a year) - ice cream. This has
traditionally come in half-gallons - 64 ounces. Now the same
containers are 56 ounces yet the price is the same or higher (I want
to see this one explained that the ice cream requires less for the
same satisfaction level).

A business should (in my opinion) always strive to be honest and
clear about what they are selling. Sadly this is not the case with
many in business today - and it is usually not small businesses that
attempt to fool the customer. How many times have you seen an ad on
TV that make spectacular promises the flashes a huge disclaimer on
the screen in tiny type for just a few seconds? Have you shopped at
Safeway recently and seen the signs about their "Ranchers Reserve"
beef that says “aged to perfection”? In truth only selected cuts are
aged - and then for 4 days - the rest is Cryo-Pack; vacuum seald and
flash frozen while still warm. I am sure all of you can think of
examples as well.

I miss the “good old days” when the customer was always right and
high-pressure was reserved for Insurance and auto salesmen.

Glenn Vaughn

22 
The problem people are having is that may synthetics are exactly
the same as their natural counterpart chemically and optically.
However, synthetic/simulant/man-made/created/lab are all the same
and not natural. Natural is dug from the ground, period. Doesn't
matter if it's been treated, still came from the ground.

In order for it to be a synthetic it HAS to be the same.

Hans Durstling
Moncton, Canada

23

Daniel,

I don't usually take issue with your stands on this forum but this
is crossing a line. If a customer comes in and asks for an
alexandrite it is your MORAL DUTY as a jeweler to show them a
natural alexandrite first, as this is what they are asking for.

I understand what you are saying. And I ask you how many natural
alexandrites have you sold and how many have come in for repair.

I called someone today who does wholesale repair for the trade, and
I asked the take-in person, who happens to own the business and asked
how long she had been there, 1991, and how many natural alexandrites
had she seen, 4 or 5. In14 years only 4 or 5 ! I believe few of the
members of this forum have seen an alexandrite, and probably not a
good quality one at that.

What I said in my post is that when someone comes in asking for an
alexandrite and I tell them what a natural costs, show them color
change garnet, and syn corundum, and they want the syn corundum as
that is what they can afford, like the looks of, whatever. This
amounts to 600-1000 stones a year. When some one comes in for an
identification of an alexandrite, they have all been synthetic. For
years and years and years. I could close my eyes and id it and the
chances of me being wrong are about 1 in a thousand of greater. If
any of you buy and sell Bali jewelry, you know those big peridot
stones? Think they are real?

They usually are glass. The people who sell them tell you they are
peridot. It defies logic and reason that they can sell as large of a
stone for so cheap. Some people don’t know, some don’t care. If you
want to be honest and ethical, you better have some damn good
education backing you up if you are buying and selling, or
identifying what others bought somewhere else, like Hans’s story. I
ahve done that so many times. And I don’t tell the whole truth, it
generates animosity that I do not deserve, they do not what to pay me
for my expertise, they want it free.

Natural alexandrite is so rare that the public believes that syn
corundum is alexandrite. When they are asking for alexandrite, they
want what they have seen. It is not my fault. All my educating my
customers has resulted in not one sale of a natural alexandrite in 12
1/2 years.

When someone comes in and asks for a diamond, I do not show them a
cz and ask them if that is what they want. But in the case of
alexandrite, when the public as a whole believes that the simulant is
alexandrite, yes I can educate them, but in 18 years of retail I have
sold hundreds of simulants, after explaining and explaining and
explaining…

I absolutely qualify as to if they want a natural stone, when I
understand what they want, it does not make much difference what the
simulant is, it matters what it costs. As I said, they take the syn
corundum over color change garnet and syn alexandrite.

And I will keep saying, as a practical matter, as there are so few
real alexandrite out there, this is one stone where the public wants
something that has nothing to do with reality of what alexandrie is.
My experience is that they want the simulant. I am not in some
esoteric rarified stratosphere, I am on the street with the average
middle class consumer. And on the subject of synthetics and
simulants, I have the customers who come in wearing all their 2 or
three carat diamonds, and what do they buy, gobs of lab quartz,
mystic topaz, simulated alexandrite. They love it, it is fashion
oriented, it is fun for them, and it is disposable.

So thank all of you who do not sell synthetics or simulants,. It
leads to repair and custom work in gold and diamonds for me.

Smart people only believe half of what they hear, wise people know
which half.

Richard Hart

24 
they think all jewelers are thieves and liars because everyone
tells them something different.

Basically I believe that until you establish a relationship with a
customer, as a jeweler you are suspect in your customers mind. My
opinion is that our reputations are about on par with used car
salesmen. When you deveope trust, people are very loyal, I believe
because it is hard to find trustworthy people. “I am glad I found
you, it is hard to find a jeweler you can trust” is what I hear.

I have been challenged by a customer, when I offer to clean their
ring for free, they ask if I am going to switch their stone while I
am back there. Handed it back to them and politely told them to go
find a jeweler they can trust. Many salespeople, usually in a mall
store, if you are looking at anything in the store, immediately offer
to reduce the price by half. Name one business you know that does
that. Think that inspires confidence? I believe that the jewelery
business is one of the most misunderstood. People don’t know the
skill and patience needed in our profession to produce the work that
we do when we make something, and they don’t seem to understand why
we should get paid what we ask for, for that object they want to pass
down as an heirloom.

Misis rampant. My customers get so much mis
and so little disclosure.

They are not informed that platinum gets a “patina”(scratches). Those
who have white gold are not informed that it is plated, and the
plating will wear off.

My wife asked about an expensive piece at Nordstrom’s fine jewelery
salon, and the stone was misidentified by the sales person. Unusual
occurrence, like hardly.

A customer comes in and wants earrings to match her “citrine smoky
quartz”. She acts like I don’t know what I am doing when I tell her
I can’t match them, because the person who sold them told her she
would be able to find something. I believe we have more colored
stones that any other store in Colorado People who are in this
business because it is their passion, are usually are well informed,
over time. Then there are people who are in this business because it
can be lucrative without knowing much.

There are stories we hear about what to ask and how to protect
yourself when buying a car, to see if it was in a wreck. There are
exposes on jewelry to show how you can get cheated, but I fail to see
where consumers are taught to ask, and what to ask to know the
difference between natural, treated, synthetic, simulant, how diamond
color, clarity ect affects price. We are taught to use this
as a sales technique to gain confidence.

SI-3 nomenclature should not exist. Eye visible inclusion with naked
eye SI3… b.s. There is a moral reponsibility that was abandoned by
an entire industry, in my not so humble opinion.

I won’t sell one. I adhere strictly to G.I.A. standards, and I have
never sold below SI-2, G.I.A. cert., E.G.L. cert has to have no eye
visible inclusion face up no matter what nomenclature the cert says,
because it don’t relate to G.I.A. standards. Why? So people can get
more money for lower quality.

When you think about it, don’t you think it would be reasonable that
customers be held accountable for mitigating damages by at least
asking questions? They might receive misbut most people
don’t assume a responsible role by wanting to know what they need to
to make an informed decision. There are people who come in my store,
they went online and these people invested themselves and it is so
much easier to have some foundation of knowledge to work with, rather
that having to have customer kindergarden, and listen to them recount
what they had been told by someone else, and I have to go over why it
ain’t true.

If you are a small mom and pop store, and sell 20-80 pieces of
sterling jewelry a day, you don’t always have time with every
customer todo all the disclosure required by JVC, and I don’t think
the customer is holding us to the standard JVC sets when they are not
spending much. Technically wrong, practically right.

And for those who have waded thru my rant, when you sell a pieceof
jewelry, is it disclosure if you do not verbally tell them, but have
the appropriate info printed on their receipt?

Richard Hart

25

So… if you are looking at an natural alexandrite, in incandescent
light, which is simulated sunlight, is the color you see, simulated or
natural? Ha Ha

Richard Hart

26 
Synthetic Corundum (which is aluminum oxide) is not natural because
it is dug from the earth and treated.

Synthetic corundum is created by man from different elements. This
is very different than a material that is dug out of the earth and
then heated or cut or undergoes some other process to prepare it for
resale. Aluminum oxide may come from the earth but it is not corundum
when it does. It is only through the actions of humans and machines
that it becomes a gem material. Corundum dug from the earth is
corundum to begin with. Incidentally people, the terms being used
here (natural, treated, synthetic, simulant) are all terms that have
been in common use in the gemological world for years and they have
some pretty clear definitions. It might help all of us old guys to go
back and reread our gemology treatises and all the young ones to go
read them for the first time. All of these definitions are in common
use.

Daniel R. Spirer, G.G.
Daniel R. Spirer Jewelers, LLC
1780 Massachusetts Ave.
Cambridge, MA 02140
@Daniel_R_Spirer

27 
"Synthetic Corundum (which is aluminum oxide) is not natural
because it is dug from the earth and treated."

Are you not confusing “natural treated” with synthetic? Synthetic
material is not dug from the earth but is created in the laboratory.

Jerry in Kodiak

28

Richard,

And I ask you how many natural alexandrites have you sold

Well actually I have sold some over the years. I have one customer
who’s bought five of them from me ranging in price from $5000 to
$17,000. There are customers for the natural material, particularly
if you establish yourself as someone who handles goods like these.
And I might point out, most of my clients are in the middle to upper
middle class range. When you spend time educating people they can be
convinced to buy the real thing.

If you want to be honest and ethical, you better have some damn
good education backing you up if you are buying and selling, or
identifying what others bought somewhere else, like Hans's story.

Well, you’re right here. You do need some good education backing you
up. And if you don’t you’d better make sure that you are dealing with
reputable suppliers because if you resell something as a real stone
and it turns out to be glass, it doesn’t matter what your supplier
told you. You’re legally responsible.

And I don't tell the whole truth, it generates animosity that I do
not deserve, they do not what to pay me for my expertise, they want
it free.

I’m not sure if you meant what you actually typed here but if you
did, then by not telling the “whole” truth you are lying (it’s like
saying you are a little bit pregnant) and you are perpetuating a lot
of myths and misthat the rest of us have to spend a lot
of our time correcting. As for the second half of the statement, only
you can give away your expertise. I don’t offer any free opinions
because that would just make people believe I don’t value my own
expertise.

But in the case of alexandrite, when the public as a whole believes
that the simulant is alexandrite, yes I can educate them, but in 18
years of retail I have sold hundreds of simulants, after explaining
and explaining and explaining....

I didn’t say you had to sell them a natural, just that if they ask
for an alexandrite, regardless of their misconceptions, you have to
first show them what a real one is. If they then choose to buy a
synthetic CORUNDUM than you have to tell them that is exactly what
they are getting. If we simply sold people based on their
misconceptions then I would have to run around killing a pigeon
every couple of days so that I could show people the color of
pigeon’s blood so that they could understand that it has no more
relation to the color of a ruby than their own blood does. And we
would have to sell them H color diamonds as top color stones, because
that’s what one of my customer thought was the case just yesterday.
And we would have to sell them “semi precious” topaz for far less
than it’s worth because how could you possibly call a $5000 stone
“semi” precious?

Daniel R. Spirer, G.G.
Daniel R. Spirer Jewelers, LLC
1780 Massachusetts Ave.
Cambridge, MA 02140
@Daniel_R_Spirer

29 
Synthetic corundum is created by man from different elements.

This sentence is incorrect - Corundum is the crystalline form of
Aluminum Oxide - both are composed of the two elements Aluminum (AL
and Oxygen (O) - the formula for both is AL2O3. The color of the
crystalline form is determined by the presence of impurities.

This is very different than a material that is dug out of the
earth and then heated or cut or undergoes some other process to
prepare it for resale.

Aluminum Oxide is dug from the earth. The process of creating
Synthetic Corundum is a process of controlled heating to produce the
crystalline form (Corundum) - all in preparation for cutting and
resale.

Aluminum oxide may come from the earth but it is not corundum when
it does.

I will give you this one.

Are you not confusing "natural treated" with synthetic? Synthetic
material is not dug from the earth but is created in the
laboratory.

It is created I the laboratory from materials dug from the earth -
from the same elements as the “natural”.

Is there a difference between rain water and water produced by
combining Hydrogen and oxygen? Is one “natural” and the other
synthetic?

Glenn Vaughn

30 
Is there a difference between rain water and water produced by
combining Hydrogen and oxygen? Is one "natural" and the other
synthetic?

According to my GIA Colored stone lesson books for my GG degree (
Ruby lesson # 12), About Synthetics

  "although they might be chemically identical, and just as
  beautiful as naturals, they are man-made and lack rarity.
  Rarity is one of the key factors that makes a gem precious"
31 
It is created I(n) the laboratory from materials dug from the
earth - from the same elements as the "natural".

If by that statement you are attempthing to justify the position
that lab created corundum is “natural”, then we have no use for the
term “synthetic” since all matter, all material, everything we eat,
wear, ride in, use, see or smell originates from the earth. Therefore
everything is natural, is it not?

Jerry in Kodiak

32

All I know is that I like corundum. Nicely cut stones are plentiful
and relatively inexpensive. They have lovely color-change
properties, they withstand high heat (can be set in PMC and heated in
a kiln without damage)…and they are easy to work with and look
pretty. I picked up a whole batch of assorted ones at a mineral show
a few years ago (they were labeled ‘alexandrite’ but the price was so
below alexandrite range that we took it over to the fellow with the
spectroscope who correctly identified it). At any rate, I use it in
rings, bracelets, pendants…if people like a piece, they buy it.
Most don’t even ask what the stone is. If they do, I say "corundum."
If they ask “what’s that?” I tell them it’s a very hard stone that
has color change properties and is very durable. If they want to go
into real detail, they can get the aluminum oxide-high-heat story.
One obliging customer said, “oh, you mean like diamonds are nothing
but carbon, only heat and pressure turn it into a diamond?”.
Couldn’t ask for a better analogy. except corundum is lots cheaper,
and I still like it.

Dee

33

My final.02 on this whole thread is that if anyone is selling
lab/created/man-made material as natural, or not disclosing that the
material is man made then you stand to get sued. The FTC has strict
guidelines on how you handle the terms used to sell ‘gems’ and what
can be called a ‘gem’. Synthetics can not be called ‘gems’ in FTC
standards.

Not only that, but you are being dishonest. If the person doesn’t
care if something is synthetic they will buy it either way, but if
they DO care, and you don’t tell them then you open yourself up to
all kinds of negative attention including being sued.

Just my.02.

Craig
www.creativecutgems.com

34

Dee,

if people like a piece, they buy it. Most don't even ask what the
stone is. If they do, I say "corundum." If they ask "what's that?"
I tell them it's a very hard stone that has color change
properties and is very durable

This is both illegal and unethical. It is against the law to not
disclose fully what the material is that you are selling to
customers. Since it is man made (synthetic–although apparently
everything is natural according to some of the postings lately) you
absolutely must disclose that fact to the customer. It is not enough
to say it’s corundum. Not only could you get sued for this action
(think about what it would cost you if one of the customers who
bought your 10 ct “corundum” came back and asked you to replace it
with a natural one because, by not disclosing what the material
actually was, you actually are inferring that it is natural–and
this has happened!) but you create a myriad of problems for both the
customers (when they are find out what they have isn’t what they
think it is) and for other jewelers (who have to tell them that some
other jeweler lied to them–which really makes our trade look upright
and honorable). It is not enough to assume that since they don’t ask
the questions, they don’t have a legal right to know.

Read the laws on this. Whether the piece is $10 or $10,000 you are
obligated to disclose whether the material is natural or not. In
some cases you are also obligated to disclose treatments used on
natural materials. And everyone out there is not ok to do something
one way just because a whole lot of other people do it that way. Lack
of knowledge is not an excuse for breaking the law (as any policeman
can tell you).

Daniel R. Spirer Jewelers, LLC
1780 Massachusetts Ave.
Cambridge, MA 02140
617-2344392

35

I have always had a problem with the FTC rules. They are just that,
rules and not laws. They should be laws I think. I know it was
originally made as guidelines so jewelers could self police
themselves and to give consumers the right to sue. I dont think they
really need guidelines to sue anyone, fraud is fraud and I would
think it would be enough to be liable in a court room. But like most
industries and trades, there is always that eliminate of people who
will “read between the lines” or just ignore the rules. I know some
would ignore laws as well, but at least a law can be enforced. To sue
someone can cost thousands of dollars just to get started. And the
odds of many people filing suit over a couple hundred dollar fraud
are slim to none, and those who are not disclosing things to the
customer know this well. That is why they get away with it. Im sure
there are some out there that consider not disclosing or fudging the
truth the same a running a red light or parking in handicap parking.
But then they are usually the same ones who scream the loudest
"where’s the police when you need them " if someone cuts them off in
traffic.

Just my opinion of a life time of observations.

Daniel