One of my clients (I’m a to-the-trade jeweler) buys lots of gold and
therefore has many, many bags of gemstones of all sizes and types,
approx. 25lbs avoirdupois.
I want to make him an offer on the lot of it.
How much per ounce should I offer? Or should I just offer a price?
What would you do?
Paf
many bags of gemstones of all sizes and types 25 lbs avoirdupois I want to make him an offer on the lot of it. How much per ounce should I offer? Or should I just offer a price?
Most of the pawns shops and gold buyers are only interested in the
recoverable gold and tell the sellers that the stones are worthless.
In many cases they are - just synthetics.
One of my customers buys bags of loose stones from the pawnshops and
gold buyers. She pays about USD$ 90 - $100 per bag - of about 1
lb/each.
Remember - many of these stones have been damaged in the removal from
their original settings. Some are chipped, nicked, split etc. And
then the Pawn brokers of course treat them with the utmost care -
jumbling them all together like so many potatoes. So many get abraded
banging around in the bags.
But I can guarantee that my customer has already recovered all of
her original investments with them on or two fine stones that she
finds in each bag.
Just in a half hour I spent in her shop I separated many Blue Topaz
stones from Aquamarines and Zircons and blue glass - and also told
her to take much better care of the stones - instead of leaving them
all jumbled together.
Of course over half of what was in the bags were synthetic stones.
To my surprise - one of my customers - who does the cruise ship
circuit bought a parcel of very nice synthetic star sapphires - I
have no idea what he plans to do with them.
Don’t offer more than USD$ 2,500.00 for the whole 25 lbs
avoirdupois. Depending upon where you are located - I might be
interested in splitting the purchase with you (though I am only
interested in the natural stones - which can be used “as is” or
repaired, refaceted etc.)
Best regards,
Robert P. Lowe Jr.
Lowe Associates - Brasil
Years ago, when I was really into faceting, I bought stones from a
gentleman in Wisconsin who bought them from pawn dealers. He would
go through them, cull out the naturals and sell them to faceters like
me, for very reasonable sums. I loved them because, while damaged,
they were what I considered ‘preforms’ and were easy to recut or
repair. One was a very beautiful.58ct Burma ruby that had been
poorly cut and had an inclusion right at the culet. I recut it into a
perfect gem with no inclusion and it came out at.50 ct exactly. Not
bad for a $10 investment. say what?
Cheers, Don in SOFL.
I completely disagree with a lot of what R. Lowe said particularly
the offer of 2500 for the bag…Just in terms of time sorting 25lbs
of what you can bet are damaged useless replacement stones that run
about 4 bucks to buy exactly what you need in a VS diamond
replacement that is calibrated you may get 4 lbs of actually useable
material. If they are in a bag and could be anything I wouldn’t offer
more tha 250 USD for the lot. Buyers won’t generally take anything
under a 1/2 carat diamond, and even that is not usual. If you want to
have an inventory of replacement stones (remeber the insurance you’d
have to add to carry the lot in your shop) then it may be worth the
time sorting them. If you teach jewelry making or stone setting then
it is a great tool to teach with and as such you could make the lot
into random packets ( or not so random) for teaching not only
sorting, but colour- grading, saturation, cuts, hardness etc. and
recover monies in selling or offering the packets you would create to
students at a cost of say, 430 dollars per packet containing up to
100 pieces - presuming they are mainly 10 points or less per stone.
Another way to profit from selling pre-made packets is to market them
to teachers of stone setting ( I maintain a list of stone setting
teachers in the US and UK if intersted contact me off list. I sell
the lists like any target marketing mailing list so please be advised
it isn’t free but is accurate as of June 2011 at a wholesale price (
minimum of perhaps 20 packets at a go, for x priece that they can
then price as they see fit. There are a number of ways to use them
besides storing them and waiting for replacement orders to come in
after sorting 25 lbs of miostly damaged stones…so keep that in mind-
Bottoom line take a look at the lot before considering it further…
rer
I’d be tempted to offer him a sum for the lot if it is within your
budget. Without being rude to his buying methods he has got them for
almost free as a byproduct of his gold buying so I dont think it is
worth getting into a deep debate on the value of individual stones
unless there are good reasons for doing so.
Nick Royall
I'd be tempted to offer him a sum for the lot if it is within your budget. Without being rude to his buying methods he has got them for almost free as a byproduct of his gold buying so I dont think it is worth getting into a deep debate on the value of individual stones unless there are good reasons for doing so.
He paid gold weight for them. But they are his and he wants the most
he can get, and he’s my biggest account and he knows I’ll be selling
them back to him at a profit. I’m going to make an offer on the lot,
and an offer to sort 'em if he won’t sell. Anyone have a clue what
to charge (per hour?) for sorting a zillion mixed up stones? Or do
you know of anyone who offers this service?