Jogia Diamonds' Blog

Like a lot of jewellers nowadays, we sell lab grown diamonds. With this comes the obligatory question from customers, “What’s the difference between lab grown and natural?” The biggest difference is of course the price – a 1ct F/VS2 ideal cut natural diamond may cost $9,000, whereas a lab grown diamond of the same size and specifications may only cost $900. However, when researching this topic, most opinions are decisively favourable toward lab grown diamonds, with only a few like Martin Rapaport, coming to the defence of natural diamonds. However, delving deeper into this debate reveals that some of the claims put forward by lab grown diamond proponents may be completely false.

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In October last year, American Gem Society (AGS) Laboratories announced they were merging with the now dominant Gemological Institute of America’s (GIA) laboratory. According to the press release, GIA offered an endowment, which was believed to have “a fair bit of money involved” in return for AGS’ intellectual property and AGS’ Las Vegas location, which it will use as a research facility.

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Back in 2007, I asked a simple question about the diamond industry: Is Commoditisation Upon Us? Now, nearly 16 years later, I can confidently say that the answer is definitely yes, however, it is clear that both many members of the trade and the general diamond buying public do not see diamonds as a commodity.

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A couple of years ago, a client asked me about whether I wanted to design and manufacture my own line of jewellery. My answer was that I was too busy with client designs, which was true, but really, I knew that even if I designed a range of super-dooper, perhaps stunning jewellery, making money from them would be an uphill battle.

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Much has been talked about in the last decade about the so-called retail apocalypse. That is, the large number of retail stores closing. The truth of the matter is, this has been talked about for the past 30 or so years. I remember in the mid-1990s, when e-commerce first came along, many people were talking about how retail was going to die and how we would all be ordering everything from furniture to groceries online.

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In his New Year message, diamond industry tzar, Martin Rapaport, or as I like to call him, “he who must be obeyed” delivered an unfettered rant about lab grown diamonds.

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This past October came news that 25% of jewellery sold in the United States was sold online. In fact, the 25% figure represented the value sold online, but if you look at the volume, it is actually 31%. This essentially means that nearly one third of all jewellery sold in the United States in 2021 was sold online.

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If you Google “how to become a jeweller”, you will get plenty of results saying the exact same thing – that is you need to do an apprenticeship. This usually takes four years, apprenticeship openings are virtually nil, especially in states like Western Australia, and to top it all off, apprenticeship wages are a pittance. However, thanks to technological changes and shifting customer demands, nowadays an apprenticeship, for the most part isn’t the best option to become a jeweller.

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So if you’re unfamiliar with the term “shrinkflation”, it refers to a product being reduced in size whilst the amount being charged staying the same. A good example is a bag of potato chips weighing 200 grams suddenly going down to 180 grams and the price staying the same. Whilst this may be good for peoples’ waistlines, the same has been happening in the diamond industry for the best part of the past two decades.

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When it comes to diamonds and crime, most people think of spectacular, and perhaps daring robberies, such as the 2013 Brussels Airport diamond heist or Argyle Diamond Mine heist. However, in Australia at least, crimes involving money laundering and loose polished diamonds are apparently non-existent, whereas crimes involving money laundering and banks or gold dealers make headline news.

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