Archive for the ‘New York’ tag

Jeweler lets customers see live diamond inscribing

Tustin, Calif.–The Jewelry Exchange retail chain will be offering its diamond customers the opportunity to choose their own inscriptions and then sit back and watch a computer screen as those words get inscribed on their newly purchased diamond at the company’s factory.

Customers will first approve the image of the transcription on screen and then can wait and watch the laser-inscribing process, which takes just minutes, The Jewelry Exchangesaid in a press release issued on Wednesday, announcing its acquisition of the newest PhotoScribe Cold Laser System for its state-of-the-art factory.

Through the inscription process, which the retailer says is 100 percent safe for laser-inscribing diamonds, customers can either have a diamond engraved with a special message of their own choosing or with a security code that would include the diamond certification number.

The inscription is done by using a tiny, precise laser beam that transforms a thin layer–just a few atoms thick–of the sparkling diamond crystal itself to opaque carbon crystal or graphite.

The cold-laser energy fully absorbs into the diamond in a process that the company describes as being superior to the hot-laser technology on the market, and which also does not require any pre-laser or post-laser processing, such as painting the diamond, which can produce inconsistent engraving.

The diamond can be inscribed all around the girdle using the special laser process, the company said. The laser inscription does not change the clarity or color grade of a diamond as it is microscopic and invisible to the unaided eye, viewable only under 10-times magnification, which requires a jeweler’s loupe or other magnifier.

The inscription process is considered permanent since it can only be removed by a professional diamond cutter. Removing the inscription would not change the weight or appearance of the diamond, the company says.

The Jewelry Exchange is a division of Goldenwest Diamond Corp. and has been operating for more than 32 years in Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Philadelphia, Phoenix, San Francisco, Seattle, St. Louis, Tampa, Fla., Tustin, Calif., and Washington D.C., where it does business as The Jewelry Exchange. The company operates as The Jewelry Factory in Cleveland, Detroit and New York. In Houston, the company operates as The Jewelry Source.

7 Million Dollar Delivery

When New York jeweler, Harry Winston, decided to donate the fabled Hope Diamond to the Smithsonian Institution, he chose first class mail. “It’s the safest way to mail gems,” Winston was quoted as saying. The delivery from New York City to Washington, D.C., cost Winston $2.44 in postage, and an additional $142.85 for a million dollars’ worth of insurance.

Letter carrier James Todd picked up the diamond at City Post Office and drove to the Natural History building, where he delivered it to the curator. Afterward, Todd told the Washington Post that he felt “a little shaky,” not because of the enormous value of the 45.52 carat diamond, but because he was not used to getting so much attention at his job.

De Beers cracking down on Everlon infringement

New York–De Beers is cracking down on companies creating designs that closely resemble its Everlon diamond jewelry. In an interview with National Jeweler on Wednesday, Sally Morrison, interim U.S. director in charge of the De Beers account at JWT, confirmed that De Beers’ new diamond designs–based on the Hercules knot and marketed as the “strength of love, forged in a knot”–as well as the name “Everlon,” are indeed trademarked. She said De Beers is going to defend its trademark, especially considering that sightholders and retailers are shouldering some of the cost of the program. “Of course we’re going to protect it,” Morrison said. “How are we going to protect it? We’re going to protect it legally.” The first stage of this legal defense is to send out cease-and-desist letters to any company De Beers learns is selling designs that could possibly infringe on Everlon. “We are aware that people have infringed, and there’s a process that has already started,” she said. Morrison would not disclose details on how many letters had been sent out or to what companies, but she did reveal that two companies that received such letters already have agreed to stop selling the offending designs. She added that she doesn’t believe all companies selling Everlon-like pieces are doing it out of “bad will,” but rather that there may be some confusion as to how this new program works. Unveiled in September, Everlon is De Beers’ latest “big idea,” intended to stimulate diamond jewelry sales as programs such as Journey and three-stone have done in the past. “That model has been around for a long time, very successfully, and everybody’s been a part of it,” Morrison said. Unlike past De Beers programs, however, Everlon is not open for everyone to duplicate. Sightholders and retailers who want to sell Everlon had to pay to have access to the designs and marketing materials, as well as a license to create their own designs based on the Everlon theme. Meanwhile, those who did not choose to participate in the program cannot create Everlon pieces as they might have done with programs such as Journey. This change, Morrison said, might have created some confusion in the marketplace. She added that when creating the program, De Beers did forsee that it might need to take legal action to protect Everlon. “We anticipated that it might be necessary, so we were ready and prepared to do it,” Morrison said. “We’ve been doing this a long time, and the trade is used to working with us in a particular way. It’s ingrained.”