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How to Deal With Retail Jewelry Salespeople

Forwarned is forearmed is what I say. This article is written from a male perspective because, well, I’m male. Like many others I’ve had the not so unique experience of combing through store front after store front for a particular item. Well, make that item SET. You see, I’m looking for an engagement ring and wedding band.

Yep, on that path to matrimony.

So, whereas I was once a newbie in dealing with aggressive diamond jewelry
salespeople, I am now the battle hardened shopper who knows what questions to ask and HOW to ask them. Realize this: no matter what YOU say or do in front of the sales person, they will want you to do something at the end of the meeting, even if you are “just looking”.

Step 1: Go Alone!
Chances are you won’t be able to avoid going by yourself at first, so roll with it. Take her out one or two times looking at rings so that you can get a feel for what she wants. Now, that won’t mean you can’t afford it, but get a good idea as to shape and color, and how she likes the band to sit on her finger. That’s very important, trust me. Some girls like big, gaudy, clunky old fashioned rings, and others like small dimunitive, barely noticeable but it’s definately there rings. Get a good feel for what she likes and doesn’t like and then go do your own thing. Sometimes it may seem like you’re placating her by nodding your head and looking dreamingly into the 45k ring on the table, but don’t give in and make a purchase on something you probably can’t afford. And those sales people know it, trust me. BUT, they’ll use your lady as a bargainning tool in getting you to buy it right there. Small head nods between your woman and the sales person and comments tossed your way about “oh how she’s worth it” and “well, we can do payments, we’ll discuss that later” do NOT help your cause. This is why you must go alone and bargain alone. All your lady wants to do is pick out her ring, blind to the factors that go into purchasing it.

Step 2: Be Firm!
Wishy-washy does not exist in a jewelry shop. Chances are even greater that you can bargain down prices, but do your research. You cannot go into a retail jewelry story and not know what’s going on. Go to a jewelry forum like www.jewelryforums.org to get the low down on pricing and what to expect when you purchase. So when you get pressured into a certain price set or even pressured to purchase on the spot- BE FIRM! and state your own mind. In the end, they’ll do anything for your business except go below their bottom end.

Step 3: Be Careful About Financing!
Another tip not to go blind into a retail jewelry situation. They’ll treat you like a king and tell you how wonderful you are purchasing that wedding band set for your girlfriend, but what they’re NOT telling you in detail are the financing costs over time. Do your research on those as well. If you’re using your credit card, make sure you have the best apr as possible. No need to get stuck with paying for a 5k ring over time that ends up costing you 12k! Trust me. Go into a wedding ring/band buying-researching situation knowing what you can afford and stick to it. Sure she’s worth it, but so is buying food and paying for rent or your mortgage too!

I hope these tips were of use to you in your research about buying a diamond ring or wedding band for your soon to be wife. As always, do your research and you’ll always come out ahead!

How to Deal With Retail Jewelry Salespeople / David

This article was written for this site: jewelry forums, the fastest growing jewelry message forum on the internet. Join today!

How to Clean Sterling Silver Jewelry At Home?

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How to Clean Silver Jewelry How to Clean Silver Jewelry

Cleaning Silver Jewelry At Home?

Cleaning a piece of silver jewelry usually takes 15 to 30 minutes, depending on the size and intricacy of the design, plus how well it has been preserved. You would be suprise how easy it is to maintain your favourite silver jewelry collection at home. Regularly cleaning silver jewelry will make it easier to keep silver jewelry from tarnishing in the long run.

Special care should be given to silver jewelry with gemstones. Where possible, it is recommended that you send your silver jewelry to a silver jewelry store for a professional polishing and examination at least once a year.

Most high-end jewelry stores should provide the service of cleaning silver jewelry for you. Now you can learn how to do it yourself at home.

Professional Jewelry Cleaning At Home in 30 minutes The following cleaning process applies to Platinum, Gold and Sterling Silver Jewelry with all Gemstones. This is the most delicate and preferred jewelry cleaning method practiced by jewelry professionals in the trade.

STEP 1: Gently place jewelry in a heat-proof container. Apply the mildest dish washing liquid you can find onto jewelry and scorch it with fresh boiled hot water, creating as much bubbles, and let it soak for at least 1 minute.

STEP 2: Remove the jewelry from the container with a soft bristle toothbrush and lay it on a non-slip cloth like a piece of chamois. Apply more liquid detergent onto toothbrush; holding down jewelry at one end, brush silver jewelry with soapy water in one directional strokes. Use a soft bristle toothbrush on harder stones silver jewelry such as diamonds, topaz, quartz. Use a softer make-up brush for softer gemstones like pearls, amber, coral, turquiose.

STEP 3: Place a ’safety container’ over the sink to avoid losing your jewelry. Rinse thoroughly with lots of water.

STEP 4: Lay jewelry on a towel to air dry. Do not rub.

STEP 5: Once jewelry is COMPLETELY dry, use a treated polishing cloth and polish jewelry in one-directional strokes for an even polish. Choose a specially treated gem cloth to polish gemstones or just use a clean lint-free cloth to buff.

And voila! Sparking new silver jewelry like those seen in jewelry stores!

**Do not attempt to clean fragile or damaged gemstone jewellery yourself. Take it to your nearest jeweler for professional consultation.

**Silver jewelry dips and polishing creams not recommended.

About the Author

Eelin Chong is a graduate gemologist, jewelry specialist and publisher of www.7wholesalesilver.com. This site features wholesale sterling silver jewelry from Thailand and Bali, plus more professional jewelry care tips and information.

How to Clean Sterling Silver Jewelry At Home? by Eelin Chong

Wholesale gold jewelry trading guide for entrepreneurs

For those of you who are thinking about selling gold jewelry, it is crucial that you understand fully how to determine the price for gold jewelry. Not only this can help you to tell a good deal from a bad one, it also helps to analyze your competitors and understand the market better before you make any investment.

Gold price
The most important part of wholesale gold jewelry trading is to understand the breakdown of the cost of a piece of gold jewelry. Let‘s say the current good price is $500 per ounce. To calculate the cost of gold for a piece of 14 karat gold jewelry that weighs 3 gram without any stones, we first divide the price per ounce by 31.5, to get the price per gram, which is $15.87. This is the price of pure gold. To convert this to 14K gold, knowing that there are 24 karats in pure gold, we divide $15.87 by 24 and multiply the result by 14. The price per gram for 14k gold is roughly $9.26. Therefore, the total cost of the gold for a 3 gram ring would be $27.78.

Labor Cost
Another major part of the cost for a piece of gold jewelry is the cost for labor, especially for pieces set with precious stones. Gold jewelry generally requires some filing and polishing after it is cast out of the mold. The labor cost can sometime be as high as $2 per gram, depending on the origin of the jewelry and the style. In addition, the cost of setting any stones on a gold jewelry can be over one dollar per stone. Certain advanced setting such as channel set and invisible set cost even more because of the high level of craftsmanship required.

Markup of Competitors
A good way to analyze if a certain style of gold jewelry is profitable and beneficial for a business is to understand your competitors’ prices. Since you already know how to calculate roughly the cost of a piece of jewelry, and therefore the price that you can get it, buy looking at the markups of your competitors, you may get an idea of how severe the competition is. For instance, if the competitors are marking up the jewelry three times of the cost, the competitiveness of that style is not really that high. On the other, if everyone has the same pricing and the markup is 50% above the cost, the style might have already saturated the market.

Volume trading
Another angle of looking at the pricing issue is that when the competitors are marking up at a low margin, the item is probably accepted by a lot of consumers. The justification behind it is that when the profit per piece is low, and people are trading them actively, there probably is a high demand for it. On short, the higher the profit margin, the low the volume of sales and the low the profit margin
, the higher could be the volume of sales. Another point that is worth noting is that the volume theory also applies to jewelry vendors. If you buy in large quantity, pricing should go down automatically. Therefore, running a successfully business involves getting the balance between all the factors within the resources and infrastructure you have such as employees and capital.

Closeout Jewelry
Since jewelry business is highly time-sensitive, styles that were once popular several months ago may not sell at all couple months later. Therefore, when buying gold jewelry wholesale, you should estimate the monthly sales and stock according to the sale volume. For example, you may want to stock a certain style for two months worth of stock and restock it when it runs out in order to minimize the closeout items in the inventory, which is sometimes referred to as inventory shrinkage.

By understanding the market and your competitors before buy wholesale gold jewelry, you can reduce the mistakes during your entrepreneurial endeavor, thus increase the chance of succeeding tremendously.

Wholesale gold jewelry trading guide for entrepreneurs / Ken22

Scott Murff got his MBA from MIT business school and currently is the marketing manager in 14K gold earrings that specializes in wholesale gold jewelry including gold and cubic zirconia body jewelry.