Some Feathers Have Been Ruffled Over Gold Parties
So we ruffled some feathers, I was not going to write on this subject anymore, but with the comments that we have been getting about several post we wrote about gold party’s I have decided to write something.
First let me say that we have never in any way said that our store gives the best price, or that you should only sell your gold to a jewelry store. We have said over, and over again that you should take your gold jewelry items to a jewelry store to have them sorted, weighed, and price given before you go to a gold party. Not only should you go to one store you should go to as many as possible to see what the going rate is. We never I repeat never offer a store credit to a customer, and give them double their money to buy something from us. We do not have a large enough mark up on our jewelry to cover something like that. We are not a large chain store we are a small family operated jewelry store.
Our intention in writing about gold parties was for the sole purpose of protecting the consumer, several of you out there who are doing these gold party’s have left some horrible comments you are very angry, but in your angry comments some not all have shamelessly tried to promote your companies. At no time have you told me or my readers if you are buying by penny weight, or gram weight, one gave me a very detailed description on how he runs his gold parties, and I did posted his comment, he was not trying to hide anything. There are many bad jewelery stores, and pawn shops who did, and are taking advantage of the public, we are not one of them. We have a sign in our store that clearly reads the amount we are taking the gold for on any given day. We sometimes changes this through out the day depending on what the gold market is doing.
Most not all of the gold buying parties are not meeting local city laws that they are conducting business in, I have yet to hear of one who has their scale inspected by a city official that they are doing business in. Our scales are inspected to make sure that we are not cheating on the weight.
There has been comments left by people who got more for there gold then they did from a jewelry store, I have posted these comments, and am very happy that they got the most they could get for their gold, that is what we hope for, that you all get what is the most you can for your gold. That you take the time to investigate, and to understand what you should be getting.
We never said that this was not a business, on the contrary we have been up front with all that have come into our store about how much we are making down to the penny if they want to know. We can not speak for other jewelery stores, nor do we, all we can say is if they are not doing business in the straight forward manner, then shame on them.
I would think that if you are an up, and up gold buying party that you would welcome a post that would expose the gold buying party operators that are not. I would also like to take this time to let all of my readers know, and I have said it before in my comments, but let me put it in a post we are not saying that all gold party’s are bad, we are simply saying to protect yourself do your research before you go to a party, watch out for any of the things we have pointed out to you that might be done at a gold party, or at a jewelry store.
For instance:
not being able to see the scale
the karat of your gold make sure it is sorted before they weight it.
not knowing how much it might be worth
penny weight or gram weight, and understanding the difference between the two.
If you have a problem with us trying to protect, and help the people who are thinking about selling their gold to you at a gold party well I can do nothing for you, and do not feel the need to try. I know for some of you it will be very difficult to conduct buisness with people who may understand what you are trying to do to them, but if you are not trying to cheat anyone then you will not have a problem with what we are doing.
If you are doing gold party’s, and would like to link please tell us if you are buying by penny weight or gram weight, and for how much how you run your parties, and so on. We will be happy to post a comment from you with a link to your website if we understand how you are operating you party, but we have an obligation to our clients, and readers who rely on us for honest information. We would not like to mislead them in any way I think that you could all agree to that.
Thank You All
N.J. Diamonds
Thank you so much for all of your post relating to gold party’s, there are many of us out here who are trying to conduct our gold buying parties in a above board manner, but because of some that are doing corrupt business we are having a hard time. I buy all the gold by gram weight, and let the people see the scale that I am weighing their gold on. I do not offer a percentage to the host because I do these party’s in my own home once a week. Keep up the good work, I think everything you are writing about this subject is to the benefit of all that are willing to do clean business.
Thank you Mary, and keep up the good work we are glad to hear that you are buying by gram weight, we hope you are having a good time doing this, and that you are making a little extra money for yourself. As I am sure you are aware of by now you do not make that big of a percentage, but it is something.
N.J. Diamonds
I think that from a store’s perspective, you are nervous becasue it is competition that you can not fully compete with. All of your writings seems to inidcate this.
As for writing about what other people are doing, you are in the same boat. Not all stores are really that honest and “Golden” so to say. As for the people running parties, as long as you are fully licensed, insured, and bonded, they have every right to do what they are doing.
Capitalism is based off of competition. If you can not take it…. move on;)
Joshua
If you have been reading the post so closely you will see that most of these gold party operators are not licensed, insured let alone bonded. They are not operating under the same restrictions that a store has to. We have to have a buying licenses, our scales are inspected once a year by the city we operate in, not including we pay taxes on all of this it is after all considered income.
As for being nervous, and considering these under the radar operators that swoop into a community and steal, that they could possibly be our competition is some thing that our store has never even considered. In order for them to be our competition we would have to be operating under similar substandard ethics we do not, when the day come’s that I consider them my competition I should pack up and close my store. What my writings indicate is that we our concerned for the consumer that is falling pray to these scams. Something that was told to us just two days ago only reinforce this thought is the fact that they have now gone to the smaller communities, and are now doing the same. and worse it has been told to us by the company that is taking all of this scrape gold from them, that they are earning 50% profit on what they are buying from the people. When the margins have dropped they are earning a whopping 50%, so no we will not stop writing about this, and comments like yours, and others that are upset because we are telling the truth only convince us that we are doing the right thing.
As long as I keep getting phone calls thanking us for what we are doing we will keep informing the public what to watch out for. You can talk about capitalism all you want, but when you are on the receiving end of some one ripping you off I trust the last thing coming out of your mouth will not be its ok that’s capitalism in action. Its greed plain and simply it is something new that people are not informed about its just another form of scamming the unprepared public weather it is being done in jewelry stores or not if you are not operating above board you are a scam artists.
We have never said that all jewelry stores are golden, as a matter of fact we know several in our area that are not, but we are not in the same boat we do not do what others are doing, and have never even thought about doing it. We after all have a reputation to up hold we are not setting up in home after home in city after city night after night, and then leaving, to go onto new hunting grounds.
You have said what you had to say, and I appreciate that, you are entitled to your opinion, and we do welcome criticism we are not perfect, and if we felt that we are doing something wrong by shining light on this subject we would most certainly stop. If you have any more questions or comments do not hesitate to let us know.
Thank you
N.J. Diamonds
I would like to discuss in more detail about these gold parties. If i have a piece that has a stone in it, would they take out the stone and just give the price for the gold, or do they give a price for the whole piece? where do the send the gold to melt it down? how do they figure the final amount to be given to the seller?
Bob
We take out the c.z. stones, and some times we take out the diamond, emerald, and ruby stones also. It depends on the stone, and the piece of jewelry that is being sold to us. If the gold has c.z. stones on it we weigh the jewelery, and then we deduct how much we should take out. You can see a sample of what we take out of jewelery here http://njdiamonds.wordpress.com/2009/03/05/rainbow-of-colors/. Many people ask us how do we know how many grams the stones are? This is simple we have been doing this for 12 years we have been buying gold from the public for 12 years, since the day we opened our doors we have had a second hand dealers licenses. We have taken these stones out of jewelery and put them on the scale to see their weight. After deducting the gram weight of the stones we give a price for the gold only, this way we do not have to destroy the piece of jewelry in order to give a price for it. Every jewelery store does this different, but this is how we do it. We take our gold to a local refinery who then melts it assay the gold content, and based on the gold price at that time, and the gold karat we get a price, and our money. Hope this we answer some of your questions if you have any other questions please let us know.
I can see that you have written extensively on this subject I started on gold party scams and how they do it and linked over to this on, I am going to take a look at the rest of them. I would like to say thank you for all of you hard work, and I can tell from the comments that have been posted that this has not been easy to write about. I did go to a gold party, and felt that something was not right, I may not have a lot of gold to sell, but it felt to me that I could get more. The next day I started looking on the internet, and found your site. What you say here, and in other post is right on the money what they did at the gold party I was at.
Many of my friends sold their things, and when I printed up the article for them they are shocked, and angry. 3 women that were going to host their own party’s have canceled. We have posted your article on our bulletin board at work, and many people fallowed what you wrote on the subject.
Some got more at gold parties, most did not, and walked away. Every party that I know of in this area bought by penny weight, after reading how to calculate the penny weight, and understanding the difference, most people walked out of the parties.
Our area of the country like yours is going through a hard time, and I think these guys are going to these areas to pray on the people that need some extra cash. Many jewelry stores in my area are just as bad if not worse then the gold buying parties, but when we go to them now, and understand how much we are suppose to get, one jewelry store decided to work with us in a different way. They are giving much more, and buy by gram weight, I did show him your post, and he did not give as much as your store, but he did give a lot per gram.
Thank you again, and I like the fact that you post the comments that do not agree with you that is refreshing, going to site after site, and only seeing the praise on these sites in itself is a little disconcerting, I am sure that not every person they have dealt with is a happy satisfied customer.
meandthatsall
Thank you so much for all you are doing to get the word out, about what is going on at gold party’s, we try to make sure that everyone has the information they need before they go, and sell people like you are making it easier to pass the word around.