June 3, 2025 • 25 mins
Diamonds are more than just sparkling stones—they carry a legacy of rarity, power, and prestige. In this episode of Legacy of Luxury, Nick Constantino and Jaron Solomon uncover the legendary stories behind the world’s most famous diamonds, the intricate trade routes of uncut stones, and the science behind what makes diamonds truly special. From the Hope Diamond’s curse to elite Type 2A diamonds, they explore the history, craftsmanship, and emotion that make diamonds timeless.
Key Takeaways:
- Type 2A diamonds represent the rarest and purest form of carbon, making up less than 2% of all diamonds mined.
- The Hope Diamond Curse is one of the most infamous legends surrounding diamonds.
- Diamonds pass through multiple countries before reaching jewelers, making tariffs and trade routes critical to pricing.
- Craftsmanship matters—perfect sparkle requires expert diamond cutting, not just size.
- Solomon Brothers uses a painstaking selection process, ensuring only elite-quality stones reach customers.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
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Now let's explore the legacy of luxury with Salomon Brothers
Jewelers. Welcome to Legacy of Luxury.
So another one of an episode we were going to do later.
Well, we're going to talk diamonds today, but there's a
story and a reason we are and we're going to approach this a
(01:03):
little differently and kind of tell some crazy stories about
diamonds because I feel like to the masses, they think
engagement rings and maybe the hope diamond here.
But there's so many crazy stories.
And I bet you, Jaron, you and your family, your dad, you've
heard them growing up. So before we get to that, let's
talk about why we're doing this.Talk a little bit about what you
got in front of you and why it is so special.
(01:24):
Yeah, well, Nick, it's not easy to get you off topics.
Yesterday I walked in with a diamond that I, you know, think
is super special, and I think you even saw it.
Like, I'm excited about a diamond and you're like, shit,
Jaron. Like, you see diamonds every
day. Yeah.
What's so special about this diamond?
Yeah, and it was like his nips were hard when he walked in
here. Hard as the Diamond A.
Pen on the most saleable. And on the scale of hardness for
(01:47):
his nips for this one. But but, and again, I as a
layman, the way you explained itpercentage wise, we're talking
like the top 001 percent of diamonds here and go into it a
little bit why it's so special. Sure.
So this diamond right here, you know, emerald cut diamond 2.73
carats E colour. So colourless.
Yeah, flawless. OK, great.
(02:09):
Even that would be impressive. Impressive amongst itself.
But I've been spoiled. I've been doing this a long
time. My dad's been in the business a
long time. Seeing a flawless diamond.
Yeah, yeah, they have to. It happens.
Yeah, I'm not saying it happens all day long.
And it absolutely is an investment grade stone being
just flawless itself, right. So nothing going on in here.
No imperfections. Now, usually comes with a GI, a
(02:31):
certificate like all of our diamonds do.
And it says right here, I'm reading the back of it for those
of you that are watching here and E flawless, excellent,
excellent, no fluorescence, chef's kiss, everything OK.
But what makes it special? It comes with another
certificate from Gia, which is pretty cool.
And basically this certificate is saying that it is a type 2A
(02:51):
diamond, which is like we just said, less than 2% of all the
rough coming out of the earth isa type 2A rough.
So this is going to be as rare of carbon as you can find.
Got it. Got it.
And this is the chemical coming Galaxy, chemical composition of
it, yes. So it's mostly carbon.
It is pure in essence, as pure as it comes.
Yes. So that's why you'll see that
(03:14):
Type 2A is pretty much going to come in colorless diamonds and
flawless and internally flawlessdiamonds because it's just such
a pure rock coming out of the grounds.
It'd be somewhat. You still have to cut it.
You still have to do all of the crazy things.
So Type 2A doesn't always translate to flawless and
perfect. So this is the perfect storm of
the two things coming together. Absolutely, which is why it's
just so rare. So this diamond, everyone's
(03:36):
heard of the Hope Diamond. I think the Hope Diamond is type
2A. It's why it's one of the most
well known diamonds because of its size, but also because of
its purity. The investment, when people talk
about investment like you and I have talked before and we like
the bullshit around like hey, does De Beers, you know, is it
really rare? Are they holding back diamonds?
(03:56):
They flood the market. And that's a big thing now, is
that artificial supply to man curve watchmakers do it.
We know it. Rolex has been doing it forever.
If you can and not have anyone know how much supply is out
there, it is easier to regulate demand.
It goes bad sometimes because then all of a sudden you're
stuck with too much supply. But yes.
Yeah. But the reason why this makes me
excited is because this truly issupply and demand at its truest
(04:19):
sense. Yeah, there is just not supply
out there. The.
Earth is not making them. The Earth is not making them.
And it would be if let's say we took all of them out of the
Earth right now, it would take 10s of thousands of years to
make more of them just because of the process of the carbon and
the pressurization. Yeah, of it.
So Speaking of the Hope Diamond,I got some pretty crazy stories
about diamonds here. So let's start with the Hope
(04:40):
Diamond. So deep blue diamond, it says,
infamous for its alleged curse. Of course, that has a curse on
it. It originated from the Calor
mine in India, passed through the hands of King Louis the
14th, a couple other American heiresses.
But legend has it that every owner suffered misfortune or
death when they had it, including beheadings in the
French Revolution and financial ruin.
Today it's in the Smithsonian, which ironically I was valeting
(05:03):
in DC once and I got surprisingly close to it while
the museum was closed without even being background checked.
So either they got some, either it's really cursed and they just
want me to touch it and die immediately.
I don't know. So it's not like a fake Hope
diamond, you have the Hope diamond.
Right. Well, not that I know of.
I don't think I was smart enoughat that age to be stealing
anything from anywhere. All right, so let's do one more.
I'm going to do. Oceans.
(05:24):
Oceans, Nick, whatever it was, 13 or 14.
The great, the Great Mogul, the vanishing giants discovered in
the 17th century in India. We got a theme here.
I787 carat diamond was given to Mogul Emperor Shah Jahan, the
builder of the Taj Mahal. Nice little snippet right there.
It was later shown to a French traveller, but after the Persian
invasion of Delhi, it vanished without a trace.
Some believe it was recut, but no one knows.
(05:46):
What happened to a 787 carat diamond.
Where did it go? Where did it go?
Did we cut that diamond to have this right here?
The world may never know. So all right, so we talked about
like, obviously the allure of them is there nothing worth
something? Doesn't have some crazy
backstories, right? Every one of these, whether it's
the Illuminati, Rolex, like whatever the stories are, that's
(06:06):
where this, that's where this comes from.
Talk a little bit about as a kidgrowing up, you know, early
memories of your dad talking about diamonds because I'm sure,
but like you said, he sees them every day.
So it took something special to really talk about it.
Talk about those and talk about some of the crazy things you've
seen since you've taken the business over in the past, you
know, 10-15 years or so. For sure.
So I mean, one of the awesome stories that, you know, he
(06:26):
always came back home with rightfrom his trips overseas when he
would go and buy rough. And now that I've gotten into
the business and I've seen a boxer rough, he always just
said, oh, I bought a box today, bought a box today.
What is a box? Yeah.
Like, what does that even mean? Is it cardboard?
What is going on here? Come to find out late and I was
just a kid. I didn't we didn't ask too many
questions, right. My dad also would look at you
(06:46):
like, don't ask. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah. You don't want to know about
the. Box you don't want about.
In seven, you don't want to knowwhat's in the box.
You don't want to know what's inthe box.
What's in the box? You know, getting into the
business, it's like, Oh my goodness, it's just these rough
diamonds. They don't look pretty.
They don't look good. And oh, by the way, the box was
two and a half million dollars. Oh shit.
And travelling around with it. In the.
(07:07):
Airport 80s, yeah, but there's no TSA.
There's no anything. Unbelievable.
That's right. Well, there there are people and
you need to know who to give certain things to certain
people. Got it.
You know, especially in the Russian markets and things of
that nature. So some crazy stories on that
and getting in and out of airports.
And I believe, you know, I don'tknow if I can really get into
that on this show. But you know, the the idea
(07:29):
though, of these rocks and that didn't even look pretty and they
weren't even ready. And how we do it now, right, is,
you know, we'll buy a Boxer Rough and we'll say, OK, yeah,
just ship it to Israel. We'll cut it there, then ship it
over here. No big deal.
And you just leave a couple 1,000,000 bucks with somebody
and you're like, all right, they'll take care of it.
Yeah. And I just read actually.
So the first official article that I saw on like big name news
(07:51):
was about diamonds. And it said that the path they
travel is so complex and complicated that a tariff in any
one of those places will throw the whole chain off and could
actually increase the prices by 333 times what the actual tariff
is because they're traveling so much.
Because once into infrastructureis made, if you break that
chain, not everybody has to take.
India doesn't have technology tomine them, cut them, put them
(08:12):
out, market them all together. It's such a big web that's been
created. For sure.
Listen, it's going minimum through three countries when
we're talking about the States here, right?
And so it's really something very interesting.
You can be talking about four and five, Yeah, before it gets
to the end country. And the argument is when is it a
stone and when is it a product, right.
When it's uncut. Yes, I understand that it is
(08:32):
actually something of value, butit is still in theory a
commodity until it is cut. Like aluminum is not worth
anything until they process the alumina to make aluminium, but
it's not anything until they do that.
So that's they become a part of the argument.
For sure. And for us in the commercial
trade, it's like, you know, whendoes it become for us because we
can only use a polished diamond,right?
We're not in the industrial trade.
(08:54):
We're not, you know, using it tocut other things.
So cutting diamond cut, you know, that also comes into the,
the tariff conversation. But, you know, going back to my
dad and like when those diamondswere cut and when they came into
the store, I remember being herewhen I was 1617 years old.
I was in high school and my dad opened up the box and.
I need that one to impress Becky, the nicest Jewish girl at
(09:14):
the temple, and I need to impress her dad.
They. Trained him early, especially
they trained. Him.
They trained him early, that I know from my time in Long
Island. Her dad owns.
Yeah, the Knicks let me go to. There it is.
You know, that's one carat little Wieder stone uncut, Yeah.
And I'm hearing these noises over at the desk.
Amazing. Like, what is going on over
there, right? Yeah, yeah.
And it was just the process, right, that he had bought these
(09:37):
ugly rocks, to be quite honest with you, right?
Spend a couple $1,000,000 on them.
But now here they're arriving intheir polished state in this
beautiful look and cut to perfection.
I mean, that's what that's what his whole shtick was here,
right? Is that and that's and that's
what this diamond is that that'sthis.
This shows you not to get on a tangent, but you know.
(09:57):
This whole show is tangents, don't worry.
You're right. You know, Tiffany's, Harry
Winston, Graf, all of these stores have the best diamonds in
the world because they are so picky.
But a lot of people think, oh, that's the only place you can
get them. Yeah, well, no, I've got one
right here in my hand. So it's really So what what his
whole story was is that when he got the this rough, you know, he
(10:19):
took so much time on the front end to cut them to perfection.
And when he saw him, I mean, I don't think he was that excited
when I was born, but when these diamonds came through.
And I can have more of you. I can't make more of these.
It really it was, it was, it wasa really cool moment for me.
And I saw his, he didn't love running a business.
(10:40):
He loved running the diamond business.
And that was, that was really cool to see.
I think you know what they say, if you love what you do, you've
never worked a day in your life.And yeah, I, I think, you know,
as hard as my father worked, no,I don't.
I don't think he ever felt that way, 'cause he just, he loved,
Yeah. His diamond so, so talk about
now let's kind of Fast forward to now, like let's talk about
being the wholesaler and people coming in and literally, and
(11:02):
I've seen it like coming in withthe suitcases of diamonds and
trying to sell them and there's I don't want to say there's
fraud, but like, you know, everyone thinks the things they
own are the greatest. Like if someone had said to your
dad that that diamond, he lookedit was not flaws about get get
the fuck out of here yeah, get out of here, get out of my
office right. So because you take a personal
attachment, it's a psychologicalthing.
It has nothing to do with being mischievous or devious.
But talk about when people come in here, talk about how
(11:22):
discerning you have to be into picking out which diamonds
eventually make it to the floor.Talk about the international
trade, how you and Romney like. Because I have to imagine from
where you're sitting, that's such a big part of the business,
but it's part that's often overlooked because of all the
other logistical challenges withrunning a modern business.
Yeah, so I mean, we're never doing anything.
Oh, we need a 2 carat. Let's just get one right?
(11:44):
That's never happening. So like you, we just said we're
going to be extremely picky. We're going to look through 15
of the exact same 2 carats before we pick one for stock.
And a lot of this has got to be,there's got to be some level of
subjectivity, right? Like you're picking diamonds
that you believe. I know there's objective, I know
there's certifications, but there's still different, There's
still subjectivity. You couldn't be more spot on.
(12:04):
So the Gia is a guide for us. Yeah.
They're humans. You know, when I was in Gia,
like, I was there in the lab, like, seeing it all happening.
It's just, you know, it's Jaron Solomon sitting there.
Yeah. Grading diamonds.
So it's really something that we're looking at and saying, oh,
wow, is that the best SI 1? Is that the best SI 2?
And we're not going to get nerdyon diamonds in this episode.
Yeah, Yeah. But it is something that we're
(12:26):
really looking at hard and making sure we're picking the
absolute cream of the crop because that's what Salomon.
Brothers and and look, we have the advantage of being so
established for so long and having a wholesale company that
owns so many diamonds that you're able to be discerning,
right? We're not some little ragtag
bunch that's selling diamonds aswe buy them and give them to
people and like so. Let's talk about that for a
quick second, because there we go, I set them up.
(12:47):
Perfectly. We didn't even plan this.
So that's pretty hysterical, right?
The the wholesale business and Ican talk about now because, you
know, it's not being done as much anymore, but a little bit.
I also don't want people to like, you know, go find
wholesale men and, you know, hitthem over the head.
So please. But the hysterical way of
travelling with diamonds, right?I mean, they're, they're they're
small, right? I don't know if our viewers can
(13:08):
see this on the screen, but like, you know, this, this is,
you know how diamonds come? I mean, I remember my dad would
say, yeah, take a look at that one.
Take a look at that one right? You could be thrown around 50
grand. Like it's not like it's nothing.
It's like chips and veins. What do we just throw around or
carat Radiance $32,000 There yougo, you know, funny.
And in the wholesale trade that like you're going, you're
sitting across the table with people.
(13:29):
And they're all characters. I mean, from everyone I've
walked in here, some of the mostfat I love.
I love our buddy who brings a tiramisu every time.
Like just characters? What I have for you today, Nick,
what I have and the way they. The way they talk, you hear in
literally 6 seconds later, fuck you, fuck you dude.
How's your mom? Like it's, it's just an, it's
just a fascinating conversation.Yeah, You know, it's a, you know
(13:50):
what, the diamond, don't take the diamond, but it's a great
price. No, I mean it's a fun business.
It's a trust business. But because we're trained and we
know what we're looking at, we don't necessarily have to listen
to the person across the table. They don't necessarily have to
listen to us. But our customers that we are
selling to on the wholesale sideare really cool customers in the
Alabamas and Louisiana's and Mississippi's and and they put a
(14:11):
lot of trust, yeah, in my dad inISL, our wholesale company.
And they do, they go to the table and say I need a two care
and they say what do you have? And they're trusting us that
we're giving them a nice two care or a nice. 1 And I bet you
based on what I know about commodities and these industries
as a whole, they've worked with so many bad actors and that
honesty and integrity, once you get it is really hard to lose.
And it's important to you and toyour to, it was important to
(14:34):
your dad because again, in any of these industries, like you
can just be a company and changecompany names.
You can be incorporated in been in like there's so many ways to
get around this because there's so much money at stake.
So that that integrity and trust, I mean, it's, it's
almost, it's almost like being part of the family.
You have to be that way. It has to be and it's imperative
with such a blind item. Just it's, it's so difficult.
(14:56):
And the trust factor. I mean, I think that that's if
someone asks me like, Hey, what are you most grateful for about
taking over this company and what did your dad do?
100% unequivocally building trust with our consumer base on
the wholesale and the retail side because you have to have.
Trust, and I think it's unbelievable because it's
something everyone says. So there's a lot of research
(15:16):
being done now about when the market switch from market
forces, which is money, to social forces and when things
are booming. That's the State Farm.
Like a good neighbor, they want to be there for you.
Customer service is great. For the record, we're going back
to a market economy. Has anyone ever able to get on
the phone? Nobody cares about you.
It's a garbage experience everywhere you go.
And they're trying to charge money.
So we switched back to market forces now.
(15:37):
So what I have found is, is thattrust is that much more
important. But also people's guard is up so
much higher. And we have put so much
bureaucracy in place to stop youfrom doing the action.
How many times have you just slammed your phone on the ground
and say, fuck it, I'm just goingto eat the 100 bucks I don't
have? And like, they do it on purpose.
And even we had that mistake. We wanted to put AI in place to
answer the phone and it does a great job, but it was impeding
(15:59):
the process of a human being geton the phone.
So we immediately cancelled it. And like, look, I don't think
anyone's going to hold it against us to try to be better
customer service, but you have to walk that line of like, if
it's not ready, it's not ready. If it's not perfect, it's not
perfect. So and the, the intention is
everything, right. We did it with the intention of
trying to make the customer experience better.
And the moment that we saw it wasn't making the customer
(16:20):
experience better, we nixed it. Well.
It wasn't the moment because thecompany we were dealing with had
a helpline across the country, that we had to get hold of six
different people to finally get something, even though I used 17
exclamation points. But Call Rail does a great job
as soon as. We could as soon.
As we could. All right, so let's finish with
this. So talk a little bit about, you
know, again, this is so subjective.
Everybody's got a favorite kind of diamond.
(16:40):
But talk a little bit about which two or three you like the
best and why. And this is not a sales pitch.
I'm not saying for the customers, I'm saying which ones
you like the best and what aboutthem?
I've seen a lot of these East West, the ones that are kind of
elongated and laid out that way.Now just for a little bit of
different, and I know styles andtrends, but there's also
probably some that have just been eternal.
So talk a little bit about whichcuts you like the best and which
(17:02):
cuts tend to lend themselves themost to these type of flawless
and really nice high end diamonds.
Yeah. So a lot there to unpack because
I'm pretty passionate about the topic, but I'll stick with the.
So we'll do a whole episode about this.
So you're now teasing a future episode.
For a jeweler round diamond is always going to be their
favorite. Not necessarily in look, but I
(17:23):
should say to a diamond guy, right, maybe to owners of other
retail companies this doesn't matter so much, but to a
wholesale diamond manufacturer in in our background.
Is that the simplicity of it? Is that?
The symmetry of it, right? You know, again, we're not going
to nerd island diamonds, but theGI only gives a cut grade on a
round diamond. And that is because we can tell
that if it is perfect or not in an emerald cut.
(17:44):
This beautiful, flawless emeraldcut I have here.
You know, I think a 145 ratio isabout perfect, but some people
might want a 150 to make it longer and narrower or A1.
We're not going to go so deep into this, but the answer to the
question is a round diamond has a perfect table, has a perfect
depth, has a perfect crown, has a perfect pavilion, has a
perfect lower. I know I'm talking gibberish,
(18:06):
but that is why. And we can get the perfect light
performance because what does every girl want to see?
They want to see sparkle. Of course.
We want to get as big as we can and we can.
We had someone in here the otherday and one of the sales folks
in there was like trying to figure out what they were
looking for. And, you know, the lady kept
saying, I, I, I want sparkly. I, I want, I want the nicest
(18:28):
diamond. And so the salesperson thought,
you know, it needs to be colorless.
It needs to be flawless. And it was like, no, it needs to
be big. But a diamond can't just be big.
It has to sparkle. If it doesn't sparkle, all bets
are and. It actually draws more attention
to the non sparkleness the bigger it is, right?
Right. If it's bigger and it doesn't
sparkle, then you're not supposed to catch the from
(18:49):
across the room. On a good diamond and a little
one, even you can catch that sparkle, yes, if it's if it's
big and and had doesn't have that and that's probably the
internal colours and the the theangles and everything.
Well, it's really fascinating because to I don't want to get
too technical, so I'm going to try and simplify.
I don't. Even know what's going to happen
when we do the technical episode, I'd probably get people
to look for like 3 minutes then or we'll put like a talking head
(19:11):
over him or something to make. It but a six carat piece of
rough right can be cut down to A4.
Carat can be cut down to A Threecan be cut down to A2.
But you want to make more money that way.
You want to be. You want to be economical,
right? So you, you actually want to
find out. And again, we can do this on a
later episode to actually, I mean, this is what we do.
This was our strategic advantagein what we did.
We made our money on front end, never on the consumer.
(19:34):
Actually we made it on the market.
So we were buying at $5 when everyone else was buying at 10.
And so that that's really how webecame who we are.
Got it. And.
That's more like a commodity trader, right?
You're hedging your bents against future.
You're trying to buy low, sell high.
I mean, that's again that saves the consumer money.
It is, but it's but it's very technical because someone that
would take that 6 carat and cut it down to a four when they
(19:55):
would have made more money in the market, you know, so you
just got to figure out. So what happens on a big diamond
sometimes is people don't cut itto perfection.
They cut corners to keep the size.
Got it. And they're praying on people
that are are just saying out there, well, I just want a big.
Diamond Well, we're here for youand we've got them and we had it
the other day for this customer,but I refuse and my father
(20:17):
refused to bend on the actual cut.
So we're going to cut it so thatit has the optimal sparkle.
So that's why I and you're. Foregoing.
Lens to that the. Raw material to cut it because
you're cutting off of it. So in theory, if you had six to
make it perfect, you got to go to 5.
Some people will just keep it atsix and cut the end and just
sell it as a six carat. And it's not being deceitful
because again, it's it's it's subjective, but you're what
(20:38):
you're trying to do is say to make this the best, this diamond
for this end consumer. It should be A5 carat diamond
cut this way right? Not a six cut with cutting
corners. And then it gets far more
complicated because now you got to figure out what shape to cut
it in. So like.
So certain diamonds lend themselves, so you.
Haven't what shape was the roughwow and so.
Grain and everything. Oh my.
Goodness. Because maybe out of a six carat
(20:58):
piece of rough, just to continueon that analogy, you maybe could
get 22 carat square stones to equal the four.
And is that better for you than A4 carat 1 stone?
Let me ask you this question because we're we're going to end
here because there's so many more ways to go at this point.
But have we allowed, are we doing, are we using computers?
Are we letting a computer scan adiamond and show the optimal way
(21:18):
to cut it? Has AI come into this?
Are we? Doing that, we are now.
We are now does. That help or hurt the industry?
What do you think? It helps everyone else.
It hurt us a little bit because it was our strategic advantage
that hey, you were doing this all by hand, got it You, you had
a marker you were marking got itwhere the cutter needed to go
in. So it it was just but I'm sure
(21:39):
you. Also, so if you use AI as the
guide, you can see what the gapsare in the AI and can use your
eye to adjust, which gives you still gives you a competitive
advantage because you've seen itthe other way.
But now, 2 generations from now,there's not going to be a human
being on Earth that's cutting itby hand.
Not cutting it by hand and also when they're analyzing it, yeah,
right. They're just putting it on a
machine and saying that question, do I cut it from a six
carat to 22 carats or 1/4 carat?That's answered by the machine
(22:02):
now. Yeah, and you can probably put
into the machine is it for optimal cut or optimal money?
And it can probably give you 2 different models of how to lay
it. Out that will, but yes that that
is coming. Yeah, and just on your
preferences and then the machinewill learn on your preferences.
So you'll just put rough on there.
It'll be doing it. You'll probably get a machine
that'll scan it and cut it for you overnight at some point.
I mean like these things are coming.
This is how this. Works laser cutting is is here
(22:23):
and it's coming in a bigger and bigger way.
The only reason why it hasn't taken over is because, you know,
even though you think lasers will be perfect, there's little
things that can be done while you're cutting and say, oh, you
know what, I can actually save that.
And God forbid you should cut that and it becomes 395 instead
of four. Got it.
You know, so there's, there's still a little nuance in it.
(22:46):
But yeah, it will get figured out.
Yeah. No, I love it and I think that's
the future of Diamonds is probably going to be a whole
crazy episode in itself. But right, so we covered a lot.
I think quick recap, we have a killer diamond right here.
This is one-of-a-kind that you don't get.
We do have pricing power to be able to get this, but this is a
passion point as you can tell. I mean Jaron, we literally sat
and talked about the rest of theyear in marketing.
He looked at me like I had 6 heads, just said get get me, let
(23:07):
me get out of this office, left and then came back in for a
longer and tell me about this diamond.
So gives the idea of the passionthat goes behind it and, and
just that the nature of it, it'scrazy.
But it's also this is that emotional connection that has
made diamonds something that areso sought after, which is also
why we buy diamonds back at fullprice because we know this back
story is built. And they will be something that
will be that will be in the lexicon of human beings forever,
(23:29):
which is a very powerful tool, Ithink.
Yeah. And listen, call me sappy for
buying into it. And I know I have a huge and
vested interest in this. You know, this is these
diamonds. They're special.
They're rare. There's not a lot of them.
We will be going through them. You know, someone was saying,
you know, take the Australian mine.
You know, that's completely dry now.
The deposit's done, right? So you're not even getting
(23:50):
diamonds out of Australia anymore.
And so these things actually arerare.
And when you give it to your loved one as a gift, as an
engagement ring, it does have a symbol of forever and it does
have a symbol of rarity and thatshe or he is special, whatever
it may be, you know, I don't care.
The point being is that it is a moment in time that you're
(24:12):
taking something that took a billion in years to get to the
surface. You're cutting it to perfection.
Now I'm able to see them give itto their loved one.
It's just a it's just a special moment.
And you know, I wouldn't trade it for anything.
And the the diamond truly is an incredible way to to be a symbol
of love and a symbol in the family.
You read a couple of just crazy stories, you know, diamonds that
(24:33):
have been passed down for for somany years and ends up in this.
Countries like criminals and kings and, you know, probably
one of the same in most places. But yeah, no, it's fascinating.
You know, all I'm going to say is that it's a shame that the
way we are when you come of age to be 25 is when you have the
least money, but you're buying something so important.
So these backstories don't matter, right?
(24:54):
Like when you finally had the girl that that wrangles you in
and to get married, you're more concerned with, Oh my God, am I
really giving up my freedom and the rest of my life then you
are? I have to make this diamond the
most special thing. And what I encourage people get
in again, don't even shop with us.
Don't buy a diamond online. If it is something with so much
value, go touch and feel it, look into it, ask questions and
hopefully this education, not even about the technical stuff
(25:15):
but just about some of this backstory stuff will encourage you
to do that. So you've been listening to
Legacy of Luxury and we will catch you next time.
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Now let's explore the legacy of luxury with Salomon Brothers
Jewelers. Welcome to Legacy of Luxury.
So another one of an episode we were going to do later.
Well, we're going to talk diamonds today, but there's a
story and a reason we are and we're going to approach this a
(01:03):
little differently and kind of tell some crazy stories about
diamonds because I feel like to the masses, they think
engagement rings and maybe the hope diamond here.
But there's so many crazy stories.
And I bet you, Jaron, you and your family, your dad, you've
heard them growing up. So before we get to that, let's
talk about why we're doing this.Talk a little bit about what you
got in front of you and why it is so special.
(01:24):
Yeah, well, Nick, it's not easy to get you off topics.
Yesterday I walked in with a diamond that I, you know, think
is super special, and I think you even saw it.
Like, I'm excited about a diamond and you're like, shit,
Jaron. Like, you see diamonds every
day. Yeah.
What's so special about this diamond?
Yeah, and it was like his nips were hard when he walked in
here. Hard as the Diamond A.
Pen on the most saleable. And on the scale of hardness for
(01:47):
his nips for this one. But but, and again, I as a
layman, the way you explained itpercentage wise, we're talking
like the top 001 percent of diamonds here and go into it a
little bit why it's so special. Sure.
So this diamond right here, you know, emerald cut diamond 2.73
carats E colour. So colourless.
Yeah, flawless. OK, great.
(02:09):
Even that would be impressive. Impressive amongst itself.
But I've been spoiled. I've been doing this a long
time. My dad's been in the business a
long time. Seeing a flawless diamond.
Yeah, yeah, they have to. It happens.
Yeah, I'm not saying it happens all day long.
And it absolutely is an investment grade stone being
just flawless itself, right. So nothing going on in here.
No imperfections. Now, usually comes with a GI, a
(02:31):
certificate like all of our diamonds do.
And it says right here, I'm reading the back of it for those
of you that are watching here and E flawless, excellent,
excellent, no fluorescence, chef's kiss, everything OK.
But what makes it special? It comes with another
certificate from Gia, which is pretty cool.
And basically this certificate is saying that it is a type 2A
(02:51):
diamond, which is like we just said, less than 2% of all the
rough coming out of the earth isa type 2A rough.
So this is going to be as rare of carbon as you can find.
Got it. Got it.
And this is the chemical coming Galaxy, chemical composition of
it, yes. So it's mostly carbon.
It is pure in essence, as pure as it comes.
Yes. So that's why you'll see that
(03:14):
Type 2A is pretty much going to come in colorless diamonds and
flawless and internally flawlessdiamonds because it's just such
a pure rock coming out of the grounds.
It'd be somewhat. You still have to cut it.
You still have to do all of the crazy things.
So Type 2A doesn't always translate to flawless and
perfect. So this is the perfect storm of
the two things coming together. Absolutely, which is why it's
just so rare. So this diamond, everyone's
(03:36):
heard of the Hope Diamond. I think the Hope Diamond is type
2A. It's why it's one of the most
well known diamonds because of its size, but also because of
its purity. The investment, when people talk
about investment like you and I have talked before and we like
the bullshit around like hey, does De Beers, you know, is it
really rare? Are they holding back diamonds?
(03:56):
They flood the market. And that's a big thing now, is
that artificial supply to man curve watchmakers do it.
We know it. Rolex has been doing it forever.
If you can and not have anyone know how much supply is out
there, it is easier to regulate demand.
It goes bad sometimes because then all of a sudden you're
stuck with too much supply. But yes.
Yeah. But the reason why this makes me
excited is because this truly issupply and demand at its truest
(04:19):
sense. Yeah, there is just not supply
out there. The.
Earth is not making them. The Earth is not making them.
And it would be if let's say we took all of them out of the
Earth right now, it would take 10s of thousands of years to
make more of them just because of the process of the carbon and
the pressurization. Yeah, of it.
So Speaking of the Hope Diamond,I got some pretty crazy stories
about diamonds here. So let's start with the Hope
(04:40):
Diamond. So deep blue diamond, it says,
infamous for its alleged curse. Of course, that has a curse on
it. It originated from the Calor
mine in India, passed through the hands of King Louis the
14th, a couple other American heiresses.
But legend has it that every owner suffered misfortune or
death when they had it, including beheadings in the
French Revolution and financial ruin.
Today it's in the Smithsonian, which ironically I was valeting
(05:03):
in DC once and I got surprisingly close to it while
the museum was closed without even being background checked.
So either they got some, either it's really cursed and they just
want me to touch it and die immediately.
I don't know. So it's not like a fake Hope
diamond, you have the Hope diamond.
Right. Well, not that I know of.
I don't think I was smart enoughat that age to be stealing
anything from anywhere. All right, so let's do one more.
I'm going to do. Oceans.
(05:24):
Oceans, Nick, whatever it was, 13 or 14.
The great, the Great Mogul, the vanishing giants discovered in
the 17th century in India. We got a theme here.
I787 carat diamond was given to Mogul Emperor Shah Jahan, the
builder of the Taj Mahal. Nice little snippet right there.
It was later shown to a French traveller, but after the Persian
invasion of Delhi, it vanished without a trace.
Some believe it was recut, but no one knows.
(05:46):
What happened to a 787 carat diamond.
Where did it go? Where did it go?
Did we cut that diamond to have this right here?
The world may never know. So all right, so we talked about
like, obviously the allure of them is there nothing worth
something? Doesn't have some crazy
backstories, right? Every one of these, whether it's
the Illuminati, Rolex, like whatever the stories are, that's
(06:06):
where this, that's where this comes from.
Talk a little bit about as a kidgrowing up, you know, early
memories of your dad talking about diamonds because I'm sure,
but like you said, he sees them every day.
So it took something special to really talk about it.
Talk about those and talk about some of the crazy things you've
seen since you've taken the business over in the past, you
know, 10-15 years or so. For sure.
So I mean, one of the awesome stories that, you know, he
(06:26):
always came back home with rightfrom his trips overseas when he
would go and buy rough. And now that I've gotten into
the business and I've seen a boxer rough, he always just
said, oh, I bought a box today, bought a box today.
What is a box? Yeah.
Like, what does that even mean? Is it cardboard?
What is going on here? Come to find out late and I was
just a kid. I didn't we didn't ask too many
questions, right. My dad also would look at you
(06:46):
like, don't ask. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah. You don't want to know about
the. Box you don't want about.
In seven, you don't want to knowwhat's in the box.
You don't want to know what's inthe box.
What's in the box? You know, getting into the
business, it's like, Oh my goodness, it's just these rough
diamonds. They don't look pretty.
They don't look good. And oh, by the way, the box was
two and a half million dollars. Oh shit.
And travelling around with it. In the.
(07:07):
Airport 80s, yeah, but there's no TSA.
There's no anything. Unbelievable.
That's right. Well, there there are people and
you need to know who to give certain things to certain
people. Got it.
You know, especially in the Russian markets and things of
that nature. So some crazy stories on that
and getting in and out of airports.
And I believe, you know, I don'tknow if I can really get into
that on this show. But you know, the the idea
(07:29):
though, of these rocks and that didn't even look pretty and they
weren't even ready. And how we do it now, right, is,
you know, we'll buy a Boxer Rough and we'll say, OK, yeah,
just ship it to Israel. We'll cut it there, then ship it
over here. No big deal.
And you just leave a couple 1,000,000 bucks with somebody
and you're like, all right, they'll take care of it.
Yeah. And I just read actually.
So the first official article that I saw on like big name news
(07:51):
was about diamonds. And it said that the path they
travel is so complex and complicated that a tariff in any
one of those places will throw the whole chain off and could
actually increase the prices by 333 times what the actual tariff
is because they're traveling so much.
Because once into infrastructureis made, if you break that
chain, not everybody has to take.
India doesn't have technology tomine them, cut them, put them
(08:12):
out, market them all together. It's such a big web that's been
created. For sure.
Listen, it's going minimum through three countries when
we're talking about the States here, right?
And so it's really something very interesting.
You can be talking about four and five, Yeah, before it gets
to the end country. And the argument is when is it a
stone and when is it a product, right.
When it's uncut. Yes, I understand that it is
(08:32):
actually something of value, butit is still in theory a
commodity until it is cut. Like aluminum is not worth
anything until they process the alumina to make aluminium, but
it's not anything until they do that.
So that's they become a part of the argument.
For sure. And for us in the commercial
trade, it's like, you know, whendoes it become for us because we
can only use a polished diamond,right?
We're not in the industrial trade.
(08:54):
We're not, you know, using it tocut other things.
So cutting diamond cut, you know, that also comes into the,
the tariff conversation. But, you know, going back to my
dad and like when those diamondswere cut and when they came into
the store, I remember being herewhen I was 1617 years old.
I was in high school and my dad opened up the box and.
I need that one to impress Becky, the nicest Jewish girl at
(09:14):
the temple, and I need to impress her dad.
They. Trained him early, especially
they trained. Him.
They trained him early, that I know from my time in Long
Island. Her dad owns.
Yeah, the Knicks let me go to. There it is.
You know, that's one carat little Wieder stone uncut, Yeah.
And I'm hearing these noises over at the desk.
Amazing. Like, what is going on over
there, right? Yeah, yeah.
And it was just the process, right, that he had bought these
(09:37):
ugly rocks, to be quite honest with you, right?
Spend a couple $1,000,000 on them.
But now here they're arriving intheir polished state in this
beautiful look and cut to perfection.
I mean, that's what that's what his whole shtick was here,
right? Is that and that's and that's
what this diamond is that that'sthis.
This shows you not to get on a tangent, but you know.
(09:57):
This whole show is tangents, don't worry.
You're right. You know, Tiffany's, Harry
Winston, Graf, all of these stores have the best diamonds in
the world because they are so picky.
But a lot of people think, oh, that's the only place you can
get them. Yeah, well, no, I've got one
right here in my hand. So it's really So what what his
whole story was is that when he got the this rough, you know, he
(10:19):
took so much time on the front end to cut them to perfection.
And when he saw him, I mean, I don't think he was that excited
when I was born, but when these diamonds came through.
And I can have more of you. I can't make more of these.
It really it was, it was, it wasa really cool moment for me.
And I saw his, he didn't love running a business.
(10:40):
He loved running the diamond business.
And that was, that was really cool to see.
I think you know what they say, if you love what you do, you've
never worked a day in your life.And yeah, I, I think, you know,
as hard as my father worked, no,I don't.
I don't think he ever felt that way, 'cause he just, he loved,
Yeah. His diamond so, so talk about
now let's kind of Fast forward to now, like let's talk about
being the wholesaler and people coming in and literally, and
(11:02):
I've seen it like coming in withthe suitcases of diamonds and
trying to sell them and there's I don't want to say there's
fraud, but like, you know, everyone thinks the things they
own are the greatest. Like if someone had said to your
dad that that diamond, he lookedit was not flaws about get get
the fuck out of here yeah, get out of here, get out of my
office right. So because you take a personal
attachment, it's a psychologicalthing.
It has nothing to do with being mischievous or devious.
But talk about when people come in here, talk about how
(11:22):
discerning you have to be into picking out which diamonds
eventually make it to the floor.Talk about the international
trade, how you and Romney like. Because I have to imagine from
where you're sitting, that's such a big part of the business,
but it's part that's often overlooked because of all the
other logistical challenges withrunning a modern business.
Yeah, so I mean, we're never doing anything.
Oh, we need a 2 carat. Let's just get one right?
(11:44):
That's never happening. So like you, we just said we're
going to be extremely picky. We're going to look through 15
of the exact same 2 carats before we pick one for stock.
And a lot of this has got to be,there's got to be some level of
subjectivity, right? Like you're picking diamonds
that you believe. I know there's objective, I know
there's certifications, but there's still different, There's
still subjectivity. You couldn't be more spot on.
(12:04):
So the Gia is a guide for us. Yeah.
They're humans. You know, when I was in Gia,
like, I was there in the lab, like, seeing it all happening.
It's just, you know, it's Jaron Solomon sitting there.
Yeah. Grading diamonds.
So it's really something that we're looking at and saying, oh,
wow, is that the best SI 1? Is that the best SI 2?
And we're not going to get nerdyon diamonds in this episode.
Yeah, Yeah. But it is something that we're
(12:26):
really looking at hard and making sure we're picking the
absolute cream of the crop because that's what Salomon.
Brothers and and look, we have the advantage of being so
established for so long and having a wholesale company that
owns so many diamonds that you're able to be discerning,
right? We're not some little ragtag
bunch that's selling diamonds aswe buy them and give them to
people and like so. Let's talk about that for a
quick second, because there we go, I set them up.
(12:47):
Perfectly. We didn't even plan this.
So that's pretty hysterical, right?
The the wholesale business and Ican talk about now because, you
know, it's not being done as much anymore, but a little bit.
I also don't want people to like, you know, go find
wholesale men and, you know, hitthem over the head.
So please. But the hysterical way of
travelling with diamonds, right?I mean, they're, they're they're
small, right? I don't know if our viewers can
(13:08):
see this on the screen, but like, you know, this, this is,
you know how diamonds come? I mean, I remember my dad would
say, yeah, take a look at that one.
Take a look at that one right? You could be thrown around 50
grand. Like it's not like it's nothing.
It's like chips and veins. What do we just throw around or
carat Radiance $32,000 There yougo, you know, funny.
And in the wholesale trade that like you're going, you're
sitting across the table with people.
(13:29):
And they're all characters. I mean, from everyone I've
walked in here, some of the mostfat I love.
I love our buddy who brings a tiramisu every time.
Like just characters? What I have for you today, Nick,
what I have and the way they. The way they talk, you hear in
literally 6 seconds later, fuck you, fuck you dude.
How's your mom? Like it's, it's just an, it's
just a fascinating conversation.Yeah, You know, it's a, you know
(13:50):
what, the diamond, don't take the diamond, but it's a great
price. No, I mean it's a fun business.
It's a trust business. But because we're trained and we
know what we're looking at, we don't necessarily have to listen
to the person across the table. They don't necessarily have to
listen to us. But our customers that we are
selling to on the wholesale sideare really cool customers in the
Alabamas and Louisiana's and Mississippi's and and they put a
(14:11):
lot of trust, yeah, in my dad inISL, our wholesale company.
And they do, they go to the table and say I need a two care
and they say what do you have? And they're trusting us that
we're giving them a nice two care or a nice. 1 And I bet you
based on what I know about commodities and these industries
as a whole, they've worked with so many bad actors and that
honesty and integrity, once you get it is really hard to lose.
And it's important to you and toyour to, it was important to
(14:34):
your dad because again, in any of these industries, like you
can just be a company and changecompany names.
You can be incorporated in been in like there's so many ways to
get around this because there's so much money at stake.
So that that integrity and trust, I mean, it's, it's
almost, it's almost like being part of the family.
You have to be that way. It has to be and it's imperative
with such a blind item. Just it's, it's so difficult.
(14:56):
And the trust factor. I mean, I think that that's if
someone asks me like, Hey, what are you most grateful for about
taking over this company and what did your dad do?
100% unequivocally building trust with our consumer base on
the wholesale and the retail side because you have to have.
Trust, and I think it's unbelievable because it's
something everyone says. So there's a lot of research
(15:16):
being done now about when the market switch from market
forces, which is money, to social forces and when things
are booming. That's the State Farm.
Like a good neighbor, they want to be there for you.
Customer service is great. For the record, we're going back
to a market economy. Has anyone ever able to get on
the phone? Nobody cares about you.
It's a garbage experience everywhere you go.
And they're trying to charge money.
So we switched back to market forces now.
(15:37):
So what I have found is, is thattrust is that much more
important. But also people's guard is up so
much higher. And we have put so much
bureaucracy in place to stop youfrom doing the action.
How many times have you just slammed your phone on the ground
and say, fuck it, I'm just goingto eat the 100 bucks I don't
have? And like, they do it on purpose.
And even we had that mistake. We wanted to put AI in place to
answer the phone and it does a great job, but it was impeding
(15:59):
the process of a human being geton the phone.
So we immediately cancelled it. And like, look, I don't think
anyone's going to hold it against us to try to be better
customer service, but you have to walk that line of like, if
it's not ready, it's not ready. If it's not perfect, it's not
perfect. So and the, the intention is
everything, right. We did it with the intention of
trying to make the customer experience better.
And the moment that we saw it wasn't making the customer
(16:20):
experience better, we nixed it. Well.
It wasn't the moment because thecompany we were dealing with had
a helpline across the country, that we had to get hold of six
different people to finally get something, even though I used 17
exclamation points. But Call Rail does a great job
as soon as. We could as soon.
As we could. All right, so let's finish with
this. So talk a little bit about, you
know, again, this is so subjective.
Everybody's got a favorite kind of diamond.
(16:40):
But talk a little bit about which two or three you like the
best and why. And this is not a sales pitch.
I'm not saying for the customers, I'm saying which ones
you like the best and what aboutthem?
I've seen a lot of these East West, the ones that are kind of
elongated and laid out that way.Now just for a little bit of
different, and I know styles andtrends, but there's also
probably some that have just been eternal.
So talk a little bit about whichcuts you like the best and which
(17:02):
cuts tend to lend themselves themost to these type of flawless
and really nice high end diamonds.
Yeah. So a lot there to unpack because
I'm pretty passionate about the topic, but I'll stick with the.
So we'll do a whole episode about this.
So you're now teasing a future episode.
For a jeweler round diamond is always going to be their
favorite. Not necessarily in look, but I
(17:23):
should say to a diamond guy, right, maybe to owners of other
retail companies this doesn't matter so much, but to a
wholesale diamond manufacturer in in our background.
Is that the simplicity of it? Is that?
The symmetry of it, right? You know, again, we're not going
to nerd island diamonds, but theGI only gives a cut grade on a
round diamond. And that is because we can tell
that if it is perfect or not in an emerald cut.
(17:44):
This beautiful, flawless emeraldcut I have here.
You know, I think a 145 ratio isabout perfect, but some people
might want a 150 to make it longer and narrower or A1.
We're not going to go so deep into this, but the answer to the
question is a round diamond has a perfect table, has a perfect
depth, has a perfect crown, has a perfect pavilion, has a
perfect lower. I know I'm talking gibberish,
(18:06):
but that is why. And we can get the perfect light
performance because what does every girl want to see?
They want to see sparkle. Of course.
We want to get as big as we can and we can.
We had someone in here the otherday and one of the sales folks
in there was like trying to figure out what they were
looking for. And, you know, the lady kept
saying, I, I, I want sparkly. I, I want, I want the nicest
(18:28):
diamond. And so the salesperson thought,
you know, it needs to be colorless.
It needs to be flawless. And it was like, no, it needs to
be big. But a diamond can't just be big.
It has to sparkle. If it doesn't sparkle, all bets
are and. It actually draws more attention
to the non sparkleness the bigger it is, right?
Right. If it's bigger and it doesn't
sparkle, then you're not supposed to catch the from
(18:49):
across the room. On a good diamond and a little
one, even you can catch that sparkle, yes, if it's if it's
big and and had doesn't have that and that's probably the
internal colours and the the theangles and everything.
Well, it's really fascinating because to I don't want to get
too technical, so I'm going to try and simplify.
I don't. Even know what's going to happen
when we do the technical episode, I'd probably get people
to look for like 3 minutes then or we'll put like a talking head
(19:11):
over him or something to make. It but a six carat piece of
rough right can be cut down to A4.
Carat can be cut down to A Threecan be cut down to A2.
But you want to make more money that way.
You want to be. You want to be economical,
right? So you, you actually want to
find out. And again, we can do this on a
later episode to actually, I mean, this is what we do.
This was our strategic advantagein what we did.
We made our money on front end, never on the consumer.
(19:34):
Actually we made it on the market.
So we were buying at $5 when everyone else was buying at 10.
And so that that's really how webecame who we are.
Got it. And.
That's more like a commodity trader, right?
You're hedging your bents against future.
You're trying to buy low, sell high.
I mean, that's again that saves the consumer money.
It is, but it's but it's very technical because someone that
would take that 6 carat and cut it down to a four when they
(19:55):
would have made more money in the market, you know, so you
just got to figure out. So what happens on a big diamond
sometimes is people don't cut itto perfection.
They cut corners to keep the size.
Got it. And they're praying on people
that are are just saying out there, well, I just want a big.
Diamond Well, we're here for youand we've got them and we had it
the other day for this customer,but I refuse and my father
(20:17):
refused to bend on the actual cut.
So we're going to cut it so thatit has the optimal sparkle.
So that's why I and you're. Foregoing.
Lens to that the. Raw material to cut it because
you're cutting off of it. So in theory, if you had six to
make it perfect, you got to go to 5.
Some people will just keep it atsix and cut the end and just
sell it as a six carat. And it's not being deceitful
because again, it's it's it's subjective, but you're what
(20:38):
you're trying to do is say to make this the best, this diamond
for this end consumer. It should be A5 carat diamond
cut this way right? Not a six cut with cutting
corners. And then it gets far more
complicated because now you got to figure out what shape to cut
it in. So like.
So certain diamonds lend themselves, so you.
Haven't what shape was the roughwow and so.
Grain and everything. Oh my.
Goodness. Because maybe out of a six carat
(20:58):
piece of rough, just to continueon that analogy, you maybe could
get 22 carat square stones to equal the four.
And is that better for you than A4 carat 1 stone?
Let me ask you this question because we're we're going to end
here because there's so many more ways to go at this point.
But have we allowed, are we doing, are we using computers?
Are we letting a computer scan adiamond and show the optimal way
(21:18):
to cut it? Has AI come into this?
Are we? Doing that, we are now.
We are now does. That help or hurt the industry?
What do you think? It helps everyone else.
It hurt us a little bit because it was our strategic advantage
that hey, you were doing this all by hand, got it You, you had
a marker you were marking got itwhere the cutter needed to go
in. So it it was just but I'm sure
(21:39):
you. Also, so if you use AI as the
guide, you can see what the gapsare in the AI and can use your
eye to adjust, which gives you still gives you a competitive
advantage because you've seen itthe other way.
But now, 2 generations from now,there's not going to be a human
being on Earth that's cutting itby hand.
Not cutting it by hand and also when they're analyzing it, yeah,
right. They're just putting it on a
machine and saying that question, do I cut it from a six
carat to 22 carats or 1/4 carat?That's answered by the machine
(22:02):
now. Yeah, and you can probably put
into the machine is it for optimal cut or optimal money?
And it can probably give you 2 different models of how to lay
it. Out that will, but yes that that
is coming. Yeah, and just on your
preferences and then the machinewill learn on your preferences.
So you'll just put rough on there.
It'll be doing it. You'll probably get a machine
that'll scan it and cut it for you overnight at some point.
I mean like these things are coming.
This is how this. Works laser cutting is is here
(22:23):
and it's coming in a bigger and bigger way.
The only reason why it hasn't taken over is because, you know,
even though you think lasers will be perfect, there's little
things that can be done while you're cutting and say, oh, you
know what, I can actually save that.
And God forbid you should cut that and it becomes 395 instead
of four. Got it.
You know, so there's, there's still a little nuance in it.
(22:46):
But yeah, it will get figured out.
Yeah. No, I love it and I think that's
the future of Diamonds is probably going to be a whole
crazy episode in itself. But right, so we covered a lot.
I think quick recap, we have a killer diamond right here.
This is one-of-a-kind that you don't get.
We do have pricing power to be able to get this, but this is a
passion point as you can tell. I mean Jaron, we literally sat
and talked about the rest of theyear in marketing.
He looked at me like I had 6 heads, just said get get me, let
(23:07):
me get out of this office, left and then came back in for a
longer and tell me about this diamond.
So gives the idea of the passionthat goes behind it and, and
just that the nature of it, it'scrazy.
But it's also this is that emotional connection that has
made diamonds something that areso sought after, which is also
why we buy diamonds back at fullprice because we know this back
story is built. And they will be something that
will be that will be in the lexicon of human beings forever,
(23:29):
which is a very powerful tool, Ithink.
Yeah. And listen, call me sappy for
buying into it. And I know I have a huge and
vested interest in this. You know, this is these
diamonds. They're special.
They're rare. There's not a lot of them.
We will be going through them. You know, someone was saying,
you know, take the Australian mine.
You know, that's completely dry now.
The deposit's done, right? So you're not even getting
(23:50):
diamonds out of Australia anymore.
And so these things actually arerare.
And when you give it to your loved one as a gift, as an
engagement ring, it does have a symbol of forever and it does
have a symbol of rarity and thatshe or he is special, whatever
it may be, you know, I don't care.
The point being is that it is a moment in time that you're
(24:12):
taking something that took a billion in years to get to the
surface. You're cutting it to perfection.
Now I'm able to see them give itto their loved one.
It's just a it's just a special moment.
And you know, I wouldn't trade it for anything.
And the the diamond truly is an incredible way to to be a symbol
of love and a symbol in the family.
You read a couple of just crazy stories, you know, diamonds that
(24:33):
have been passed down for for somany years and ends up in this.
Countries like criminals and kings and, you know, probably
one of the same in most places. But yeah, no, it's fascinating.
You know, all I'm going to say is that it's a shame that the
way we are when you come of age to be 25 is when you have the
least money, but you're buying something so important.
So these backstories don't matter, right?
(24:54):
Like when you finally had the girl that that wrangles you in
and to get married, you're more concerned with, Oh my God, am I
really giving up my freedom and the rest of my life then you
are? I have to make this diamond the
most special thing. And what I encourage people get
in again, don't even shop with us.
Don't buy a diamond online. If it is something with so much
value, go touch and feel it, look into it, ask questions and
hopefully this education, not even about the technical stuff
(25:15):
but just about some of this backstory stuff will encourage you
to do that. So you've been listening to
Legacy of Luxury and we will catch you next time.
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