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 WigJig News
-- AKA Boomer Sez:
Our Spokesdog: If an insurance company can have a gecko, we
have decided that we can have a spokesdog. Boomer, shown at right, is
our spokesdog. If you select Boomer's picture at right, you will be
able to view Boomer at work.
How to Unsubscribe: If you signed up for our newsletter and
then decided you don't want to receive it any more, the proper way to
unsubscribe is to select the "Unsubscribe" link at the bottom of every
newsletter e-mail or to follow our sign up link above. On that sign up
page we also provide a way for people to unsubscribe.
 Birthstone
for April: The birthstone for April is the diamond. Diamonds
are not only the hardest naturally occurring material, but they are one of
the best materials at conducting heat. A diamond is even better than
silver, which is the metal that this the best at conducting heat. This
is the property that jewelers frequently use to differentiate a diamond from
a cubic zirconia. Cubic zirconia, even though they appear very similar
to a diamond, are actually a very poor conductor of heat, or stated another
way that are an insulator with respect to heat. Some jeweler's have a pen
like piece of test equipment that measures the conductivity of heat and they
use this test equipment to differentiate between diamonds and cubic zirconia.
This month we have our
package of two 10mm man-made, round white or clear cubic zirconia
gemstones on sale for 20% off.
Please select here for
more information on diamonds.
Gemstones: Over much of the past year, the price of natural,
uncut gemstones was rising very rapidly. At one point in time, some
jewelers were commenting that the value of uncut stones was rising so fast,
that it did not pay to have the stones cut. One could purchase an
uncut stone and in a few months sell the uncut stone for more than it would
bring after being cut. Please note that this is a temporary phenomena
and was very much brought about because of the decline in the value of the
dollar relative to other currencies. Please note that we believe that
natural gemstones are not going to increase in value as significantly in the
future. We believe that the fact that man-made gemstones like
diamonds, rubies and sapphires are chemically identical to the mined
gemstones and that the quality of the man-made stones in clarity and color
is far superior to the natural gemstones means that over time, people will
not be willing to pay the premium required by natural gemstones.
This past week, we received 27 natural, mined grade AAA aquamarine 6mm round
gemstones from a vendor from India. The stones were relatively
expensive because aquamarine is not as available as more common minerals
like garnet and peridot. The stones have good cut, and clarity, but
unfortunately, the color is unacceptable. These natural aquamarine
gemstones are so lightly colored that they are almost clear. Our
normal pricing for these stones would mean that we would have to sell the
6mm round aquamarines for $48 per pair, when we can sell better quality
man-made aquamarines for $7.99 a pair. At present, we do not intend to
sell the natural aquamarine stones for the simple reason that we don't think
that our customers would be happy with the product.
  Now,
I will finally get to the point. At this time, some people do have a
preference for higher priced, lower quality natural gemstones. We do
believe that this preference is limited. We don't believe that people
would pay $48 for natural aquamarines that look like the ones at left when
they could pay $7.99 for the man-made aquamarines at right. Over the
next 20 years, we believe that man-made gemstones will gain much greater
acceptance and as they do, the prices for natural gemstones won't continue
to rise at the same rate. The bottom line is don't buy a natural
gemstone as an investment. In 20 years, its value probably won't keep
pace with inflation. (If anyone wants to purchase some natural, mined
aquamarine that is more clear than aqua in color,
please send us
an e-mail.)
 New
Item: We have one new item in our store since our last newsletter.
The new item is our gemstone setting pliers. These pliers are made to
set our bling gemstones into all types of setting and do a great job of
allowing anyone to set gemstones
more professionally and faster. At right you can view a small picture
of the side view of the jaws of these pliers. At left, you can view an
enlarged view. The way these pliers work is that the smaller, shorter
jaw has a groove it it. One of the prongs in your gemstone setting is
aligned with this grove. Then the longer jaw of the pliers is used to
bend the tip of the opposite prong in so that it holds the gemstone in the
setting. These pliers work with gemstones up to 12mm in size and are
excellent for helping with setting these larger, more difficult to set
stones. In our next newsletter, we will provide some pictures showing
how to use these pliers.
We also have a couple of items back in stock after being out of stock for a
while. Our natural,
 mined
from the earth garnet and peridot gemstones in the 6mm size are back in
stock now. When we last had these stones in stock, they were very
popular and sold out within about a month. We plan on carrying these
products permanently, but our supplies are limited and we do anticipate that
we will sell out again, before we have more in stock. To view these
items in our Internet store, please select either picture.
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