Rapaport Magazine - May 2019

VOL. 42 NO. 5 MAY 2019

WHAT WOMEN WANT

FOR HER,

BY HER

Working to end discrimination through leadership

HAVING WOMEN IN CHARGE MAKES GOOD BUSINESS SENSE FOR JEWELERS

Fiercely

Female

NO MAN’S

LAND The female pioneers who were integral to major diamond finds

FOUR EXECS SHARE THE SECRETS OF THEIR ROUTE TO THE TOP

May Cover .indd 1

INTERVIEW

RETAIL

GEMSTONE

STYLE

THE WORLD’S OLDEST GEM LAB TAKES A TOUGH LINE ON SYNTHETICS

HOW TO MANAGE CLIENT MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT DIAMONDS

EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT HPHTTREATED SAPPHIRES

A LOOK AT THAILAND’S UP-AND-COMING JEWELRY DESIGNERS

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CO N T E N TS

38 Page

48 Page

STYLE & DESIGN

45 Jewelry Connoisseur Emeralds and diamonds are longtime companions.

46 Style Bangkok’s designers are making a name for themselves internationally.

48 Designer A former antiques dealer, Parisian jeweler Lydia Courteille creates colorful contemporary collections.

50 Legacy

IN-DEPTH 16 News

Industry: AGS Conclave gives cause for optimism.

Retail: Signet reduces mall presence.

Mining: Tough time for rough.

Movers & shakers: Who’s coming, who’s going.

22 Interview

IMAGES: MOCIUN; LYDIA COURTEILLE; PATCHARAVIPA

No man’s land: Pioneering women were instrumental in finding some of the world’s major diamond deposits.

High Pressure-High Temperature (HPHT) treatment can give subpar sapphires a richer hue, but buyers should beware undisclosed stones.

38 Retail profile Caitlin Mociun combines haute style and housewares at her eponymous jewelry store in New York.

40 Retail insight

COVER

43 RetailRap

What women want: Empowering female leaders throughout the industry is an important step toward eradicating discrimination.

Fiercely female: Four women in top posts talk about the paths that led them there, and the challenges along the way.

For her, by her: In a trade that caters to female clients, it pays to have someone at the retail helm who understands them.

52 Colored gemstone

RETAIL

Why doesn’t the world’s oldest gem lab certify synthetic diamonds? Director Aurélien Delaunay explains.

26 Cover story

A new exhibition showcases the meticulously handcrafted micromosaics of the 18th and 19th centuries.

MARKETS & PRICING

Tips on how to create successful in-store events.

Two retailers discuss how they manage misconceptions about buying diamonds.

46 Page

57 Trade report 59 USA 64 India 67 Israel 69 Antwerp 70 Hong Kong 72 Diamond data 77 Price List 89 RapNet price list 94 Directory 98 Calendar 100 The final cut DIAMONDS.NET

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Note from the publisher BEING PROGRESSIVE IS GOOD FOR BUSINESS

IMAGE: BEN KELMER

H

er message was simple but gamechanging for those willing to embrace it: “Business as usual is insufficient.”

These words were delivered by Signet CEO Gina Drosos in her keynote speech at the 2018 JCK Las Vegas jewelry trade show. Sometimes, she told the audience, the greatest success comes from “seeing game-changing opportunities and grabbing them, even if things seem to be going relatively well.”

Her impressive speech, almost a year later, still resonates with me.

While Drosos has a tough job ahead of her when it comes to revitalizing the fortunes of Signet, her approach to date has been impressive. She has brought a much-needed fresh mind-set to the company she now leads and to the industry in which it operates.

I believe in meritocracy. So regardless of the fact that Signet’s CEO is a woman, she happens to be highly talented and the right person for the job. Her gender should not be the issue; her performance stands on its own.

However, there is little doubt that our industry is behind the curve when it comes to equality and meritocracy. And I

believe the two go hand in hand. I have been in a handful of meetings in this industry where I have been the only male, but I have been in dozens upon dozens of meetings where there has been no female presence.

If you look around your boardroom, your management team or your staff and see only men in key positions, you have a big problem. Having a well-rounded perspective is critical, and if yours is male-dominated, it is simply far from optimal — and most likely damaging.

Our industry is, thankfully, waking up. Rapaport’s news service on Diamonds.net recently covered the appointment of Shahdeh Ammadi as the new director of institute relations at the Gemological Institute of America (GIA), and Nancy Liu’s promotion to CEO at De Beers jewelry subsidiary Forevermark.

As our cover story this month states: In a trade where most of the clientele is female, having women in key senior positions isn’t just progressive, it’s good business sense.

John Costello PUBLISHER john.costello@diamonds.net DIAMONDS.NET

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INTE RVIEW

CLARITY OF PURPOSE

The world’s oldest gem lab has taken a stand against synthetics. Its director, Aurélien Delaunay, explains why. By Marie Chabrol

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T

he French Gemmological Laboratory (LFG) is the oldest of its kind in the world. Founded in 1929, it came into being after the arrival of cultured pearls on the market prompted more than 300 pearl dealers from Paris’s 9th arrondissement to call for a way to differentiate them from natural pearls.

The French government managed the lab from 1936 until 2010, when it was sold to the French Union of Jewellery (UFBJOP), today its majority shareholder.

Aurélien Delaunay has been its director since July 2018.

What is your lab’s specialty?

The LFG’s strength is that it is multidisciplinary. Our specialty is our privileged link with the University of Nantes, known worldwide for its research wing in gemology and mineralogy. Prof.

Emmanuel Fritsch is also our external scientific adviser, with whom we set up research projects, particularly on diamonds.

We are also the only laboratory that refuses to grade synthetic diamonds.

We offer our services to an extremely varied clientele, ranging from the key houses of the Place Vendôme to auction houses and museums. We are particularly proud to have been able to warn about the discovery and presence of synthetic chemical vapor deposition (CVD) brown diamonds. We have also published many articles with Emmanuel Fritsch on chameleon diamonds. Our latest discovery was a natural type IIa/ IaB zoned diamond. We collaborate with [Gemological Institute of America (GIA) journal] Gems & Gemology, [The Gemmological Association of Britain’s] Journal of Gemmology and the French Journal of Gemmology.

logical view of things: If they are graded, this must also be done for other synthetic stones. Also, not grading these stones helps to differentiate and isolate them.

How are you dealing with the increase of undisclosed lab-grown diamonds on the market?

We regularly analyze synthetic diamonds, but we cannot say that their proportion has increased in our volume of analyses.

We saw a lot between 2012 and 2013, but with the awareness of the diamond industry and the development of analytical tools, things have stabilized. The improved sourcing of our customers has clearly contributed to this decrease.

Also, we might have 0% synthetic stones in a batch, or up to 20% when [the batch] is not correctly sourced. But our annual average is less than 1% synthetic in melee batches. It can nevertheless be said that problems still come from India, where the presence of synthetic diamonds in lots is widely known.

In which areas do you think the industry needs more training?

“NOT GRADING THESE STONES HELPS TO DIFFERENTIATE AND ISOLATE THEM”

Why did your lab decide not to grade synthetic diamonds?

It is a joint decision of the profession and the UFBJOP not to grade synthetic diamonds, unlike other international laboratories. These stones do not have to be evaluated on the same scale as natural ones, because they are an imitation of the diamond and must remain so.

This decision is unanimous in the profession except for those who want to promote this [lab-grown] material. But it must be remembered that the increase of synthetic diamonds on the market will bring down their price. Also, natural diamonds will always be desired for what they are, a rare and precious natural resource. The question of the grading of synthetics matches a

The presence of synthetic diamonds on the market is a major issue. But there is much work to do on the terminology of [describing] gems, as well as on the disclosure of the different treatments. In France, we are fortunate to have a law, Decree No. 2002-65, which clarifies things.

But this is not the case everywhere.

What are the main challenges facing the diamond industry?

For us, the provenance of the gems remains a big question for our customers.

But among the challenges of the industry are undetectable treatments such as low-temperature heating, irradiation of tourmaline, and heating aquamarines or citrines.

Our customers want total transparency. Laboratories will be more and more important in this process. They should be able to analyze very small gems, loose or set in jewelry, but also all the other materials that are submitted to it.

What are your plans for 2019?

Today, we hope to make ourselves better known to individuals wishing to obtain clear information about their gems. And we also want to grow internationally. We will exhibit at GemGenève [in May], where we will offer on-site analyses.

We will also increase our conferences, with a frequency of four per year, inviting international speakers such as [lecturer, editor and founder of the Portugal Gemas Academy] Rui Galopim de Carvalho or [curator of Paris’s Mineralogy Museum] Eloise Gaillou. ◼ DIAMONDS.NET

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COVE R

FOR HER,

BY HER

In a field where most of the clientele is female, having women at the retail helm isn’t just progressive, it’s good business sense. By Lara Ewen

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F

or an industry that depends on women to wear its product, surprisingly few women are in charge.

That’s not to say there aren’t any; Beryl Raff, chairman and CEO of Helzberg Diamonds, and Lisa Bridge, who became president and CEO of Ben Bridge Jeweler last year, both hold C-suite positions, and the 2018 Forbes list of America’s Richest Self-Made Women included two jewelers: Alex and Ani founder and CEO Carolyn Rafaelian (ranked 21 out of 60) and Kendra Scott (40).

Yet women are the exception rather than the rule, and in the age of #MeToo and #TimesUp, that’s particularly thorny. Even if the 2017 classaction suit calling out sexual harassment at Sterling Jewelers hadn’t been filed, the preponderance of men in positions of power makes for an uneasy balance. A 2017 Financial Times report showed that only six out of 31 luxury industry chief executives were women.

The gender disparity between customer and CEO may be more than just outdated, though; it may be bad for business.

Male-pattern marketing

IMAGES: SHUTTERSTOCK

The jewelry trade has traditionally taken a maleoriented marketing approach that assumes women are passive recipients, rather than active participants — and store owners need to reevaluate this, some retailers assert.

“Jewelry isn’t inherently masculine,” says Babs Noelle, owner of Alara Jewelry in Bozeman, Montana. “The majority of fine jewelry is still worn by women. But for years, what that jewelry would be was primarily the choice of men. It was a very

“We’re going to ask what her life is like. If you go camping a lot, don’t get her something she can’t wear camping”

upside-down way of bringing a product to market.”

Having more jewelry businesses run by women can disrupt that pattern, Noelle continues. “Then all the status-quo players whose sales we’re nibbling away at will have to peek behind the curtain at what we’re doing. And through that, we achieve some slow change, even among owners who aren’t female.”

Women are paying increasing amounts of attention to where they’re getting their goods, and to who’s providing them. In 2014, Walmart conducted a study of 1,200 consumers and found that 90% of female shoppers would go out of their way to buy a product marked as “womenowned.” Three years later, 84% of respondents in a Cone Communications survey said they wanted companies to support women’s rights, and 87% said they’d buy something from a company that shared their values. In addition, 41% of millennial women know who the founders of their favorite brands are, while 47% know those brands’ “origin stories,” according to a 2018 report by marketing agency Merkle and Levo.

Knowing what they like As female customers forge relationships with retailers, having women on the business side can facilitate those connections.

“There are 1,001 advantages to having a woman at the helm,” declares Liz Chatelain, owner of Texas-based consumer research firm MVI Marketing, which focuses on the global gem and jewelry industry. “Jewelry is a female product, and the product is about self-adornment, and women know what they like and how something should be worn and how it should feel. And they know how it should look on other women.”

While men think about how they would like something to look on a woman, Chatelain adds, women think about how it will make them feel.

Noelle says store owners need to adjust the way they sell jewelry so they can better address their female customers’ needs, even when talking to men. “Part of the issue is that men focus on the ring, when really what they want is that look on her face [when she receives it],” she says. “So we’re going to ask what her life is like. Like, if you go camping a lot, don’t get her something she can’t wear camping. Women think like this because we wear this stuff.”

Emotional connections are also important with men, notes Noelle. “So many men don’t actually enjoy talking about the 4Cs. That’s just what gets shoved at them.” ▶

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COVE R

“There could be more real female involvement in online. There’s not as much storytelling as there could be” Some store owners find it’s helpful to have both men and women working with customers in order to provide the best range of service.

“There’s a difference in the way my husband relates to guys and girls, what he can say versus what I can say,” says Gail Friedman, owner of Sarah Leonard Fine Jewelers in Los Angeles, California. “There are things that men say to men, and some people are more surprised if you said them as a woman” — though, she notes, “I don’t know if it’s personality or because of a man/ woman thing.”

Weaving stories on the web Retail voice matters just as much, and maybe more, in online sales. “I think the one who wins in online is whoever tells the story better,” says Noelle. “If you’re trying to sell jewelry, the storytelling will attract a lot of women. Not that women don’t like facts. But women are more interested in the people and the story. And that’s done through words.”

Chatelain agrees. “There could be more real female involvement in online. There’s not as much storytelling online as there could be. Some online shoppers love to read, and some just want to go straight to the product. But most websites don’t offer the gamut. They either have too many words, or they just go straight to the product. But there’s a happy middle.”

The ones who make the decisions Retailers without female leadership at all levels of the corporate chain risk losing touch with their female customers, contends Chatelain.

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8%

Only 8% of grooms plan their ring budgets with their partners, according to The Knot.

THE MIRROR IMAGE:

SHERYL JONES Sheryl Jones, owner of Sheryl Jones Fine Diamond & Gemstone Jewelry in New York, knows her clientele.

“Many of my clients are women of color who are very well-to-do and in their 50s,” says Jones, who is 52. “They’re bankers and CEOs, and they travel a lot. They can afford to buy a $30,000 piece of jewelry, and they’re excited to see me because I’m a mirror of them. They know I’m going to say, ‘This is what I’d want to wear.’ I know that gala or conference because I’ve been there. And that’s always been the sweet spot for women selling to other women.

We understand women.”

Jones has been in the jewelry business since 1998 and has had her storefront on 47th Street for six years. She sells everything from $200 cufflinks and 20-carat Colombian emeralds to $30,000 finished pieces. She sees no difference in what men and women shop for or what they’re willing to spend, but she observes that some women still don’t feel comfortable buying certain pieces for themselves. “You’re seeing more women able to purchase stuff on their own now,” she notes. “But there are still some women waiting for their husbands to do it. Sometimes I’ve even heard women say to me, ‘I really feel like he should be buying this.’”

Then there’s the other side: “A lot of the men love to buy fancy stuff for their wives, and their wives don’t necessarily want it. The man is driving the purchase, and she’s not interested in jewelry.”

In retail overall these days, “every industry is coming to terms with whether they reflect the diversity of America and of their customers,” says Jones. For her, it’s not about race or gender, but understanding: “How do I make sure you feel valued and respected? But also, how do I make sure we all feel that way?” sheryljonesjewels.com

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51%

IMAGES: GUMUCHIAN

More than 51% of women age 25 to 40 with a household income of $75,000 or above reported self-purchasing jewelry, according to an August 2018 survey, with diamond jewelry being their top choice.

“Pandora could have benefitted from having women in the top roles of the company,” she says, but instead of positioning itself as an affordable gifting brand, it aimed for the fine-jewelry category and found itself unable to sustain growth there.

The original Pandora product connected with women because of its emotional value, and the company faltered when it lost that thread, she elaborates. “A pair of sunglasses isn’t a gift. And that happened because they don’t have any women in their top echelon. Here’s a company that could have been something, but they went the way of Krementz & Co.” — a reference to the iconic New Jersey jeweler that sold off many of its assets in the 1990s.

Retailers should keep in mind that women influence the bulk of fine-jewelry purchases, even in non-bridal, Noelle adds. “Remember that most women this year are not getting engaged, but most women still want a piece of jewelry. Start targeting the people who are [kickstarting] the decisions.”

Sometimes that means taking chances with marketing, she says. “We did an ad that said, ‘You’ve been married 10 years and you never had the guts to tell him you didn’t like the ring.’ And one group of people who noticed that ad were women who hadn’t even gotten engaged yet. The ad was a big hit, because it was reinforcing women’s value. Like, let’s not make jewelry all chivalric, with the white horse.”

Noelle believes women empowering other women to talk about what they like and don’t like will only benefit the jewelry industry. “The steady arrival of more female fine jewelers is ultimately good for the market. The cream rises to the top regardless of gender.” ◼

“The product is about self-adornment, and women know how something should be worn and how it should feel”

THE SELF-PURCHASING

BOOM Self-purchasing women — particularly millennials — are a driving force in the finejewelry business, and it’s time retailers took note. An August 2018 survey by MVI Marketing found that more than 51% of women age 25 to 40 with a household income of $75,000 or above said they self-purchased jewelry, and that diamond jewelry was the top choice.

Another 17% reported buying jewelry with their partners. These consumers are the perfect target for luxury brands, according to MVI, because their 30-year spending cycle is just beginning, while baby boomers are aging out of theirs. Millennials are also just starting to form brand attachments.

De Beers confirmed this trend in its 2018 Diamond Insight Report, which said selfpurchasing of diamond jewelry, particularly among younger women, accounted for onethird of pieces acquired, and that the average amount spent on self-purchased jewelry had risen to the level of gifted pieces.

Beyond that, a third of couples shop for bridal jewelry together, according to a recent survey on wedding website The Knot. While only 8% of grooms plan their ring budgets with their partners, 70% of women know how much the ring cost, the survey found.

Moonlight Zigzag ring stack by Gumuchian.

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TH E FINAL CU T

MILESTONE MOMENTS Rapaport Magazine asks: At what age did you get your first diamond, and what did it commemorate?

I was 12 years old when I first received a diamond.

After many years of my asking for pierced ears, my dad finally agreed and took me for the “big event,” to get my ears pierced.

To commemorate this day, which was a triumph in my mind, he surprised me with a pair of diamond stud earrings. Although the diamonds are rather small and of average quality, I still wear them all the time. These diamonds allow me to remember my dad — who passed away over 25 years ago — every day, and that moment in time that made our special relationship even more special than it already was.

FERIEL ZEROUKI SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS AND ETHICAL INITIATIVES, DE BEERS My first piece of diamond jewelry was a gift from my mother when I was 13. It was a heart-shaped gold ring covered in small diamonds. I recently asked her what the occasion was, and her response was simply that she’d felt I was responsible enough to own it.

Jewelry is a large part of my Algerian culture and is gifted on many occasions, like for the birth of a child or marriage, or even just because. Wearing statement jewelry at a wedding — whether as bride or guest — is also part of our DNA, and I recall instances when my sisters and I would watch my mother getting ready, and that magic moment when she brought the jewelry out. My sisters and I would immediately lay claim to the different beautiful pieces for when “we grow up.” I guess when I was 13, she was testing whether I’d started to do that!

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TONIA (TONI) ZEHRER SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT AND CHIEF MERCHANDISING OFFICER, SIGNET JEWELERS Diamond jewelry has always been associated with special moments in my life. My first diamonds were a half-carat pair of studs for my high school graduation, given to me by my parents. I was thrilled beyond belief to have received such a special gift! My parents also gave me another present, my second diamond jewelry piece — a half-carat solitaire necklace — for my college graduation. They are both still so special to me today because each one reminds me of how proud they were of me and how loved I was. I feel so fortunate to have learned at an early age how a gift of fine jewelry makes special occasions and relationships even more memorable and lasting. It’s one of the reasons I’m proud to be part of this industry.

CAROLINE MORISSEY HEAD OF SALES, US, BONHAMS My first diamond symbolized the beginning of a total obsession. When I was 18, I was left a small inheritance, and a piece of jewelry seemed a fitting, if not slightly extravagant, purchase. I was living in Antwerp at the time, doing an internship at a diamond manufacturer, and it was an opportunity to select and buy a stone directly from diamond cutters. I looked at so many loose stones and remember how the painstaking decision over which shape, color and clarity I wanted was, at the time, such a thrill to me.

In the end, I selected a princess-cut, G VS2, and a jeweler friend helped me custom-design a necklace pendant. That diamond pendant represented both a self-purchase and a commemorative purchase, and as a young woman, I found it very empowering.

COMPILED BY LEAH MEIROVICH. IMAGE: SHUTTERSTOCK

REBECCA FOERSTER PRESIDENT, ALROSA USA

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