Jeweler, Heal Thyself

My mother and I have a small but very upscale jewelry store in Harrisburg, Pa. We both just finished reading your [editorial] in the April 2003 edition of JCK (“So You Wanna Buy a Ring,” p. 112).

We applaud you. We don’t ever have a “sale.” We do have an “old friends” case where we place our markdowns. This industry, very much like the automobile business that I spent the last 24 years in, has truly “whored” itself, and we feel that it is up to those of us in the jewelry trade to fix it, since it is our trade that did it. Just thought I would share and thank you again.

Randy Bronstein, Harrisburg, Pa.

AGS Standards Benefit the Industry

I just read your latest Editor’s Page. Excellent! Seventy years ago, Robert Shipley foresaw the damage that price misrepresentation and poorly educated jewelers would have on this industry.

I am personally committed to making AGS the kind of organization that all jewelers and jewelry manufacturers will strive to be a member of. The standards that AGS demands of its members are indeed beneficial to the entire industry.

Ruth Batson, Executive Director, American Gem Society, Las Vegas