IT’S BEEN DEBATED for years: Are diamonds a good investment? Sure, diamonds aren’t on the commodities exchange next to pork bellies and sawdust, but according to some scales, diamonds have doubled in value every 10 years since 1940. Old-mine-cut and European shapes from the early 20th century have skyrocketed in value.
That said, I would not recommend telling a client they are a good investment from a monetary point of view. Yes, people buy diamonds as part of an investment — but it’s an investment in a relationship and a person.
Diamonds are the strongest universal symbol of love in the world. We don’t buy diamonds and give them to people we don’t like (although if De Beers would invent the divorce diamond, sales would double — you’d get one coming and one going! Just kidding!).
The real investment of a diamond is in the one you’re giving it to. A diamond says things to a loved one like no other product can. It says, “I’d marry you all over again.” It makes a statement on the left hand that you’re taken and that someone loves you very much.
Diamonds are a universal statement of power, wealth, strength, success. What other product says right on TV that it is forever? They’re the only known substance whose beauty is unaffected by age. Diamonds are memory makers, and they’re a sign of commitment. Diamonds deal with feelings and emotions. They’re generational, forever, timeless. They are the doghouse getter-outer. They symbolize forgiveness, hope, life, happiness. And they are time’s only enemy.
Let’s look at it another way. A man walks into your jewelry store who’s been married 30 years and he wants to buy his wife a 1-carat diamond for their anniversary. You give him a price of $7,000, and he says, “Man, that’s a lot of money.” You grab a calculator and say, “Sir? $7,000 divided by 30 years costs you $233 per year. Divided by 365, that’s 63 cents a day. Sir, tell me something else you can buy for 63 cents a day that’ll do for your wife what a diamond does.”
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So here’s my question to you. Ask the giver and the receiver: “Are diamonds a good investment? You be the judge.”
