The Big Survey 2018: Manmade Diamonds

24. Would you consider stocking laboratory-grown diamonds?

25. What is your strongest feeling about laboratory-grown diamonds?

26. If you stock laboratory-grown diamonds, what’s your approach to marketing them?

I aggressively let everyone know I have them. 10%

I market them in much the same way as any other product 42%

I quietly let customers know they are an option 48%

27. In what order would you recommend these alternatives to a customer who was reluctant to buy a freshly mined diamond?

NOT SO FAST: Though the ranking remained static, more jewelers (20%) said laboratory-grown diamonds would be the first alternative they recommended to such customers compared to just 13% in 2016.

28. Legal Quiz
Check the terms you’re allowed to use to describe laboratory-grown diamonds, according to the FTC:

Laboratory-grown 94%

Manmade 56%

Laboratory-created 47%

Synthetic 35%

(Manufacturer-name)-created 34%

Cultured 20%

Simulant 7%

Imitation 6%

Comment: Overall, you did pretty well. The top six terms can all be used, although with some qualifications, while the bottom two — “simulant” and “imitation” — are verboten, according to the FTC. Now, those qualifications: “cultured” can be used, but only if in addition to one of the FTC’s three pre-approved terms: laboratory-grown, laboratory-created, or manufacturer-name created, says Tiffany Stevens, CEO and president of the JVC. “‘Synthetic’ can still be used, but it shouldn’t be used to imply that the lab-grown is a simulant,” she says, or to disparage competitors. “Lastly, please also keep in mind that ‘real, natural, genuine, precious and semi-precious’ can only be used to describe diamonds and colored gemstones from the earth,” she says.