September 2020 - Lab Grown Magazine

September 2020 | The Lab Grown Diamond Resource Book 14 To advertise call (888) 832-1109 | September 2020 15 What is the relationship between LGDs and mined diamonds? (Graphic: Luxe Licensing LLC) Online blogs and diamond news sites were fast to re-tell Danziger’s Forbes story. Left: Idex.com, 20 July 2020. (Photo: Idex.com) Right: Coverage by The Dia- mond Loupe, 21 July 2020. (Photo: thediamondloupe. com) bands, while the naturally white precious pal- ladium would be reintroduced in fine fashion. Since it is less heavy, palladium is ideal for earrings and other jewels. We flew the nation’s top jewelry editors for a three-day exploration and mining tour hosted by Stillwater Mining in Montana, and then hosted a standing-room-only event at JCK, where Scott Kay led the charge. Thousands of palladium fashion styles be- gan hitting the market and Scott Kay was honored by a masthead placement in the Wall Street Journal. Investors flocked to purchase the white metal as its future in the jewelry industry seemed bright. We were the right hand of the Palladium Alliance, the metal’s trade body. That hand tried to shake hands with Plati- num Group International (PGI) to form a unified team to market both metals. The handshake, however, turned into a handoff. Although global platinum mining groups would have greatly gained from mining pal- ladium (it comes from the same source as platinum), the two sister metals fought, just as they had in 1939. The result is obvious today. Palladium is now mostly forgotten and white gold has again won the white precious metal war in fine fashion jewelry. Platinum bridal sales eroded and platinum’s value and premiere status on the commodity exchange (COMEX) bowed to gold, then and now. A second example of industry turmoil in- volved the drawn-out public battle between Fredrick Goldman’s tungsten empire and the launch of Scott Kay Cobalt. Starting in Janu- ary 2011, this fight was dramatic, expensive and a main reason I resigned from the firm after ten years as its CMO. The patent on tungsten carbide, the leader in contemporary men’s wedding bands at that time, was held by Frederick Goldman. Scott Kay Inc (SKI) worked with Spector Corporation and Carpenter Technologies (a specialty metal refiner) to introduce cobalt into jewelry. Millions of SK cobalt wedding bands hit the market under five different brand names. Helzberg Diamonds devoted four feet of space exclusively to SK Cobalt. Scott Kay designer cobalt bands landed in over 4,000 doors in four months including every Jared and Kays as well as leading inde- pendent doors. Scott Kay took the spotlight on CNNMoney, while Fredrick Goldman took to lawsuits. ►