Into the Light
A comprehensive overview of precious metals trends
By Tina Wojtkielo Snyder
Just when you thought metals prices couldn’t get any higher, 2010 proved you wrong. With gold hitting new record highs, silver reaching figures not seen since the 1980s, and palladium nearly doubling in price between the opening and closing fixes, it’s no surprise that the big trend in jewelry today is lightening up.
Trends in platinum are given below. For other metals, click on the following links:
Palladium Trends | Gold Trends | Silver Trends
Platinum
When the price of gold hit record highs in 2010, only to continue its run up in the first half of 2011, $1,600 to $1,700 platinum started to look a lot more affordable to jewelers and manufacturers.
"With the gold market reasonably close to platinum again, we have recently seen a surge in demand for platinum," reports Teresa Fryé, owner of Techform Casting in Portland, Oregon, where 85 percent of the company’s business comes from casting custom bridal jewelry.
Gold’s flirting with platinum in the price arena was definitely a factor in the 30 percent bump in North American jewelry demand reported in Johnson Matthey’s Platinum 2011. "The retailers at the mid-level are selling from stock, with little or no sign of re-ordering, but the high end is doing well, with increased manufacturing demand coming from that sector," reports Mark Danks, sales and marketing manager for Johnson Matthey’s New York sales office. "With 18k gold and platinum bridal jewelry close in price, consumers thinking about buying 18k might be more easily persuaded to buy a platinum ring."
Donna DeLucia, national account executive for John C. Nordt Co. in Roanoke, Virginia, says that savvy retailers today are pushing platinum bridal sales. "The high-end retailer today is smart—she’s not going to sell an 18k white gold piece when she can upsell the customer to platinum because it’s much less of a leap today," she says.
And there may soon be more affordable platinum bridal in retailers’ cases, thanks in part to the efforts of Platinum Guild International (PGI). In an effort to make platinum a realistic option for more consumers, PGI kicked off its "entry platinum" campaign in mid-2010 and is continuing to push the concept this year. Engagement rings priced under $2,500 (not including the center stone) and fashion jewelry under $3,500 compose this category. Heather Zachary Rogoff, PGI’s manager of public relations, reports that a recent research study PGI conducted indicates that retailers are now actively stocking and selling entry platinum. The study of 400 retailers showed that 45 percent had purchased entry platinum jewelry in 2010, with 70 percent reporting sell through by year’s end, and 65 percent planning to restock before the end of 2011.
"But affordable price point does not mean she’ll have to sacrifice design," Rogoff adds. "Designers including Phyllis Bergman, Philip Press, Uneek, and Memoire have all introduced entry platinum bridal collections, all of which offer unique, intricate designs."
One manufacturer hoping to make a big splash with its entry platinum bridal line is Novell Design Studio in Rahway, New Jersey—and its taking a unique approach to getting that line in retail store. "We’re calling it The GAME—The Great American Metal Exchange," explains Bruce Pucciarello, CEO of Novell. In partnership with its refiners and its platinum supplier, Johnson Matthey, Novell is inviting retailers to send in their unwanted inventory in exchange for the Novell Studio Platinum Collection, a line of 53 classic mountings that wholesale for between $400 and $900 each. The retailer pays a fee of $750 to participate, plus the difference if the scrap they send in doesn’t add up to the cost of the Studio Platinum Collection—about $24,000 at presstime, when the price of platinum was around $1,800. (Novell has set up a scrap calculator on its website, novellsgame.com, so retailers can gauge costs.) On July 22, GAME day, Novell will take all of the scrap that it has collected and send it in for bulk refining, getting a one-time discount that enables the manufacturer to make this program possible.
"It’s the one time an independent can get treated like a major and get rid of inventory that isn’t doing well without losing their lungs," says Pucciarello. "The platinum price is in the perfect relationship to the gold price now to recapture the engagement ring market. We want to make that happen, that’s why we priced this collection about $6,000 lower than we normally would so it could compete with much of the designer 18k product in the marketplace. If more platinum jewelry sells, it’s better for the industry."
Another manufacturer using an innovative approach to provide retailers with platinum bridal at friendly price points is PlatMx in Mexico City. The company is using a patented process to manufacture its Light Weight Structured Band, a hollow band with a T-strut that prevents denting and allows for sizing by a half-size.
"Other hollow core rings dent easily and are impossible to size," says Abel Jacob, owner of PlatMx. "Out patented process eliminates those problems while significantly reducing the weight of the piece—while a size 6, 5 mm solid platinum band weighs 11.55 grams, the same piece in a structured band weighs 7.22 grams."
Other than the very high end, perhaps the one area that’s not concerned with lightening up is the custom design segment. "We are still seeing a good deal of heavy pieces," says Fryé. "This is likely an attribute of the custom market, where costs are passed straight through to the consumer and there is no need to stock expensive inventory in the case."
Palladium Trends | Gold Trends | Silver Trends
Ring by ArtCarved. Earrings by John Apel. Photos courtesy of PGI.