Diary Of A Pawnbroker April 2016
Last month I wrote about the surprisingly high price of scrap gold at the present. Since then a lot of people have taken the opportunity to cash-in their unwanted jewellery while the price is so strong. Some have used the money to pay off bills and others towards their holidays.What has delighted me though is the amount of people just looking for a change of jewellery rather than taking the money. Why not?
You have owned and worn a necklace, ring or bracelet for so many years and perhaps it is wearing out or perhaps you just fancy a change.
This is therefore a good time to call in, fix an appointment and we will sit down and design something different. You could re-use the diamonds or coloured stones. It’s not impossible to even use the same gold although most often it’s better value to start from scratch.
Over the last 3 months we have made dozens of unique and bespoke pieces of jewellery for customers and worked together in the design process to make a piece that is unique and individual. This service is free and it doesn’t cost the customer any more than if we had bought the piece ready made from a supplier and marked it up in the window.
Once we have agreed what the customer is looking for we can build any piece of jewellery in one of two ways:
Firstly we can use a CAD plan on computer which allows us to form a digital image of the item. It then gets sent to a type of 3D printer that actually carves the item out of wax. This is then fixed to a wax ‘tree’ with multiple items on, a cast is made and the molten metal is poured in and allowed to cool. The castings are then cut off, polished and set, using stones we source and select with the customer or the existing stones from the old piece.
The second option is to build the item from the huge choice of existing mounts, shanks and settings and get these cast then assembled and polished by one of our expert jewellery craftsman. This way you can assemble the desired piece from many different parts and build something unique. Either way, the customer gets the piece they wish for and a new piece of jewellery is born for future generations to enjoy.
Coincidentally, the April birthstone is diamond. Diamond signifies love, eternity, strength and everlasting affection. No wonder it’s the stone of choice for engagement rings and for people to show when they really care.
So if you have a diamond that you love in a piece of jewellery that you don’t, why not get it reset and design your own unique piece instead?
Brown & Gold Jewellers in Seacroft and Batley and Christopher Brown Jewellers in Shipley all offer this service. You can book an appointment to discuss your personal or bespoke jewellery requirements with myself directly or by visiting one of our stores and you will get a really honest appraisal of what we can do to give you a unique and special piece.
We have also had an interesting month with our pawnbroking lending service. Big loans are the order of the day and many people have needed some funding to help tide themselves over while waiting for cheques to arrive or payment to come through.
Most of these are smaller loans however business owners also use our service all the time. Most often it is when the cash flow is tight due to VAT payments, wages and rent and rates all coinciding with a delayed payment from a customer.
One such example is a gentleman who travelled across Leeds to our Seacroft branch after a good recommendation from a friend. He needed to borrow £1000 to avoid bank overdraft charges due to a delayed payment for some work. We were able to lend him more if he had wanted it on his Rolex but he just needed the cash for a few weeks and found it far cheaper and quicker than pleading with the bank. We assessed the watch, agreed the loan and sent the money by BACS within 5 minutes. His phone beeped to inform him the funds had arrived and he was delighted that he didn’t even have to go to his local bank to deposit the cash. The service has moved on so much and our customer base is expanding all the time as people realise how professional, quick and easy it is to get a loan against something you own. We offer an instant assessment of your jewellery at all our shops so it really is worth calling in to see if we can help.
Chris Brown
