There have been lots of references on this forum to the vast amounts of Jade that Gemporia is pushing. For the record I am a long standing Gems customer who wants to see the company continue, but in my mind successful companies trade on trust. Like others I am very worried about the selling techniques being used by Dave and supporting presenters, to sell this material, in particular random comparisons inferring investment value v. houses, cars etc. This may apply to certain material, but can Dave provide any valuations at all for what he is selling (i suspect nothing he would wish to share)? Or have any Gemporia customers had their acquisitions valued?
Valuations will always come in higher because they're
insurance valuations that take into consideration how much it would take to reproduce a like-for-like replacement in the event that its lost or stolen. That valuation is not a representation of the item's worth / value - it is an estimate of how much it would cost to source a replacement like-for-like stone (if even possible), the cost of obtaining the previous metals to re-make it, the labour costs to cut and facet the replacement stone, the labour costs of a silversmith to create the setting, costs to import the stone from aboard, allowance for future material price and labour rises due to annual inflation etc.
This is why Gemporia tell customers to "send in their valuations". They know full well that people will always have a higher valuation than they paid for it. Quite often, they even tell people to get jewellery valued that costs less to buy than the cost of an evaluation. They tell people to get a £20 ring valued because they know that no sane person is going to pay the £30+ valuation cost on a £20 ring.
If they told people to get a valuation of what their item was WORTH, they'd have many many disgruntled customers saying that their valuations were much lower than they paid for it.
It is no secret that Gemporia have financial problems at the moment. If they thought their Jadeite was valued at the amounts they claim it sells for, then why are they flogging it to Dave in Derby and Suzanna in Scunthorpe for a fraction of its supposed value? They're a business - not a charity. It's in their interest to make money.
If I had a business, and had the option of selling a few thousand carats of Jadeite cabochons to the trade at £100 per carat, or Barbara in Barnsley at £10 a carat, guess who I would sell it to?
Basically, whatever Gemporia are flogging it for, they'll be selling it at profit - it's what businesses do. If they're selling it for £100, then the stone and materials are going to be WORTH considerably less.
