Jewelry Catalog

Please note that we do not have a printed or written catalog available as you would find for a retail jewelry store. The reasons for this are as follows:

1. This is a wholesale business only and does not operate like a retail establishment.
2. A typical retail jewelry store will have a catalog with 400 or 500 items in it. In our case if we had a catalog, it would weigh 700 or 800 lbs. because we have 300,000 or more items available. During a typical week 5,000 to 20,000 new items will arrive.
3. It takes several weeks or months to produce a catalog and by that time 90% of what was originally on hand would be gone and no longer available. Merchandise comes and goes much faster at the wholesale level.
4. Finally, if we had a catalog, your cost to obtain one would be $600 or $700 each, and no one would want to pay that amount of money only to find that 90% of the items had already been sold.

Therefore, while we do not have a catalog, you can see our merchandise three ways: First, many items are shown on the web site; Second, we travel around the country and do shows and displays 4 or 5 times per year in different parts of the U.S.; Third, you can have access to our other items by following the simple steps below for placing a Special Order.

Inventory Numbers / Item Numbers from jewelry stores

Please note that the inventory or item numbers from various jewelry stores have no meaning to us. There are over 200,000 jewelry stores in the country, and each has its own inventory numbering system. Therefore, it is of no value to send us any item numbers from other stores, because we will have no idea about the item in question.

If you don't see what you need, just place a Special Order or a Special Inquiry to see if we have something similar. We have a whole paragraph in this same section that tells you how to do a Special Order. Do not do or place a Special Order if you are looking for an "exact item", because we will not have it. Place a Special Order only if you can live with something similar or something in that category and not the "exact item". This will work to your benefit, because most of the time we will have something that people will like even better. See also Special Orders.

Purchases

Purchases may be made by credit card, cash, money order, certified check, or wire transfer. Personal checks must clear our bank, usually ten working days from receipt, before the item will be shipped. Please call in advance to make arrangements for same-day shipping (credit cards and wire transfers). It is especially helpful if we receive "Next Day" orders before 12:00 AM Eastern.

Special Order Items

In addition to the items on the web site, we have hundreds of thousands of other items. For example as a general rule, we will have about 90,000 rings on hand and about 250,000 to 300,000 other jewelry items. If you do not find what you need, try placing a Special Order. We will be glad to help you with any Special Order as long as the amount of such order is $250.00 or higher. Our wholesale supplier will not process Special Orders for less than $250.00.

To do a special order, just email us at sales@southeasterngems.com and give us your name, IMD number (if available), phone number and a description of the item you are looking for, along with a budget amount. If you can send us a picture of what you're looking for that will help, too. We will do our best to find something similar.

We will take your special order to the wholesale showroom and try to match it up with the items we have on hand. Be sure to include a daytime phone number where you can be reached. We will not fill your order nor ship until we talk with you and have a meeting of minds.

With all special orders, it will be very important for you to have a "flexible attitude". We will seldom have the specific or exact item you are seeking. But we may have something very close or we may have something even better. The more flexible you are, the better your chances of getting a super special order item. For example, one lady sent in a special order wanting a 10 ctw diamond bracelet. We did not have that item on the day she ordered it, but we did have an 8.5 ctw diamond bracelet, a 12 ctw and a 14 ctw diamond bracelet on hand. So the selection and opportunities were better than she had ever expected. On the other hand if you place a special order with one exact, specific item in mind, you will probably be disappointed to find that we do not have it. The lady above did not get a 10 ctw diamond bracelet, but she did purchase one of the others at a very low price, and later she called back to report that she had gotten a appraisal for $22,000.

Flexibility will work to your advantage with Special Orders.

Returns

Items may be returned for refund or exchange within 15 days subject to the following limitations:

	Items which have been "sized" or altered will not be taken back.
	Returned items are examined under a microscope by an outside party to ensure that the original item is being returned. No item will be accepted for return or refund after 15 days, and there is no exception to this policy.
	To avoid the need to return high ticket items, it is recommended that you consider coming to Atlanta and inspecting items over $20,000 prior to purchase.
	The need to get involved with returns can be almost entirely eliminated by taking the following steps: Talking with friends who have already purchased through this program; Attending one of your company's events where many of these items will be on display and can be purchased at that time; Recognizing that you are dealing with a supplier who has been providing diamonds and gems to retail stores in one manner or another for 20 years and has a total of 39 years of experience.
	When returning an item, please send it back with a note asking for credit or a refund. Please do not do a "Charge Back" to your Credit Card. Our contract with the Bank and Credit Card Companies states that CUSTOMERS will not do Charge Backs. Upon receipt of a returned item (within the terms of our Return Policy), Southeastern Gems will issue a credit to your credit card or send a refund if item was not charged.
	When sending an item back for credit, it is highly recommended that you ship it back, insured using either UPS or FedEx. We have experienced many problems when customers use the U.S. Post Office.
	When addressing your return package, it is recommended that you address the package to Southeastern or to Southeastern GG & D. Please do not label or address the package to Southeastern Gems. Addressing it to Southeastern Gems will increase the chances of theft by about 500%.
	Southeastern is not responsible for items returned and left unclaimed for more than 60 days.
	When doing a return, I agree not to do a credit card charge back under any circumstances.

Repairs & Replacement of Lost Diamonds

Recently one customer in Missouri decided to take a ring to a local jeweler to have the diamond replaced instead of mailing it to us. The local jeweler gave her a price of $400 for the diamond and the mounting of it. She sent it to us, and we accomplished the job for $40.00.

Sizes

Most rings will need to be sized by you in order to get the fit which you want or need. We cannot guarantee a given size because different people wear rings on many different fingers. Also, on different days or on different occasions, people often switch from one finger to another. On your order, you may request a given size, and we will ship the closest that we have to that size but we cannot guarantee the availability of a given size. "The cost of sizing is usually around $20 or $25 at local jewelry stores."

Sizing, Re-setting Stones, Repairs, Custom Design

In some cases local jewelers may be reluctant to size, repair, or make other adjustments to a given item simply because they did not sell the item which you have.

However, it is normally not necessary to send in your ring to have it sized. The key is to simply approach the local jewelers in the right way. One of the best ways to approach a local jeweler is to say that a friend or relative in California sent you this ring as a gift, and that you need to have it sized. This will result in the local jeweler sizing it for you in 99% of the time. If this doesn't work, send it back to Southeastern Gems and we will take the item to the jeweler that we use. They can size just about anything.

Settings & Mountings for Rings

We have a number of settings and mountings for rings. If you are not particular about the setting or mounting or if you are flexible, then we may be able to provide a setting or mounting. However, if you have some specific setting or mounting in mind that you have seen in some store or have seen in a picture, we may be able to provide that exact setting or mounting. There are over 9,000 different settings or mountings available, so we may not be able to supply the specific setting that you desire.

If you have a specific setting in mind, you may want to pick it up locally. Most people contact us to obtain a loose diamond. Often we ship them the loose diamond by itself, and they pick up the mounting where they have seen one they like. Sometimes people buy a setting or mounting locally and send it to us so that we can mount a loose diamond.

If you purchase a loose diamond from us and in so doing save $2,000 or $10,000, then picking up a mounting locally for $200 or $300 becomes fast and efficient way to wrap up your diamond package.

With a purchase of 1 ctw or larger diamond, we can usually provide a Tiffany setting or mounting for a diamond. The Tiffany setting is a yellow or white gold band with four or six prongs to hold the diamond.

Jewelry for Conventions, Meetings, & Special Events

Southeastern Gems attends conventions, meetings, and other events on a regular basis. The jewelry for these special functions is selected by the wholesale supplier because he owns the merchandise, and only he can decide which pieces can be out of his showroom for two or three days. Therefore, it will not be productive for people to call our office and leave instructions to bring along certain specific items, because we are not the decision maker in this area.

The wholesaler selects the items and ships them by armored delivery service directly to the hotel where they are stored in the vault until the day of the show. We then arrange for plain clothes security people to be in the audience and around our display at all times.

The Wholesale Showroom

Our wholesale showrooms are located in Atlanta and take up almost half of an entire floor in a downtown office building. In the showroom, there is enough jewelry items to fill a high school gymnasium. In a typical week, some 5,000 to 20,000 new items will arrive. Each day jewelry store owners from around the country fly into Atlanta and come to the wholesale showroom to make purchases for their stores in their home states. The wholesale showroom is locked at all times, guarded and monitored, and protected by elaborate alarm systems. To gain admission to the showroom, one must be operating a licensed jewelry store, have elaborate documentation about that jewelry store, fill out a 10 page credit application, be prepared to make a minimum purchase of $25,000, and have a scheduled appointment. In short, the wholesale showroom is not open to the general public and is not open to anyone other than documented buyers for jewelry stores who are going to make major purchases. We do not keep jewelry in our office, but go to our wholesale suppliers each day to pick up jewelry.

Shipping

All items are shipped by UPS insured delivery. The purchaser has a choice of Ground, Second Day or Next Day Air delivery.

If the purchase is for $700 or more, it will be shipped with the notation that "Signature is Required for Delivery". This will help prevent the package from being left in a mail box or on a door step. Therefore, if your order is for less than $700, you may want to have someone at home to receive your package, because they will leave it on your door step or on the porch. It could be stolen after delivery which means that the insurance would not cover its loss.

If your package does not arrive on time and you would like the Tracking Number, please call our office at (770)-452-1941.

Guarantee

The authenticity and quality of each item is unconditionally guaranteed. You may buy with confidence, because our wholesale supplier has been providing diamonds, gems, and gold items to retail stores for over 30 years. In fact, the grading standards are so high and so rigid that it is common for your diamond to be of a higher quality than it was purported to be. For example, if a stone is on the border line between two grades, we will always give it the lower rating whereas retail jewelry stores will lean toward giving it the higher rating. This attention to exacting standards assures you of the best quality, particularly when dealing in diamonds.

Appraisal Information

The way you go about getting an appraisal will dramatically affect the results of that appraisal. For example, many local jewelers are very protective of their market area. They do not want anyone else selling to the customers in their local market. If they find out that you have bought something from someone outside of your local area, many of them are very threatened by this development. They are especially threatened if you have made your purchase at a very desirable price. If they find out any of this information, they will often take steps to kill this threat to their business.

One way they do this is by giving a very low appraisal so that one will never again buy from this source. Recently we had two ladies buy the same ring for around $350. One lady rushed in to her local jeweler and said look what I bought over the Internet. He gave her an appraisal for $400. Two weeks later another lady went to the same jeweler with the same item. When he asked her where she got it, she told him that her sister had sent it to her as a gift. He gave her an appraisal of $1,700.

Therefore, you will want to use some judgment when taking your items to local jewelers for an appraisal. You will get your best results if you indicate that it was received as a gift. Some people say that they have had it for a long time and just never got around to appraising or insuring the item. If the jeweler gives you a disappointing appraisal, look around and see how many he has available at that price.

An IMD got an appraisal for $350 for one item. This seemed low to her so she waited about two weeks and had her girl friend call the jeweler to order the exact item which he had appraised at a low level. He gave her a price of $1,200. Suddenly since he was going to sell the item the price went from $350 to $1,200. Another approach is to tell the local jeweler that you are getting the item appraised for a friend who lives out of town where there is no jewelry store. But be aware if you let the jeweler know you bought it from an out of town source, he will often try to discourage you from ever using that source. They are being defensive and protecting their local market.

Finally, when you ask your jeweler for an appraisal, you will want to let him know that you want a "Retail Appraisal Price" and not a Replacement Appraisal. Many of the insurance companies have contracts with wholesale suppliers so that they can replace items at wholesale. Therefore, your jeweler may give you an insurance or a replacement appraisal which will be much lower than a Retail Appraisal. You will want to let them know up front that you want a Retail Appraisal and not a Replacement or Wholesale Appraisal.

If you want to get a good appraisal,here are some helpful tips:

1. The jeweler must never know that you bought it somewhere else.
2. The jeweler must never under any circumstances know what you or someone else paid for the item. If you let them know this figure, your appraisal will come in at that price or lower.
3. Remember, the jeweler makes money by selling jewelry and not by doing appraisals. Therefore, if he thinks that you may be a customer sometime in the future, he will "trash" the appraisal of your piece in order to get you to buy from him.
4. The following comments or actions are a sure sign that you are being manipulated and are being set up:

1. The jeweler says, "I could have gotten it for you at the same price."
2. The jeweler takes out a loupe and starts telling you the things that are wrong with the piece. This is never done as a part of a normal, ethical appraisal. It is only done to "trash" what he suspects you have purchased elsewhere in order to get you to buy from him.

Insurance Information

Often people try to obtain individual insurance coverage for their items as soon as they are appraised.  This can be a very costly approach and often it is an unnecessary step.  Most of the time our homeowner's insurance policy affords us some pretty good coverage.  Many homeowners' policies provide you with coverage of up to $1,000 on each item of jewelry without the need for obtaining separate coverage.

In addition, if you have a theft, just let me know, and I will sell you the replacement item at cost.   By being able to purchase the replacement item at cost, in many cases this savings is sufficient that it is not necessary to obtain separate insurance coverage.  This is an additional item of savings for our associates that is available nowhere else.

Estimated Retail Prices & Approximate Discount Prices

Each item sold by Southeastern Gems either on the web site or at your organization's functions will have the following pricing information:
"Estimated Retail Price"
"Southeastern Gem's Price"

The Estimated Retail Prices are attempts by Southeastern to show and illustrate the extraordinary markups used by some retail stores. Each week, we talk with retail jewelers, we visit their web sites, we visit their stores, and we phone them to see what they are charging. The prices charged by these retailers will fluctuate within wide ranges. When we show an estimated or approximate price, we are relating to you the highest price that we have seen, read about, or heard about for that given item. You may never see this price in your hometown, because it may be the price charged by an upscale retailer in an expensive area. Nonetheless, the highest price is shown for purposes of illustrating the high price charged by some retailers.

When you buy an item from Southeastern, we may tell you and people around you that we just sold a $10,000 or a $20,000 item. Again this price to which we are referring is the price charged by some retailers. This price is not the amount for which an item will appraise nor is it the value of the item. It is simply a price charged or asked by some retailers.

It should be noted that these estimated prices are not always high or overstated. For example, we had ring # R-25 on the web site, and it was priced at $990. We showed an estimated retail price of $4,995. A lady called from St. Louis and said that our estimated retail price was too low, because she had just seen it in a St. Louis jewelry store for $6,000. This scenario has been repeated several times. Therefore, if the estimated retail price shown by us seems high, please keep in mind that somewhere there is a jewelry store charging an even higher price.

Item Substitution

From time to time, we may not have the exact item that you have ordered. In those cases, we recognize that you are often in a bind or in a difficult situation if the gift item does not show up on time. Therefore, in order to better serve you and to avoid not having a gift on hand, we reserve the right to make a substitution with the next nearest item whenever we do not have the precise item that you have ordered. When the item arrives, you have 15 days to look at the item and to decide if you want to keep it or not. If not, just return it within 15 days for a full refund. After 15 days the transaction is complete, because the time for return has elapsed.

Accuracy of Ratings on Diamonds

When you order a diamond of a certain quality or rating, we will do our best to ship a diamond which in the opinion of our diamond experts is of that quality or grade. However, it should be noted that we do not guarantee a specific grade or quality. The reason for this is that this entire area is not an exact science. Diamonds do not wear labels stating their color or clarity. Instead someone has to look at them and make an informed judgment based on years of experience. The standard that we use is the same standard that is used by gem labs who issue certificates on certified diamonds. If you turn over the certificate on a certified diamond and read the information on the back, it states something like this: "In our opinion the diamond in question has the grades and ratings as set forth on the front of this certificate. However, we do not guarantee the accuracy of such ratings. Instead, these ratings and grades are simply the opinion of the person reviewing this diamond and preparing this report."

The key in this area is for you to understand that this is an "inexact" science that is based on the opinions of the person looking at a given diamond. It is very common to take the same diamond, send it to four different gem labs, and receive back certified reports showing four different ratings or grades.

"With regard to the color of diamonds, it should be noted that there is often a difference of opinion as to whether a diamond is one color or another color. For example, if you talk to three or four different people or different appraisers, you may well get three or four different opinions as to the color of a given diamond. Again the key is to recognize that this entire area is not an exact or precise science. Often the problem in identifying the color of a given diamond is so great that the appraiser won't give an exact color, but will instead simple identify the grouping into which it falls, i.e. Colorless category: D, E, F, Near Colorless category: G, H, I, J, Slightly tinted: K, L, M.

The problem with the colors and grades of diamonds is exacerbated by the fact that the six or eight gem labs that do ratings all have different standards. It would be common for them to each give you a different grade or a different color for the same diamond. Therefore, when you get a diamond from us that is marked SI-2 by us, do not be surprised if it is graded SI-1 by someone else and I-1 by still another. The same applies to color. We may represent a diamond as an "H" color, but someone else may call it a "G" and another may call it an "I".

Again the key is to recognize this entire area as an inexact activity, and the way to guarantee success is to purchase a diamond that looks good to you and that you like. The way to guarantee failure is to worry about exact grading, because there is no such thing as "exact grading or exact rating". (Also see Frequently Asked Questions #18.)

Watches Sold on Closeout Basis

From time to time we have the opportunity to purchase a large volume of watches in the marketplace. When we purchase these watches, we do not resell them with the standard 300% or 400% markup. Instead, they are resold on a Closeout Basis with a small margin that covers the cost of traveling across the country to pick them up. We drive to Chicago, New York, Philadelphia or any other large city to pick up these items and to bring them back. They are then sold as Closeouts meaning that they come with no warranties, no guarantees, no returns, no exchanges, and no refunds. Generally, all that is needed is a new battery every two or three years. Should any other type of maintenance be needed, they can be taken to a local watch shop. As an example of the savings to be had with the closeout watches, we recently sold some high-end Seikos that were retailing around the country for $260 to $300, and we sold these for $125.

NSF Checks

It is the policy of Southestern Gems to accept only cash and credit cards as payment for the various items. In the rare event that a check is accepted, it is imperitative that you take all necessary steps to ensure that the check does not come back NSF. This type of returned check creates major bookkeeeping and accounting problems for both Southeastern and for Team National, because many ancillary transactions are effected. There will be a minimum charge of $45 for each NSF check, and the charge could go much higher if a large volume of transactions have to be reversed.