Why are diamonds expensive?
When planning to purchase a diamond, the first thing that comes to mind is how costly it is, which raises the question: why are diamonds expensive? It is well known that diamonds are expensive but what are the reasons for this.
Below we take a look at why these stones are so valuable and in high demand.
WHY DIAMONDS ARE SO EXPENSIVE?
- DIAMONDS OF HIGH QUALITY ARE RARE
It is worth pointing out that not all diamonds mined are good enough to be used in jewelry, in fact, most of them are not good enough to be used. The ones that are of good high quality and can be used in jewelry and sold to the public are few. Therefore, because diamonds that are high in quality and have acceptable grade are rare, they attract high prices.
- COLOR OF THE DIAMOND
One of the most essential characteristics of a diamond is the color it has. Basically, the whiter or more colorless a diamond, the higher it’s value. In a way it’s similar to Vodka: expensive Vodka has little flavor – aside from the alcohol of course. A lot of diamonds mined are yellowish with a few of them categorized as not having any tints. Stones that show lower color grade with faint yellowish shades are also very hard to find. The high prices charged for colorless diamonds is due to how these stone are hard to find, making it one of the reasons why diamonds are expensive.
- DIAMONDS OF HIGH CLARITY ARE RARE
Another essential characteristic of diamonds is how bright they look. A diamond of high clarity has little, if any, known imperfections like lines or black spots within the stone. Finding diamonds with no imperfections is rare and even finding the ones with few flaws is quite hard as well. Naturally, most stones found, have some measure of imperfections or flaws in them. When people insist on having diamonds with none or few imperfections and flaws it leads to prices of diamonds going up, which is why diamonds are expensive.
- BIGGER DIAMONDS ARE NOT READILY AVAILABLE
The size of a stone matters when it comes to its price and how expensive it will be. When looking at prices diamonds of different karat weights one will notice that the bigger the stone is the higher the price per karat will be because larger and bigger diamonds are hard to get. Apart from this, getting big stones that are of very high clarity is also hard because the larger the stone is, the more likely it is to have imperfections.
The final reason why diamonds are so expensive is because of all the traders involved in the process. It starts with the company which mines the stones and sends it to the storehouse where it is then packaged and sold to traders. The diamonds are then taken to the city where the cutters work on them to get the right shape to exhibit their brilliance. They are then sold to wholesalers who sell them to retailers from where they are bought by the final consumer. All these processes – with each person involved hoping to make a profit – explains why diamonds are expensive.