In the last two years, the myth about diamonds has been shattered. When getting married, people who spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to buy diamond rings only regret it. And the new generation of young people has long been eyeing more cost-effective second-hand diamond rings and artificial diamonds.
Once, a diamond was the brightest star to pick up after climbing the tall building of love. But now, in front of the building of love, there are many doors, and no one wants to see the stars. Waking up from the artificially created "diamond dream", everyone suddenly woke up to the fact that diamonds are "just a piece of carbon".
Text | Xu Qing
编辑 | Yang
Operations | killer whale
In 10 minutes, it depreciated from 100,000 to 10,000
Some people say that to wear diamonds when you get married is to "put the history of the earth on your ring finger". It's ancient – most of the diamonds that have been excavated by humans today were formed more than a billion years ago; It is sturdy – the hardest thing known in the world and can only be cut with the diamond itself.
Hard, shiny, eternal, these qualities similar to love, once made diamonds considered a luxury for a long time, 1 carat diamond is only 0.2g, a small one, the price can reach more than 100,000.
But in the last two years, the myth about diamonds has been shattered.
"Let's put it this way, if you go to the counter now and buy a diamond ring of 100,000 yuan, after 10 minutes, it will only be worth more than 10,000 yuan."
Andy, who has been in the jewelry and luxury goods recycling business for two years, recovered a 1-carat, D-color diamond from a customer a few days ago - that is the best color of the diamond. Three years ago, the diamond was worth 110,000 yuan, and now, it was recycled for 18,000 yuan, and it was bought by another buyer for 19,000 yuan. The customer and he both felt heartache, the customer was heartbroken and the wealth was depreciated, Andy was distressed that there was no oil and water, "just made 1,000 yuan".
▲ Picture / Visual China
When it comes to diamonds, Andy sighed, two years ago, a 1-carat diamond of good quality, the original price of 100,000 yuan, can be recovered with a price of more than 20,000 or 30,000 yuan, and now, it is only worth more than 10,000 yuan; A 50-cent diamond with an original price of 30,000 or 40,000 yuan was worth 5,000 yuan two years ago, and now it can basically only give a recovery price of 2,000.
Today, recycling diamonds is a riskier business than stock trading. At the beginning of the year, Andy bought a yellowish 1-carat diamond ring for 6,000 yuan, and put it in his store for almost three months, and he couldn't sell it without making a dime. A friend of his, who received hundreds of diamonds last year, came back, but the price fell too fast, and he couldn't sell it for 2,000 yuan and 1,500 yuan, and finally lost more than 100,000 yuan.
Under the change of the market, those who used to spend a lot of money on diamonds began to regret it.
Zhang Jiajia, born in the 90s, when she got married 3 years ago, she and her husband spent 170,000 yuan to buy a 1-carat Cartier diamond ring and a pair of rings. At that time, the teller said, "No matter how much the value of diamonds depreciates, it will not be Cartier's turn." But today, the recycling price of the ring is less than 40,000 yuan. Zhang Jiajia often thinks about what the 170,000 yuan can be done now - a good new energy vehicle or a small bathroom outside Beijing's Fifth Ring Road, "better than a diamond ring".
No matter how careful you are when buying diamonds, you can't withstand the torrent of depreciation. The year before last, Lin Han, a post-95 girl, deliberately found a relative who worked in South Africa and spent about 70,000 yuan to buy back a 1-carat diamond from the place of origin. This one has high purity, brighter and whiter color, if you buy it in China, you have to spend more than 100,000 yuan, she and her husband have always sighed, "It's really worth buying". But last month, she happened to pass by the store where the diamond was recycled, and she learned that the diamond was only worth more than 20,000 yuan, "not even half of the original price."
▲ Picture / Visual China
Like luxury, expensive diamonds are characterized by their impracticality. Lin Han's diamond ring is too large, combing his hair and shaving his hair, wearing clothes and hooking clothes, and it is easy to scratch his skin. The only scene that can be worn out, except for marriage, is the annual meeting. However, in the context of "reducing costs and increasing efficiency", the annual meeting is about to disappear. In this way, she wears it once in her life, 70,000 yuan at a time, which is equivalent to half a year's salary. She couldn't help but wonder what would have happened if she had bought the gold in the first place? "It has to rise by 5,000 yuan, at least, it won't depreciate."
After losing his job in June last year, Luo Xiao's regret about buying diamonds reached its peak. Just before she lost her job, she sold her 30-point wedding diamond ring, and added another 20,004 to exchange it for a 72-point one. The big diamond ring has not been worn for long, the job of the medical representative has been lost, the savings have been spent, the car loan of 1,600 yuan a month has to be repaid, the fees for the children's tutoring classes and interest classes in primary school have to be paid, the 1,000 yuan of living expenses given by the husband every month are completely insufficient, and the child is sick once and there is no 500 yuan, and the idea of exchanging the diamond ring for cash comes up from time to time.
When I really went to the pawn shop, the other party said that I could only collect a few thousand yuan, and I couldn't even sell it for 10,000 yuan. Luo Xiao was shocked, the 20,004 was his savings for half a year, and after a year, the money seemed to evaporate. She gritted her teeth and walked out, thinking, don't sell it, leave it to her daughter-in-law in the future.
Diamond's "Dream Making"
The 130,000 yuan spent on the diamond ring is the most impulsive consumption in Zhang Jiajia's life. In the store, the clerk took a magnifying glass to show her the luster of the diamond, and repeatedly took it out for her to try on, and the clerk asked her, in addition to the house and car, what are the big expenses in this life?
In this way, diamonds were elevated to the same status as houses and cars, and unconsciously became a kind of "rigid need" in marriage.
"Every woman has a diamond dream", Luo Xiao said, for diamonds, her attitude is "no, no, no", swiping social media, seeing someone show a diamond ring, "I can't think about it"; When I went out to eat, I saw the beautiful girl at the next table stretching out her hand wearing a big diamond ring, "I can't love it". By the time she got married, she "didn't want anything anymore, she just wanted a diamond ring."
But this dream about diamonds, from the very beginning, was a "sweet trap" set by businessmen.
Before the 18th century, diamonds were just a common piece of jewelry. It was not until the late 19th century that the British businessman Rhodes monopolized the diamond mines in South Africa with a production of tens of millions of carats and created the De Beers Company. He began to control the annual production of diamonds, establishing a single channel for placing and taking the business firmly into his own hands.
After that, the most crucial step is to coat the diamond with a love filter. In the advertising industry, diamonds were once called "the most successful marketing case in history".
After 1938, the Oppenheimer family, who were at the helm of De Beers, spent a lot of money on advertising. In the popular movie "Sweet Home Alabama" at the time, the male protagonist proposed with diamonds, and the lines showed: Diamonds should buy the biggest and shiniest ones.
After World War II, when the economy, culture, and entertainment in the West fully recovered, De Beers invited dozens of Hollywood stars to endorse it, and the diamond appeared on the pages of 125 newspapers. The most famous advertising slogan, "A diamond is forever, a diamond is forever", was born at this time. It not only reminds people that diamonds are as unique and precious as love, but also avoids the depreciation of diamonds in large quantities on the second-hand market.
Various domestic literary and artistic works have also inadvertently contributed to this "dream-making action".
In Yishu's novel, after Xibao gets a check from her lover Miao Cunzi, she leisurely walks into the jewelry store and asks, "Is there a 10-carat (carat) all-American square diamond?" In "Lust and Caution" directed by Ang Lee, it was a pigeon-egg-sized, 6-carat super-large pink diamond that moved Wang Jiazhi and made her feel some sincerity towards Mr. Yi. In the hit "Flowers" some time ago, the retro, fashionable and dazzling proprietress Li Li wore a brilliant diamond necklace when she appeared. There is fashion blogger Archaeology, the necklace is from Harry Winston's Sunflower collection, conservatively estimated, worth 2 million.
▲ Mr. Yi gave Wang Jiazhi the ring in the movie "Lust and Caution". Picture / Screenshot
Just like Bitcoin, the value of a diamond depends on the person's beliefs. When a common dream is created, diamonds are not just a piece of jewelry to be worn, but have an economic attribute and become a hard currency representing wealth. Many diamond brands, like De Beers, make money by tying diamonds to love.
For example, Hengxin Xili's diamond brand "I DO" directly binds diamonds to marriage proposals and marriages; The well-known brand DR has played the concept of "men can only customize one in their life", attracting a large number of young people who believe in love.
A friend once said to Lin Han, "If you look for a boyfriend in the future, you will buy DR, which can verify whether he has bought it for other girls." So, after buying the South African diamond ring, Lin Han continued to go to DR with her husband, preparing to buy another pair of rings to wear on a daily basis.
Walking into the store, she learned that buying a ring in DR, like luxury goods, needs to be "matched" - before buying a pair of rings, you must first buy a diamond ring. So the two of them bought a small diamond ring, which is equivalent to getting married once and buying 4 rings.
Lin Han is willing to spend more money because of the atmosphere in the store. After buying the diamond rings, the clerk held a small ceremony for them, and the two of them signed a letter of commitment, promising to buy only once in their lives, to be pious to each other, and not to lie. After signing and exchanging with each other, the people around them applauded and cheered, and "the sense of ceremony was almost full".
In the age of social media, the diamond business is much better. Back then, Zhang Yuqi's sentence "broken diamonds are not valuable" made diamonds over 1 carat highly sought after. Lin Han saw this sentence and decided to buy a 1-carat diamond. Later, I Do invited Zhang Yuqi to be the spokesperson. With a 10-carat diamond, Zhang Yuqi walked into Li Jiaqi's live broadcast room, although the unit price was 10 million, it was sold out as soon as it was put on the shelves. Diamond jewelry brands have taken advantage of the dream of love to usher in the peak of real performance and stock price.
In the past ten years, Luo Xiao has bought three diamonds. The first one was bought for me when I was just working, only 1,000 yuan, and a small one was embedded in the delicate ring ring; When I got married 8 years ago, my husband paid 15,000 yuan to buy a 30-point diamond ring, and finally the one that was replaced at a higher price last year.
At that time, she had to dress up carefully every day, go around the jewelry counter alone, go around for three months, and finally gritted her teeth and paid. She prefers the big one to the small diamond her husband bought. It symbolizes a sum of money spent on oneself and "has a feeling that I deserve it".
▲ Picture / Visual China
When I wake up
When a person has financial problems, what is the order in which they sell their property?
Andy gave the answer: first selling non-essential luxury goods, jewelry, then cars, and finally houses. Among all kinds of jewelry bags, diamond rings represent a love and a marriage, and if the relationship between the husband and wife is not broken, it will be sold at the end, and it is often sold by the husband and wife together.
Andy remembers that there was a husband and wife who were in the business of a mother and baby store, but in recent years, there have been fewer customers, and the location of the store is in a shopping mall, the rent is expensive, the flow of people is uneven, and the business has gradually become deserted. After a year of support, the rent of the store and the mortgage of the family continued to squeeze the cash flow of this family. During that time, the two of them asked him one after another to dispose of the gold and jewelry, and finally, handed over the diamond ring for the wedding. The time he sold the diamond ring and left, his wife turned back many times.
More and more people want to sell diamonds, except for extreme cases such as broken cash flow, more often than not, it is a change in consumption attitudes. The priceless love represented by diamonds has begun to become lower in the value ranking of people's lives - it is not as good as a good meal, a football extracurricular class worth 6,800 yuan and a confidence to treat oneself well.
Luo Xiao's parents are dual-income workers, and she is an only child, she never treated herself badly when she was young, and her salary was moonlight. After marriage, she spent all aspects of her children's expenses with her husband AA. Since she lost her job, her consumption has been downgraded, Lancôme's Absolue cosmetics have been replaced by Kristina, thousands of clothes have been replaced by hundreds of yuan, she can't afford to eat a big meal, and occasionally her husband treats her, and the physical stores she always goes to are no longer patronized, and all of them are replaced by live broadcast rooms.
It's hard to find a job, and recently this month, she interviewed for positions in four companies, and almost every position has 7 or 8 candidates, and many of them are post-00s.
Unemployment made her lose her money, and she also lost the confidence to treat herself preferentially. Once I enrolled my son in a football class, 6,800 yuan, and all the money was paid by my husband, "because I really can't get it." The child also knew that it was his father who gave the money, and said "thank you Dad" several times. After that, she wanted to sell the diamonds for cash.
▲ Picture / Visual China
In an era when it is becoming more and more difficult to make money, every penny has to be spent on the cutting edge, becoming the top priority of family consumption. Diamonds, as a more symbolic consumer product, may not even be a "knife handle".
Some time ago, Zhang Jiajia had a quarrel with her husband. The two are discussing whether to buy a house when housing prices are falling, but the husband wants to study for a part-time MBA in the near future, which may be beneficial to his job and promotion, and the tuition fee is about 100,000 yuan. Zhang Jiajia disagreed, "I mean we have to buy a house first." In just three years, her consumption concept has also changed dramatically, and her spending must be able to see a return and be a priority. She finally said, "If you don't have any money, you take the diamond ring away and see how much money you can exchange." ”
In Nantong, Lin Han and her husband have factories at home, Lin Han is a weaving factory in which her parents are joint ventures with her, and her husband is an accessories for home textiles. But last year, because there were no orders, my factory collapsed in the winter of November; On the husband's side, the demand from customers has also decreased visibly. Lin Han began to go out to work for others, and with a salary of several thousand yuan a month as a comparison, the 70,000 yuan that year was extremely valuable, and the emotion of regretting buying diamonds also reached its peak.
Along with the diamond dream, there are also people's fantasies about love.
In the corner of Luo Xiao's house, there has been a huge bouquet of red roses. It was given to her by her husband when she was still her boyfriend. Now, it has become a dried flower, but she has never been willing to throw it away, "I didn't expect to stay for 9 years".
▲ Picture / Visual China
After getting married, the child was born, Luo Xiao's life transitioned to middle age, passion, youth, and the heart that was excited because of being close to each other disappeared in the days of firewood, rice, oil and salt. The whole family's energy and money are revolving around the child. Her husband is more budget-conscious than her, "I'm still willing to buy it for him, if I make some money and spend more than 3,000 to buy a watch for him, he won't buy it for me if it is more than 2,000." ”
Every year on Valentine's Day, 520, and Tanabata, there are no more flowers for her. Only once on Mother's Day, her husband gave her and her mother a bouquet of carnations each. She realized that she had gone from being a wife, a woman, to a pure mother.
The depreciation of diamonds not only reflects the demise of love, but also witnesses the decline of the business of love.
In 2021, on the day of her 10th wedding anniversary, Wang Xiaofei posted a Weibo, and the big S in the group photo was wearing a 10-carat diamond ring on his hand. Only later did I know that the diamond ring came from the sponsorship of I DO, and this love had long been mixed into the business.
Soon after, the two got married, one got married quickly, and the other set off a scolding war on the Internet many times, and the family affairs were known to the whole network, and the marriage of the two did not leave a trace of decency, only Zhang Lan, who sold hot and sour noodles, earned a steady stream of traffic and money.
Behind the I Do, who sponsored them to show their affection, was Hengxin Xili Industry, which first dived in 2022 due to a decline in performance, with 205 stores reduced and more than 80% of employees laid off. Later, it faced suspension and bankruptcy reorganization, and the founder Li Houlin was restricted from consumption, and once became a "lai". Similar to the fate of Hengxin Xili, Liuliufu Jewelry Co., Ltd. has failed to hit the IPO three times.
▲ I DO Beijing store. Photo / Visual China
From diamonds to gold
Andy feels that he has "taken advantage of the dividends of the times". Around 2015, he sold a house in Shanghai, "tens of thousands of yuan a month is stable". By 2020, the house was not selling, and he returned to Changsha to open a real estate agency, losing all the money he had earned in the past few years. In 2022, he transformed into luxury goods and gold recycling, just in time for the period when second-hand transactions were more frequent.
Although the diamond business is no longer in business, on the other hand, gold recycling is particularly hot. Walking into the first floor of the mall, the jewelry counters have been transformed into gold counters. At the beginning of this year, the recycling price of gold was 440 yuan, and now it has risen to more than 500 yuan. Every month, he hands over the gold from retail investors to a first-class recycler, and after passing through layers of hands, it finally arrives in Shenzhen, where it is made into brand new jewellery and sold to consumers.
Why does gold retain its value better than diamonds?
The most important factor is the development of man-made diamonds. In the past 10 years, the technology and industry of Chinese diamond-made diamonds have been moving forward rapidly. Now, grow a gem-quality diamond with the purity, clarity and brilliance of a natural diamond in just a few weeks.
One expert once described the difference between man-made and natural diamonds: "It's like the difference between ice in a river and ice in a refrigerator." ”
Because of the reduced cost, man-made diamonds are more than half the price of natural diamonds. 90% of the world's man-made diamonds are produced in China, and most of China's man-made diamonds come from Henan. ”
▲ Diamonds at the Zhengzhou Lab-grown Diamond Fair. Photo / Visual China
Threatened by "Made in Henan", De Beers began to save itself, changing the advertising slogan to "Real is Rare, Real is Diamond" - real is rare, real is diamond, in order to highlight the only drawback of man-made diamonds. It also spent $40 million to build a special grading machine to distinguish between natural and man-made diamonds.
This was followed by price reductions. According to the Economic Observer, in 2024, De Beers will cut the price of rough diamonds over 2 carats by more than 15%; Rough diamonds from 0.75 to 2 carats are reduced by 10%-15% on average; The price reduction of less than 0.75 carats is 5%-10%, which is a large price reduction in recent years.
This effort ultimately proved futile. Across the globe, marriage rates are falling. Taking the mainland as an example, in 2022, the number of marriage registrations in the mainland will be 6.833 million, a new low since 1986. Young people no longer believe in love and are reluctant to rush into marriage. At present, the most popular genre of film and television dramas is the "big heroine" drama - the heroine does not fall in love, does not touch men, and only engages in her career.
In an age when there are more and more single men and women, young people care more about the actual economic value of diamonds than about their symbolic meaning. When the value of diamonds depreciated, there were more young people buying second-hand diamonds, artificial diamonds, or even not buying diamonds.
Fang Miaomiao, who was born in the 95s, bought a second-hand diamond ring of a well-known brand on Xianyu. Before buying, she did her homework - she was looking for a personal seller, and it was within 50 kilometers of Wuxi, where she was located. In the end, she managed to lock in a 60-point diamond.
The seller was a man, and the price was 30,000 yuan, and she cut it to 9,000 yuan. She guessed that the other party sold diamond rings because of divorce, because the two offline meetings came alone, and his wife was never mentioned. Later, when we went to the brand counter to change the ring, he forgot the member account, and the person at the counter said that he could use the name of the registrant to query, and asked twice before he said his wife's name.
Fang Miaomiao bought a diamond ring to get married. Her mother-in-law gave her 50,000 yuan to buy jewelry. In addition to this diamond ring, she also bought a pair of rings with a simple style of more than 4,000 yuan, ready to wear them with her lover, and the rest of the money was all used to buy gold.
▲ Picture / Visual China
This experience was posted by her on Xiaohongshu, and the comments were divided into two voices, some people think that love and diamonds should be the only one, and it is not good to buy a second-hand diamond ring; Some people also praised her for being budget-conscious, and buying second-hand is the most cost-effective.
Fang Miaomiao felt that she was not the most exaggerated, her sister only bought a pair of rings when she got married, not even a diamond ring, and the money saved bought a 300,000 car with her husband. On Xiaohongshu, there are also young girls, and all the money from marriage is used to buy gold bars.
As for people who buy a diamond ring and regret it, there is no better way than to wear more to improve the cost performance. After returning from the pawn shop, Luo Xiao had to wear a ring every day, wear it in the bath, and wear it in the pot, and she was reluctant at first, but now she treats it as a jewelry, "After all, it is a status symbol, it can't prove that you are a rich woman, but it can prove that you have a diamond ring" - although she can't say what "diamond ring" represents.
When he hadn't returned to his hometown and worked in Shanghai, Luo Xiao had a colleague who married in Beijing. On the day of the wedding, a convoy of dozens of beetles greeted her, and a special video team followed the whole process, in front of the carefully arranged background, the colleague showed off the diamond ring on his hand, which was bigger, whiter, and more shining than Luo Xiao's. She also heard that her colleague and her husband were planning to go to the Maldives for their honeymoon. When chatting with another colleague in the company, the other party comforted her: "You will go to a better place than her when you get married in the future." ”
But in fact, when he returned to his hometown to get married and have children, "how can I have the opportunity to go to the Maldives?" ”
Today's life is full of embarrassment. When I was short of money, I wanted to sell everything, and I changed a new car last year, but recently I had the idea of selling it. Her only sustenance is to find a job, she plans to earn a few more years, save 200,000 yuan, and retire at the age of 45 after 15 years of pension insurance.
Whenever she sees the diamond in her hand, she still remembers the beautiful afternoon when she went to buy diamonds with her husband, when they had a youthful spirit, infinite hope for the future, and a feeling of caring for and loving each other. Although, like the value of a diamond, it is gone.
She knows that nothing lasts forever, including diamonds. The value of the diamond itself is artificially carved, and its chemical composition is the same as that of graphite, but the structure is different. As the British novelist Wilkie Collins said in "The Jewel of the Moon", diamonds are "nothing more than lumps of carbon."
(Names have been changed)
Resources
[1] Popular Science China, "In Henan County, "Diamonds Sell Like Cabbage"
[2] Economic Observer, "Natural Diamond Price Reduction Turmoil"
[3] Martin Meredith, Diamonds, Gold and War