Fire Mountain Gems Takes A Step In The Right Direction!

by Pippit L. Carlington

As many of you readers might remember I wrote to Fire Mountain Gems on behalf of The Art Jewelry Collective to give them feedback on their growing trend to offer cheaper quality materials and less high quality, fine stone beads, and told them that their "promotional strands" were sending the wrong message to the wrong market and that it was alienating those of us who work with fine material in the creation of our jewelry.

Well...I got an e-mail today which suggests that they have thought about this position and decided that they should go back in the other direction toward higher quality bead strands! This is real progress for the industry, as Fire Mountain Gems is a major supplier of jewelry findings, beads, tools, packaging, etc.

Read the letter below (re-printed from an e-mail I received announcing their about-face);
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Dear Designers,

Fire Mountain Gems and Beads is pleased to announce that the largest consortium of gemstone bead cutters in India has appointed us their official distributor in North America.This comes with two changes:

Because of the difficulty of getting rough gem materials, they will no longer be cutting the low-grade materials; these are the strands we normally sell for $1 to $2.

In return for our pledge to sell everything they can cut, they will lower their price by 50% or more on all materials. Our buyers readily agreed to this arrangement, knowing that our designer customers would be delighted to get a supply of fine gems priced at least half-off. We will implement these new prices immediately, starting with the current prices in the Web offering.

Please Note:
We usually can't predict what’s coming in on the next shipment.
Once an item is sold out, it may show up again in the next shipment - or we may never see it again.

If you are selling to a steady customer, such as a department store, we recommend that you secure all of the material that you will need for the entire contract, from the beginning. These are not the same as our regular stock, where you can usually buy more as you go along. Once these are gone, they're gone.

You can mix and match these for our All Assortable pricing program.
Our Ironclad Guarantee applies to these products, as it does to all products you buy from Fire Mountain. You can return anything, for any reason, for a full refund - no time limit, no kiddin'.

We would like to thank our customers who have supported our India gemstone program over the years. Your support has made this appointment possible, and it is only right that you share in the benefits. We wish we could take each of you to the Jaipur area of India and have you meet the families of the cutters who prepare these gemstones. These families are immensely grateful and thankful for your support. You should know that you are helping to forge an unbreakable bond between our country and India, (the largest democracy in the world).

Happy Beading from all of us at Fire Mountain Gems and Beads,

Chris and Stuart
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I took a look at the beads they currently have in that collection and though most of them are listed as B-grade, not A, AA, or AAA, I must say that some of the strands of facetted black garnet they're offering are pretty good.

This might be worth watching over the coming months to see what else they are carrying.