Clarity Enhanced Diamonds

[PinkDiamond]

From November 2009

Wow! This ruling really surprises me!

Jury Rules Against Blue Nile in $60.1 Million Lawsuit
JCK Staff -- JCK Online, 11/2/2009 12:12:32 PM

"A federal jury in Seattle dismissed Blue Nile Inc.'s $60.1 million claim against The Yehuda Diamond Company following a six-day trial, reaffirming Yehuda Diamond's right to compare the prices of its clarity-enhanced diamonds to the untreated diamonds sold by online retailer Blue Nile.

The suit, brought by Blue Nile and heard last month in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington, involved Blue Nile’s efforts to prevent Yehuda from comparing the price and appearance of its clarity enhanced diamonds to those natural untreated diamonds sold by Blue Nile.

The jury dismissed both Blue Nile’s federal and state claims that Yehuda had engaged in false or misleading advertising.

Yehuda will continue to press its own lawsuit against Blue Nile filed in November 2008 in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. In that suit, Yehuda contends that consumers who purchased rubies, emeralds, sapphires, or jewelry containing those stones from Blue Nile were not informed that the gemstones had been treated to enhance their appearance."

http://www.jckonline.com/article/367105 ... d=15114325

[PinkDiamond]

dare I ask why it surprises you?

I haven't read the backstory - the article linked to only gives a summary of the decision... which sounds like a basic advertising ruling.. in that any company can offer comparisons between products in advertisements as long as the information given in those advertisements is factual and reasonably actual. If The Yehuda Diamond Company held itself to such rules... no problem?

It's like comparing apples to oranges and selling them for the same price. I don't see how filled diamonds can be compared to ones that don't require processing to look that good. Just my because I know I wouldn't want to pay the same price for a filled stone as a natural.

Neither would I (I'm partial to Canadian natural diamonds as far as diamonds go) - but as long as they're honest about what they're doing, and in their comparison honest about what those they're comparing to are doing, I don't think it would be right for an established gem industry to be able to quash an upcoming (non-natural) gem business by the legal means explored in this case. I'd say let the market decide.. and I think they'll quickly find that they can't sell their stones at the same price as regular diamonds any more than fully lab-grown diamonds* now or CZ well in the past; mostly because it has already been ingrained in most people's minds that anything but natural is a 'fake'.. regardless of whether it is technically a better stone and can even look better.