In a discussion on Pricescope today Paul Slegers of Infinity Diamonds responded with the following post that I thought worthy of being posted separately.
I am a vendor of Infinity Diamonds and this is the type of reason why I enjoy working with Paul.
Going back to the original topic of Sara, I think that Sara and others are only touching part of the positive aspects of consistency.
In order to understand this, you need to think with a different mindset. Most contributors here are used to thinking about the product and the product only, where I think that processes are most important. Some of these processes involve the choice of retailers selling a line, and the level of service that they provide (Sara touched this aspect also), but also the production-process which delivers the final product is extremely important.
Here on Pricescope and on other consumer-forums before that, I have learned important aspects of product. Some of these aspects are the choice of the lab-report, the need for photographs of the actual stone, the ideal-scope, the hearts-and-arrows, later on also of the ASET, and the disclosure of maximum information about the stone, available at all times.
What many do not realise, is that all these features of the product do not define the product. They describe certain aspects of the product, with great tools, but all these tools have their limitations. In our attempts to educate people, we have a lot of tools to cover, but we often forget to emphasize the limitations of each tool. As such, the mistaken idea arises that the combination of these tools accurately describe the diamond.
The reality is different however. If a stone passes the test of a tool, it indicates that the stone is better than a certain minimum-level. For example, if a stone has an Ideal cut-grade by AGS, this only means that the stone has passed the minimum-level chosen by AGS to describe the stone as Ideal. Within that grade, there are still a number of variations.
Also, if a stone passes the minimum standards of H&A, this is not complete information, since the crispness of the H&A-pattern is an important differentiator between stones, but is not part of the minimum standards of H&A. From my side, I have not only learned from these minimum-levels of information on PS, but I combine this with the experience and common sense of generations of the best diamond-cutters in the world. This is necessary, because science has not yet completely cracked the formula that makes a diamond work. As such, I do not have objective data to prove what works, but I guess that I do have the experience to make it work.
In this regard, we are proud that we did not have to change our formula when AGS and GIA introduced new cut-grades, and the ongoing scintillation-studies by AGS will also have no effect on our formula. What I am trying to say in a complicated way, is that our formula for cutting our diamonds is ahead of its time, where the majority of cutters is only adapting (constantly) to newly arising needs.
Back to process.
In our operation, we spend a lot of energy in the particulars of the cutting-process. This approach is totally different to one of product-quality-control. In the latter, one compares the final product (or at a sub-step in production) with a quality-level that needs to be achieved. The result is that everything that passes the minimally needed quality-level passes, since it is good enough. In our approach, I may have been influenced by my father, who used to be working at Ford Motor Company, where he was part of a quality-improvement-team. This team introduced the then new Japanese quality-improvement-methods into Ford's manufacturing process, and, there, I learned that quality is not a matter of checking it afterwards only, it is much more a matter of adapting production-processes so that quality is an automatic result.
It is our attention to the process that creates our Infinity-brand with diamonds that dazzle consumers and that our retailers are proud to carry. I am often surprised how some consumers describe certain unique aspects of our stones. I know that these aspects are a result of our process and they can only be observed in real-life, as the currently available tools cannot show these.Actually, that is why I think that consistency is important. Our consistent process guarantees a product that also delivers benefits beyond the abilities of the current cut-assessment-tools.
Live long,
Paul SlegersInfinity Diamondswww.CraftedByInfinity.com
I found this fascinating and I hope you enjoyed it also. You can read the entire thread on Pricescope by clicking on the title. As always, the discussions there are lively!
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