The Importance of Chain of Custody

Chain of custody is the knowledge of every set of hands a gem has passed through between the moment it is dug from the ground and when it ends up in the hands of the final owner. Complete knowledge of the chain of custody is the only way to ensure that the gem you buy meets your personal standards for ethical sourcing and treatment status.

We often see people in the gem industry refer to “trusted” suppliers, and indeed, we all rely on them for obtaining gem material from locations that we cannot travel to ourselves. However, even trusted suppliers can be fooled. Material is often brought from other locations to the latest “hot” find to meet demand from buyers; without being present when the material is mined, it can be hard to be sure that the material is truly local. How does one avoid these problems and truly know where the gem material comes? What were the conditions under which it was extracted from the earth?

It’s not possible to mine everything ourselves— or even travel to all of the mines where the material comes from— so ensuring that we know the full chain of custody is an important task. We address chain of custody in a variety of ways.

We work very diligently to make connections with individual mine owners and miners, many of whom work for a cut of the finds, which they then sell.  Jeff has also invested both time and money in mines in places as far off as east Africa.  These relationships allow us to have confidence in the gem rough we purchase and guarantee that the miners are getting the best price for their gems. That said, there are so many different gems found in so many different parts of the world that we still must rely on brokers who can travel to these remote destinations.  Similar to how we carefully choose the mines and miners we work with, we also carefully select the brokers we chose to work with.

We track where all of our gem rough comes from, so if you’re looking for a particular gem and you want to know the full chain of custody, we can provide that information to you.  No matter where our gem rough comes from, we work to make sure it’s not from locations where the environment is being destructively exploited or where the gems pass through the hands of those who use the profits for funding conflict. We make sure the original miners are independent claim workers and not exploited labor when possible.  If we can’t ensure this, then we don’t buy it, it’s that simple.