Diamonds are a girl’s best friend, according to Marilyn Monroe’s character in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes — they may also become a valuable acquaintance of the media industry.
At the Facets diamond conference in Antwerp this week, industry leaders from around the world made a pressing case for more category-wide marketing to stimulate demand for natural diamonds, according to Rapaport.
Al Cook, CEO of De Beers (which created the ‘A Diamond is Forever’ slogan in 1947), reportedly said that diamantaires had taken for granted the previous decades of category marketing. He urged industry leaders to ‘step up’ and ‘play their role’ — a hint, according to Rapaport, to give more money marketing funds to the Natural Diamond Council (NDC), a not-for-profit that promotes natural diamonds.
Also speaking at the conference, NDC’s CEO David Kellie said, ‘No one sees the value in marketing until you take it away.’
De Beers used to invest a lot of money into category marketing, but it pulled back around 15 years ago, after giving up what was often described as monopolistic control of the industry. The funds available for category marketing of natural diamonds also took a hit when Russia’s largest diamond miner, Alrosa, left the NDC when the Russia-Ukraine war broke out in 2022.
Earlier this month, Rapaport announced that the Antwerp World Diamond Centre (AWDC), the Dubai Multi Commodities Centre (DMCC) and India’s Gem & Jewellery Export Promotion Council (GJEPC) are now discussing plans to fill the gap Alrosa created and increase the NDC’s budget to over £79 million ($100 million).
Diamond production decreased drastically, from 177 million carats in 2005 to 121 million in 2022. One reason for this decline is the rise of synthetic diamonds, which are nearly identical to natural diamonds and significantly cheaper. This week, McKinsey also reported that the diamond industry is at an inflection point, with prices plunging following a peak in February 2022.
Featured image: Edgar Soto / Unsplash
