GIA OPENS MELEE SCREENING CENTER AT STULLER HEADQUARTERS, LAFAYETTE, LOUISIANA

The Gemological Institute of America (GIA), in association with Stuller Inc., one of the largest jewelry manufacturing and distribution facilities in the United States, has launched a melee-screening center, at the headquarters of Stuller in Lafayette, Louisiana, enabling the jeweler to sell natural diamonds to its clients with the assurance of the certification of the world’s most recognized  Gemological Institute.

The arrangement allows Stuller to sell its natural diamonds to retail clients with an accompanying GIA document stating that the goods are not synthetic or simulants.

 

STULLER INC. HEADQUARTERS, LAFAYETTE, LOUISIANA
STULLER INC. HEADQUARTERS, LAFAYETTE, LOUISIANA

 

The melee screening center is operated independently by GIA in a dedicated, secured space and became fully integrated with Stuller’s business processes on Monday, April 16, 2018. GIA’s own employees working in the center inside the Stuller headquarters in Lafayette, Louisiana, will provide the laboratory’s melee-analysis service, operating the GIA-owned analytical instrumentation, for round polished diamonds ranging from about 0.005 carats to 0.25 carats. Apart from this the service also sifts out diamonds treated using high-pressure, high-temperature (HPHT) techniques, and can also sort out natural stones by color.

Commenting on the opening of the screening center at Stuller, Stanley Zale, the vice president for diamond and gemstone procurement at the company said, “Stuller, which stocks both mined and lab-grown diamonds, already screens the vast majority of its stones to check that the company is advertising them accurately. The new initiative will give the extra confirmation that clients seek. Each of us in the industry has an obligation to one another to correctly represent the product we’re selling.” Continuing further he said, “We have a concern there might be this inevitable story on “60 Minutes” about undisclosed lab-grown diamonds,” referring to the CBS news show.

“GIA is the most trusted gemological authority in the industry. Therefore there is no one better than GIA for Stuller to rely on to deliver on our commitment to correctly represent the product we are selling.”

“GIA is here to give our customers the highest level of assurance that they’re buying exactly what we say they’re buying,” he added. “It’s incumbent on all of us to have a strict and vigilant quality-assurance program, and to have the highest level of assurance that we are correctly representing the product we’re selling.”

 

THOMAS M. MOSES, GIA EXECUTIVE VICE-PRESIDENT OPENS THE MELEE SCREENING CENTER IN THE PRESENCE OF STULLER PRESIDENT DANNY CLARK
THOMAS M. MOSES, GIA EXECUTIVE VICE-PRESIDENT OPENS THE MELEE SCREENING CENTER IN THE PRESENCE OF STULLER PRESIDENT DANNY CLARK

 

The Screening Center was declared open by Thomas M. Moses, GIA executive vice president and chief laboratory and research officer for the GIA, in the presence of Stuller president Danny Clark. In his remarks the vice president of GIA said, “Locating our service within Stuller’s premises allows GIA to rapidly and efficiently analyze a higher volume of melee diamonds, helping to protect the consumer and ensure their confidence in the most prevalent stones in the market,”

The GIA Melee Analysis Service, launched in December 2016, applies GIA’s decades of research into natural, treated and synthetic diamonds to quickly and accurately separate natural, untreated diamonds from simulants, synthetics and HPHT treated natural diamonds, and sorts the natural, untreated diamonds by color range. It screens round, D-to-Z color melee from 0.9 mm to 4.0 mm in size or 0.005 to 0.25 carats in weight.

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