I’m including excerpts from an article I found in (where else) Reuter’s Oddly Enough.
Remember your loved one – as a diamond
CHUR, Switzerland (Reuters) – Diamonds really are forever. Algordanza, a small company based in the mountainous southeast of Switzerland, uses the ashes of dead people to make diamonds as a permanent memento for their nearest and dearest.
And with prices starting at less than 5,000 euros ($7,488), the jewels are not solely the preserve of the jetset.
7+ grand??? To wear my dead husband as jewelry??? (The article does go on to say that you can use hair of a living person — do you don’t have to wear your dead husband as jewelry — you can wear your living husband as jewelry.
“Astonishingly these are mainly Christian people. They say: ‘Why should I say goodbye? I’ll see my husband in 15 years in heaven anyway,’” Brimer said in his office overlooking the town of Chur and its surrounding steep mountains.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t that Jesus dude give lots of talk about feeding the hungry and taking care of the poor and there was lots of stuff about orphans and widows. I’m thinking that $7+ grand could help a whole lot of poor people.
The technology for making artificial diamonds was first pioneered by General Electric in the 1950s, and mirrors nature by subjecting carbon to huge pressure and temperature.
U.S.-based LifeGem and Britain’s Phoenix Diamonds, for example, also offer diamonds made from hair, which contains more carbon than ashes meaning a gem can be created from the hair of a living person, or from someone who has been buried rather than cremated. LifeGem even offers diamonds made from dead pets.
Did you read the part about this costing $7+GRAND?? Yeah I love Fuzzybutt. But for 7 grand I could pretty much adopt a few other dogs too.
IN THE PUB FOREVER
Hold the presses??? What’s this about eternity in the pub???
Often the gem is mounted in jewelry, which the bereaved then wear to maintain close contact with their loved one. But some customers have different plans.
One widow, Brimer said, carried around her husband’s diamond in her handbag. Others have them mounted on the deceased’s table in the local pub.
You know — I like my local pub, but that amount of money, invested correctly, could pay someone’s college education. Crem, if you die, and give me $7 grand and want me to invest it at the local pub — you can bet I’d throw a heck of a party — and then visit on a regular basis and pretend I’m talking to you.
In its first year, 2004, the company sold one diamond. These days it is creating about 60 a month, which Brimer attributes to word-of-mouth recommendations and media coverage, as Algordanza does not advertise.
You GOT to love a business plan that has that much growth with no advertising.
Each one takes between three weeks and three months to create, said chemist Nesimi Oner in one of Algordanza’s laboratories.
(Editing by Sara Ledwith)
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