Bench Jeweler Memes

36: Special Guest "Step-Daddy" Ron Joins the Show & We Talk Shop, Continuing Education & Retirement

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Episode 36 is a special one! We’re joined by longtime supporter and fellow bench jeweler, Ron — better known around here as “Step-Daddy Ron.”

From supporting our nonsense since day one to officially becoming the temporary namesake of our “studio” (yes… welcome to Step-Daddy Ron Studios), Ron was an absolute blast to hang with.

We spend the episode talking shop, bench jeweler life, continuing education and jewelry classes, the future of the, retirement, and plenty of random side tangents along the way. Just a fun, laid-back conversation with someone who truly gets the industry — and gets our sense of humor.

Honestly one of the most relaxed and enjoyable episodes we’ve done in a while. Grab a drink, pull up a bench chair, and come hang out with us!

Follow us on Instagram & YouTube @benchjewelermemes

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SPEAKER_02

All right. Well, good morning and good afternoon and good evening. We've established Brad. Morning. Good well, good afternoon. Yes, it's afternoon right now. Today is a special day, Brad. It sure is. I'm so excited. We have a guest on that we're about to introduce, and um, I think we can just introduce him by his show name. His show nickname is stage name. Stepdaddy Ron has joined the show. Welcome, Ron. Thank you so much for being a part of what we're doing this morning. How are you doing, sir? I'm well. Thanks for having me. Well, I said this before we started recording, and I know no one can see this. We'll have to post a picture of all three of us because I swear we all look like we could be related to each other. It looks like I'm just gonna describe it. It looks like Ron is me and Brad if we merged into one person. Yes. I'm just gonna say it. Yep. How do you feel about that? Or now that you're seeing us, do you think that's a disrespect? He's like No, no. I didn't come on here to be insulted, boys. So how are you doing, buddy? I'm well yourself? I'm doing good, man. Both of us, I think all three of us uh are recording on a day that we are not open to the public, correct? Oh yeah. Well, I took the day off, so yeah, you took the day off. So I I do want to, okay, well, first off, let's let's because we want everybody to know who you are. So why don't we go a little backstory first on how long you've been in the jewelry industry and kind of how you got your start, and then that'll launch into some follow-up questions.

SPEAKER_05

Okay, so my father owned a jewelry store in a little suburb of Columbus called Gehanna for let's see, he opened in would have been, I was, I don't know, six or seven years old. So it would have been the 80s, and uh, you know, he had a very successful store. Uh ended up buying a bank in town and then moving and converting that. And then when he went to retire in 2014, uh my myself, my sister, and he opened a new location and started working by appointment.

SPEAKER_04

Those bank buildings are so freaking cool. Oh man, I really wish we kept it.

SPEAKER_05

Oh, yeah. 12 by 12 volt, uh 4,000 pound door.

SPEAKER_02

Every time I see if I see a bank that like closes down or is like rebuilding, I'm like, I wonder if I should how can we pull this off to buy this old bank? So cool. It's probably never gonna happen. It won't. Especially the way we're going. Yeah. Maybe. Who knows, Brad? That might be our studio one day. Which by the way, um, okay, so I don't want to distract from your story, but uh but before before we hopped on here, uh Brad and I agreed, at least temporarily, we're gonna we're gonna give naming rights to this recording studio that that we're in right now, which aka the the our shop. Yep. Um but it's from now on, until further notice, we're gonna call our studio Stepdaddy Ron Studios. So we appreciate all your contributions. I think you've earned naming rights to our studio.

SPEAKER_05

Absolutely. There we go.

SPEAKER_02

So hopefully you are flattered by that because we're gonna we're gonna do that for a few weeks. Coming alive from Stepdaddy Ron Studios. All right, so your dad had a jewelry store and you were a kid, so you just grew up in the jewelry store business?

SPEAKER_05

Pretty much. Um, I was young, young when he opened, and I was, I don't know, seven or eight and programming the cash register of the old Casio. I don't know if you remember those old cash registered before they had the the computerized everything. It was push button, everything had to be logged in and and set up. Um, but yeah, he was in a uh an old dump truck garage that was converted, drywalled and carpeted and had cases. It was a very, you know, kind of a small, you know, nothing shop. And over the years he got bigger and ended up moving into a bank. It was very successful. Um, we actually had three employees move on to open their own stores, which is a testament to my dad, you know, and his ability to train and keep good people. That's amazing. So yeah, eventually we uh opened our own shop uh by appointment, which was you know one of those things that it's kind of a dream. You get rid of all the stuff you don't want and keep the things you do.

SPEAKER_04

Exactly. And stuff you mean customers.

SPEAKER_05

Get rid of the customer. You know, if I had my way, I'd sit in a little dark room and just work on stuff all day, engrave and and uh you know, set stones, but unfortunately that's not the way it works.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, unfortunately we have to sell our we have to sell our artwork to people eventually at some point to keep it. That is true. If you want to eat so, how long did you work for your dad until you went out on your own or or is are you on your own?

SPEAKER_05

So what ended up happening, um, I worked for my dad from 2002 to 2014. Um, when he closed the shop, we basically became we were partners, uh, my dad, myself, and my sister. Um so we eventually bought him out. He's now retired and living that good life. Yeah. Like we all want to live. Um, but it's me and my sister. We're uh two men shop, we have no employees, you know, owners on site. People typically really, really like that because the buck stops here. You know, you end up talking directly to the person, I'm the person executing the design. So it works out really well.

SPEAKER_02

So you're so your sister's with you every day?

SPEAKER_05

She is. Um, she you know kind of spearheads most of the customer service and keeps me on track because you know, I tend to uh get sidetracked and not want to complete specific tasks. She does all the uh you know banking and and uh bookkeeping, that kind of thing.

SPEAKER_04

Nice.

SPEAKER_02

Should I bring my sister in, Brad? Should we get her involved?

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, I don't think it would work that that way. I think she'd be great though, because I know she listens to the podcast.

SPEAKER_02

So you're also when we when we're done recording, we'll say what we really think. No, I'm just kidding. She's great. Both of my sisters are great. All my siblings are fantastic uh for the record. So I'm on the record of saying I love all of them so much. All right. So you've been so it's been you and your sister by so y'all immediately when you started just immediately went by appointment, pretty much.

SPEAKER_05

That's correct. Yeah. Initially we were pretty loose with our appointments and um kind of worked around customer you know time frames. But as time went on, we kind of realized that you know you can't be open 24-7. You can't take an eight o'clock appointment, you can't take a 7.30 appointment. So we've we've kind of morphed into a hybrid where we'll take an appointment at you know 8:30 in the morning, but that's not typical. But usually we take appointments from you know nine to four Monday through Thursday and Friday we work uh nine to one. So it's it's really beneficial for for us. We both have kids, so if we need to leave the the shop, we can, if we can take care of a doctor's appointment or whatever.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. Yeah, I think what the little bit we've talked um outside of this, um, from what you've described, this is kind of I think it's kind of what me and Brad are gonna eventually work towards. I don't think we're quite ready to just make a hard switch. That's why I thought it'd be interesting to um to have you on because I do think that is something that I feel like a lot more jewelers are doing, especially the jeweler or the store owners or shop owners that are the ones doing the work and running the shop. Um I think it just makes our life easier. Um, because it's just hard to do both, as me and Brad attest to, almost on a weekly basis when we're, you know, working on the bench and then have to stop because somebody walked in and they need seven watch batteries changed or want to, you know, shop for a $20 necklace, or et cetera, you know.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, that's tough. And and it really robs you of your creativity and and stops you mid-flow, which is big, you know, it's a big problem.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I think what's funny is uh all my I never consider myself a creative person, but I guess what we do is creative. But then I found once we started doing the bench dealer memes and the podcast, like all a lot of my creativity goes towards that, which I think is fine because we enjoy doing it. I mean, Brad, you'll have to, you know, speak into this, but it gives us it's allows us to express ourselves, have some personality that's not just uh because I think while we're both working, I mean we have the luxury both of us are doing bench work all day, and we're just you know, while we're working, we're just goofing off, telling stupid stories, sharing stupid content. And so we just thought we'd kind of bring that, you know.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, it's definitely our outlet, right? So yeah. Because we do have to work. I'm definitely not creative. Uh I'm I'm definitely just yeah, this is the only creativity I have.

SPEAKER_02

I don't know. You should see he's he's working the he's he's a laser machine over here. He is the laser machine.

SPEAKER_04

All right.

SPEAKER_02

Call me C-Sma. That's his new nickname. Um now, speaking of customers and by appointment, I would so you mentioned how much that obviously makes your life easier, easier to manage, probably a lot happier. But I think it was last night you were sharing with me a client that a client story, a client situation, and I didn't want to tell Brad, so you're gonna have to retell everything you were sharing with me. But you know, even by appointment, you still have those clients who are gonna drive you crazy.

SPEAKER_05

We still have pop-ins, and and if I'm there, I'll help them. You know, I'm not gonna turn them away. I'm you know, money's money. But uh last week I had an appointment at nine, I had a customer pickup, and they they showed up a little bit early. It's it's uh 8.50, it was just a pickup. You know, we cash out, they walk away. It's 8.55. I'm sitting at my desk working on a design, and there the doorbell rings, so I walk over and it's a customer. She wants to um discuss a design for her husband. So, you know, we talked briefly and she leaves, and I didn't really think a whole lot of it. She didn't leave any money, she didn't leave any items. So the following day, she shows up again, you know, right about nine o'clock without an appointment, and uh goes back into it, and she's got uh gold that she wants to use for this this custom ring. And she's got five five grams of 24 carat, she's got 1.7 grams of 18 carat, she's got 0.7 grams of 14 carat. So she wants this heavy men's ring with a like a frog on top of it that's jade. So we go through it, you know, and I kind of give her an idea of pricing and what I charge to alloy her gold, pour her gold, cat her design, you know, print her a wax, you know, so on and so forth. And uh she kind of agrees and says okay, and she leaves. And, you know, flash forward to the following Monday, and she shows up with her husband and her daughter, and they start talking about it. We get more in depth. He tells me exactly what he wants. And I look at him and I say, Okay, you know, we're probably looking at about a week on our CAD design, and I'll get back to you. So, flash forward a week, it's Monday, and I get to work about 8:30. I'm working on her design. I send out an email and it's pretty in-depth, you know, goes through pricing and you know how much it weighs and how much additional gold we're gonna need, and so on, and so forth. And about 10 minutes later, I have another customer come in. I'm helping them, and uh, it's a custom design. We're going through it, and and this lady walks in. You know, she apparently got my email and wanted to chat about it. And my sister was sitting at her desk and she goes over and talks to my sister, and I can hear her. You know, I'm I'm dealing with my customer, but I can hear her out of the corner of my eye, and she's upset that I'm not free and can't deal with her immediately. You know, she's busy, she's got stuff going on.

SPEAKER_02

And uh what a concept.

SPEAKER_05

So go figure. So, about an hour later, you know, she she leaves her phone number. And at this point, I don't want to call her, I want everything to be in writing, so I'm I'm responding via email. And I sent her an email that basically said, Hey, this email is to confirm I I worked on your design, I sent over pricing, and that also I work by appointment. And if you'd like to come in, I'd appreciate it if you, you know, come in and set up an appointment for us. So after that, she uh, you know, gives me the well, you know, the the design that she wants weighs 16 and a half grams, which we're not gonna get to with her her gold that I alloy up. We we need an additional five grams of gold. And she asks me what the price of that gold is, and I quote her $285 a gram for 14 karat, which isn't inexpensive by any means, but it's also not outrageous by industry standards. And she basically gives me the well, that that's too much. I don't want to pay that. You know, so she ends up going and she buys a two and a half gram, you know, little bar from wherever the coin shop or and brings it in. So she shoots me an email back and says, you know, I really like this design, but it's just too heavy. You know, I'm gonna send my husband in and he's gonna try it on. So he comes in, he's very nice. And and and don't get me wrong, they're they're super friendly and you know, they're nice people. So, you know, they decide that they want to put a heart on one of the sides of the ring and a T on the other to conserve gold, you know, basically straight through shops. And you know, I you know, I'm kind of like, well, you know, this is something that you're gonna wear for a long time. Do you want to heart on it forever? It's a men's ring, so that's kind of out of the ordinary, right? A little different. And um, you know, he tries it on. Flash forward to the following day. I wake up, it's 7 30 in the morning, and I already have two emails from her.

SPEAKER_04

No, no.

SPEAKER_05

And uh the one is uh, you know, he wants it to be wider, but we don't want we don't want to spend more money on gold. How are we gonna accomplish this task? Oh yeah, magic. Yeah, yeah. Just I'm gonna wave my magic wand. So we ended up the the final design after seven more emails and two more stops in the shop, ends up being you know 16 grams. And she ends up going out and buying another another uh bar of gold so that she doesn't have to pay retail on it, which I don't, you know, I get it, you know. Yeah, whatever. I'm I'm one to save money myself.

SPEAKER_02

Now you now you can really jack up that labor price though.

SPEAKER_05

Well, which we'll get to it. You know the final story is you know, I did charge them a little additional because I ended up redoing the design and reprinting the model, but you know, I was pretty conservative about my additional charges. I only charged them 150 bucks, which you know, in my eyes seems like a steal after you know 37 emails, eight pop-ins, four model prints. You know, it's it is what it is. But that's that's kind of custom. And the downside to having a shop that's by appointment is you're dealing with people that can't get into regular jewelry, they they won't accept it, they want their own, you know, their own style. That makes sense, which which is awesome, you know, and I get to make some really cool pieces, but I also end up making just the most awful things on the planet sometimes. You know, I get a nepkin sketch from a guy. One of the pieces that I made that I really, really hated. This, you know, and it's hard to describe, but it's about a three-inch heart. Okay. Of course it is. Yep. And we take five of her rings that he had gotten her over the years. Some of them were invisible sets, some of them were baguettes. Of course. And he wanted all the the Millie set on the outside of the heart, and then the diamonds coming down from the center of each ring. So there's like a chain of larger bezel set diamonds coming down. It's beautiful. It was awful. And the whole time I, you know, it's one of those like, Are you sure you want to do this? Like, are we positive? So, you know, I end up making it, and about three months later, his wife comes in and looks at me and she goes, I can't believe you you let him do this.

SPEAKER_02

This is a testament to why men shouldn't just take things upon themselves and get their wives involved when they want to make something special.

SPEAKER_05

And every man wants to get his wife a heart, and every man should realize it's just not what they want.

SPEAKER_02

So I you're a lot nicer than I am because like if we get especially if somebody has like old jewelry and it's got baguettes or a bunch of tiny melee, I'm just like, oh yeah, we know we we don't use this. I just we just flat out say no. Because I'm like, I'm not gonna sit here and try to measure every single tapered baguette that's 1.5 millimeters long.

SPEAKER_05

Baguettes are the devil, they're they're my least favorite things that I gotta be honest.

SPEAKER_02

I mean, I tell them every uh every baguette is cut specifically for that ring, and we're making a new ring, so now we need new new baguettes. Right. That's just how it works. We're not using them, sorry.

SPEAKER_05

This is how it works. You know, the benefit to using the customer's gold is you open up an avenue for sales. You know, everybody says when they walk into the store that the people go, We don't use your gold, we don't, you know, we don't use your stones. And it opens up labor for me. You know, I end up charging the couple with the frog ring fifteen hundred bucks and it's all their materials. You know, I'm gonna have six hours in it, which you know I could make more, but that's reasonable pay.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. No, um, I was gonna ask you when you're you know it's hard to do this in real time, but if you figure out how uh what's the right word, ir irritating certain clients are gonna be. Well if if you figure it out soon enough, you can incorporate that into the price.

SPEAKER_04

Which is gonna take more of your time.

SPEAKER_02

So I mean, yeah, it's just yeah, if we're like six emails in and I haven't even given you a price yet. Well, thank God because the price is about to go up because I have to stop and answer and respond, and we're trying to figure all these details out as we move forward as well.

SPEAKER_05

Well, absolutely. And you you have to there's like an engineer surcharge as well. You know, every engineer is like the worst person to work for ever.

SPEAKER_02

I've only had I've only had one actually, no, we've had two, but one of the most recent was actually engineering student, which might be worse than an actual engineer who's like in college and they're trying to get engaged. Yes. And you know, yeah, they have to ask every you know point millimeter, you know, how well can you make it point two millimeters wider and can you make that prong? It's like sure, buddy, sure. Trying to explain that to an engineer.

SPEAKER_05

Right. And what they don't understand is you polish, you sand, you know, things change as you go very very minorly, but they do.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, no, and that's the conversation is like, hey, we can get this cat exactly where you want it, but once it's time to set stones and polish and file, like it is what it is. It's very good chance it might be a half a millimeter off. It's very possible. Especially if you tell me, because you measured her finger with calipers what size she is, and then you come come to find out it's a you know a whole size or two smaller. It's like, well, now we gotta change everything, buddy.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, and and you just ran diamonds three quarters of the way down the shank.

SPEAKER_02

Oh, every single time I tell you every time you have diamonds all the way around the shank, it's it's always the wrong size. Every single time. Never fails.

SPEAKER_05

I want to surprise her with an eternity band.

SPEAKER_02

Dude, I don't know how you feel about eternity bands. This is a good conversation. How do you feel about eternity bands?

SPEAKER_05

So I actually make a decent amount of money sizing eternity bands because nobody wants to touch them. And the problem is you can size them, but you have to size them to a stone. So you know, you can go down a stone or up a stone. Um but one of the most expensive sizings I ever did was on a platinum eternity band with a you know it was basically a twelve hundred dollar sizing. Um put a chunk in, you know, cut it out with a graver, set a baguette, and it turned out perfect, but you know, it's one of those things that's terrible to deal with.

SPEAKER_02

So we um because I I hate the idea of doing what you just said, so we usually just create like a because our our I shouldn't say our it's not our policy, but generally, generally speaking, I I hate eternity bands because every time they come in, they're always worn out and they're always gonna be, well, I need it bigger, I need it smaller. And so we basically just convince them like, hey, we're gonna remove a stone and create a sizing piece, and now it's no longer an eternity ban. And now when you want to size it up or down again, because you will eventually, now we have somewhere to do that work. So I don't know, I'm sure everybody will probably uh you know be outraged that that's kind of how we handle it, but that's just the way I've chosen to handle it.

SPEAKER_04

And we give them the we get their go-ahead, like we're not like we're not forcing them into it. Right. Not like we're we're saying, Oh yeah, we're just gonna it's still gonna be an attorney band. They know at that point it's not technically an attorney band.

SPEAKER_05

But you know, people at that point we're just dealing with an anniversary band that's sizable.

SPEAKER_02

Exactly. Right. Yeah. Win win. Win win win. I think a couple times I have been able to because it's very it feels like it's very rare. I feel like the ones that we always tend to get are like, you know, where the where the round diamond is three millimeters, but they only want it sized up like a half a size or you know, down a half a size, and it's like, okay, well it's just the just the math don't be mathing, ma'am. So this is what we gotta do. Do you want to do it or not?

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, you're either going up too far or down too far.

SPEAKER_02

Yep. Mm-hmm. Yep. I think one time it worked out magically where I was pretty proud of it, but I just hate doing them so much. But yeah, we don't even if people come in asking, I guess do you ever try to talk people out of it, or are you totally fine with just I guess because if you're doing it and you know, hey, if I have to do it in the future, it's more, you know, more work in the f future work. But I don't know. I just I try to talk people out of it. I know that sounds terrible, but we're not salespeople, we're bench jewelers, so whatever.

SPEAKER_05

I mean, one of the best things you can learn in the industry is when to say no, you know.

SPEAKER_02

Man, I'm so glad you said that.

SPEAKER_05

I mean, that's it's a big part. And and when you're young and hungry and you just opened your shop, you take anything on, but I mean, you gotta save yourself the headache sometimes.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I think what if you're listening to this and whether you are new to this or have been doing it forever, I still think people struggle with when. To say no. And how and how to say no. We should do a whole episode on that. Have we not? I don't know. We've talked about it quite a bit. I mean, it comes it comes up. Both of us work for a family jeweler and for a guy who who just never said no. And so thankfully, because I've worked in that environment, all it does is create so many more problems that you just don't have to have, which is exactly why you are, you know, set up as by appointment, because it gives you the opportunity to say no at the end of the day. And maybe I'm oversimplifying, you know, why and how you operate, but that's the way I see it.

SPEAKER_05

That's pretty straightforward.

SPEAKER_02

That's it. Everybody has to wrap. Just say no. But seriously, though, it's like thank you for your appointment. No. There are there are things we can do. Like we all know Brad started out as a watchmaker for a long time. And we could easily take on more watch repair work. But not easily. I mean, yeah, not easily, but I would hate it. Yes, exactly. And that's the point, is it's gonna make him miserable. I'm gonna be miserable because I have to hear him whine about it. I would be whining. Customers are those are the worst customers because they're the ones that want to check on it constantly. So we just made the decision, even though we can definitely change movements in watches, and we still do occasionally. I think if it's a good customer and it seems pretty straightforward. But if we can't just, you know, order the watch movement, install it, call it a day, knock it out, then we're just we just say, I'm sorry, we don't do that anymore. Yeah. Even though we can we don't.

SPEAKER_05

My dad did a lot of watch repair, and when I say did a lot, I did it. But it was mostly crystals, crowns and stems, batteries, that kind of thing. And I've just gotten away from that. I don't deal with watches at all except for batteries. Oh, that's smart.

SPEAKER_02

So people have to schedule an appointment to get a battery changed? Yep. How much do you charge? 15. Okay, nice. We went up to 20. You should consider it.

SPEAKER_04

So do they call to Yeah, I just went interjected there. I'm sorry. Go ahead. I'm sorry. You should go up to 20. Okay, thanks. Do they call you to set up an appointment or is this something online that you have set up or or everything?

SPEAKER_05

We take all the calls and um schedule them specifically. And we've talked about going to a online style booking, but then you have to, you know, basically you have to be very dil diligent about when you're in and out. And it doesn't work if you have kids and you need to run out and go pick them up or take them to baseball or whatever.

SPEAKER_02

Yep. Makes sense. So what you mentioned kids. You just you you just had well, I assume say just had. How old is your youngest?

SPEAKER_05

Uh just over a year and a half.

SPEAKER_02

A year and a half, and if you don't mind me asking, what's your current age?

SPEAKER_05

I'm 45.

SPEAKER_02

So my man had a my man had a newborn at the age of 40.

SPEAKER_05

43, yeah.

SPEAKER_02

43. Nice. How how how how's that taking its toll?

SPEAKER_05

You know, he's he's an exceptional kid, honestly. We got really, really lucky. He sleeps through the night after six months. We put him down at eight. He sleeps till eight, typically. You know, there's the occasional wake up early and uh get him fed, but overall, he's just a I got really, really lucky.

SPEAKER_04

He's on my sleep schedule. Yeah, I d I do the eight to eight myself.

SPEAKER_02

If if I text Brad after nine p.m., I am not getting an answer until the next day. Sure will, mm-hmm. I'm over I'm up and sending him sending him reels at like 1 a.m. And I'm like, I cannot wait till he sees this tomorrow at nine.

SPEAKER_04

When he's drinking his coffee.

SPEAKER_02

So is is that your boy or girl?

SPEAKER_05

It's a boy.

SPEAKER_02

So is that your only child?

SPEAKER_05

So it's my only. My fiance has two older boys that are um 17 and 18, which is kind of funny that you call me stepdaddy Ron. Because, you know, I'm I'm over here stepdaddying. Um do they call you stepdaddy Ron? No, no, they don't.

SPEAKER_04

They should. They should. Wolf, we got you a t-shirt that said that. There you go. Okay.

SPEAKER_02

He would wear it. I'm I'm I'm here and he would wear it. That's all I oh I would wear it. Oh, yeah. We should uh just see how many we can sell. He would be like, Why who what is stepdaddy Ron?

SPEAKER_05

20 years from now, I'm gonna see one in a in a thrift shop.

SPEAKER_02

I think three three to four people who make sure they never miss an episode, so would all have stepdaddy Ron t-shirts that no one would understand on the planet. Oh man.

SPEAKER_04

Stop wearing that, please.

SPEAKER_05

What is this nonsense?

SPEAKER_02

Oh man.

SPEAKER_04

Well at least don't wear it to church. Gosh, come on.

SPEAKER_02

Late late, congratulations on having your first day. It's a better late than never. Thank you. Thank you. Brad's got two boys. I do. Yep.

SPEAKER_04

I got um one is driving now. Oh, did he get his permit? Oh, dude, it's terrifying. He's doing great though. Well, my wife not so much.

SPEAKER_02

By the time Ronson gets his permit, he'll be like re-almost retired.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, well, I'm I'm probably gonna retire in the next year or two. Our lease is is almost up. So wait, what? I think I'm out. Really? Yeah, yeah. Yeah. What the heck? I've done pretty well.

SPEAKER_04

You just bringing this all this breaking news.

SPEAKER_05

Well, yeah, I say retire. I'll I'll work from my basement. I've got a studio at the house that's uh pretty well equipped. I'm probably one of the only jewelers that has a laser welder at home.

SPEAKER_04

Dang. So you'll just have customers come to your house? I don't know.

SPEAKER_05

Um we'll see how that plays out. I don't know. Well, what's gonna happen, I'm guessing, is I'm gonna take the you know the uh website and just you know have it go to my phone and deal with it from that you know, from that aspect. I'll I'll meet people at their house or however it works out. But yeah, I'll I'll work from home.

SPEAKER_02

Nice. So when you say retire, you just mean just keep scaling back. So still just kind of doing jewelry, just kind of more on a smaller scale?

SPEAKER_05

Well, my my goal would be to to engrave more. I I really, really love engraving, and it's um one of those things that I can lose myself in. It allows me, you know, that that ability to sit down at a bench and and everything else just disappears and gives you that that kind of I don't even know what to call it, but it's it's a great place to be.

SPEAKER_02

Um Well, I mean the good news is when that so what we'll do is maybe we'll just wait until you kind of semi-retire, and then that's when you can, because uh we've discussed and I've seen some of your engraving work, and I really want one of those spider coat knives, but I'm gonna have to need about a year to save up for it because then things are insane. I know. It's absolutely insane.

SPEAKER_05

It's wild the amount of work that goes into them, to be honest. I mean, it's it's crazy.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, little old me is just like, oh well, what was that? Like 50 bucks? Would you spend a half an hour on it? Um no, but when I've seen them, like I've always seen them, and yeah, they're they're obviously expensive because of the amount of time and and labor that goes into them, but man, they are an absolute work of art. And one day I will own one, and I will be a proud owner of a stepdaddy Ron Spider-Co hand-engraved knife. Man, that's a lot to go.

SPEAKER_03

There you go.

SPEAKER_04

You gotta engrave that somewhere on it in a secret place.

SPEAKER_02

So you're gonna do like a little side career, or is or is just are you just gonna be able to maintain whatever quality of life that you want from your basement?

SPEAKER_05

So, you know, this is this is kind of a weird, weird space to get into, but I I um I I've done very well over the years and and made some very good decisions financially. So work is not necessarily something I have to do, um, it's something I love to do. So, you know, the engraving and the you know, custom work and the casting and the stone setting, it's always something that I've been really, really into. Um so you know, I'll be more choosy about my projects as as I move forward. And I'll I've been collecting knives and and firearms over the years to engrave with what I want to do, which is something that I don't ever get to do. And I'm sure you guys feel that. Yeah, you've got this skill set that you know you can make things, but you don't necessarily make what you want to make because you have a line of people that want you to make stuff for them. Correct. So there's this big giant, you know, hole of uh things that I'd love to do, but have never gotten the opportunity to actually execute.

SPEAKER_02

Dude, that's awesome, man. I am not jealous at all. No, but that is I was like super awesome.

SPEAKER_04

My man Ron has lived the exact opposite life. I have not made good financial decisions.

SPEAKER_02

We are gonna do this until we die. And I hate work, so no, I think we have a pretty sweet setup here. I mean, as far as work goes, we've worked both of us have worked for other jewel other jewelers, and we're both first generation, and so I think we're constantly just carving out a way to do this and enjoy it.

SPEAKER_03

And it's it's an evolution, you know.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, if you don't enjoy it, you're just coming to work every day with dread. And one of the reasons I I take all the classes that I take is you know, I have to get out of the box. And um the nice thing is you get to meet other jewelers, and and I've met some really amazing people and um people I've I've made really strong connections with over the last 15 years of these classes.

SPEAKER_02

Do you do you want to talk about those? Because I know we've vaguely mentioned it, but um talk about the classes you've taken and who you've taken them with, just so I don't mess anything up. It'll be a free ad for fill in the blank.

SPEAKER_05

Okay. So I've done five classes at GRS. Um, two of those were with uh Rex Peterson, uh, who's an amazing instructor. I've done um a class with uh Jake Newall for Bolino, which was great. Um Todd Daniels, I did one with as well, and uh Sam Alfano at New Approach. Uh I took classes with, and I'm gonna butcher his name, Jason Maschia Farva. He goes by Jason Farva, who is the um only person ever to be nominated a master jeweler from Tiffany's. And he's an amazing individual and really, really um enjoys teaching, and you can you can see it. Um and at New Approach, I've done their comprehensive stone setting, advanced stone setting, pave, uh sculptural engraving, and the the uh basic hand push, um, all of which I highly, highly recommend if you're into any of those things. Um Jason's just fantastic. And then I've taken a lot of classes under Jeff Park, which is actually my favorite place to go. Um Jeff's a he's in uh Mesa, right outside of Phoenix. Okay. Jeff is is a different type of engraver and has made a living doing art engraving on Rolexes and knives. And um his studio is a different space. Yeah, his his work is just you look at it and go, What the heck? How do I do that? And uh he's a little bit different, you know. He's an artist and he's he's very kind of reserved and quiet, and a lot of people don't realize that they try to interact with him on Facebook, and his Facebook actually got hacked at some point, so he can't his Facebook's just shut down. So he can't interact with you. So if you want to take a class with him, you need to direct message him on Instagram, um, is the best way to get a hold of him. But his classes, he um basically opens up his studio, which is it's a very, very unique space, it's very different than anything else you're gonna go to. Um opens it up at eight in the morning, and then you work from eight until noon. You take an hour lunch, and then you go till six o'clock. And then after that, his studio is open kind of as late as you want it to be. He'll, you know, he's got a TA that'll stay there and work with you till nine o'clock at night if you want, which is you know, for me, I go there because I can't engrave at work. I I don't have the time. Yeah. Um, and it it just allows this great, amazing space for you to practice that that skill. Um, and it's very different comparatively. They're not trying to push tools on you, they're not trying to you know sell you anything. It's it is all about the engraving.

SPEAKER_02

Nice. And are these um like classes that are scheduled with other students, or is it like a one-on-one type thing?

SPEAKER_05

Oh, all the classes I've taken have been scheduled with other students on like for GRFs, they their typical class schedule. Um, New Approach, same way. And um, Jeff's a little bit tougher because he doesn't have a website. You you have to follow him and really, really pay attention to his schedule.

SPEAKER_03

Okay.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, that's awesome. That that is a good uh thing for I think for people in the industry to hear. Um I'll say I've said it, I've only went to New Approach for one week, and that was the stone setting course because I just felt like I needed to kind of learn some proper techniques after I left my old job. And um, man, it just it gets you it gets you, like you said, out of the box. It gets you thinking a different way, it gets you meeting new people, it gets you making sure you're not going crazy. I mean, it's just all the things that rejuvenate you. Um so it's awesome that you've been able to kind of experience uh that kind of uh extended training outside of just the normal stuff that we do.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, it's really nice to to you know, it gets you back in the groove. You know, you you start you do this for so long and you size a thousand rings and you just think to yourself, this is this is awful, this is all I'm doing. And then you you go take these classes, you meet these people, and you're you know, kind of back into the groove.

SPEAKER_02

Now, do you find yourself, because you do like to hand engrave and you've obviously spent a lot of time and money on learning how to do it, do you find yourself when a client comes in and they're doing custom work, do you like push or suggest, like, hey, you know, we could engrave, you know, the shank or you know, blah, blah, blah?

SPEAKER_05

Um, yes, but you know, it's not an inexpensive thing to do. Um, some customers are all about it. You know, I've got this this old, you know, kind of rubber-made toad of all my practice plates that I'll drag out and and kind of do the song and dance when the customers come in and they're doing uh custom work. And some of them fall in love with it and think it's amazing, and some of them kind of look at it and are like, Why are you showing me this? You're wasting my time.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. Anytime I feel like I've ever brought it up, like, oh, you know, it'd be cool if we did this, or just like, yeah, no. And then they just like move right along, like, and I don't even do it. I just, you know, now I'm starting to meet people who do. I've actually had the pleasure of meeting so many people adding you to the list. I'm hoping that somebody will ask me for some hand engraving so I can send you some business.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, I mean, it's something that I really, really enjoy. Um, and it's just it's tough to get enough work to do that specifically. So I don't know if I'll ever ever be just a hand engraver, but I I can hand engrave.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, no, I think I think if you're doing it for fun, like you said, out of your basement, the kind of projects you want, I think you would be surprised at like if you finish a knife or an item and and have a little small Shopify website, I think you'd be surprised at what people would be into. Yeah. Yeah, we with any luck. I mean, I'm gonna buy one eventually. Um, so me and Brad were talking about this. Uh, we were um we I think we did this early on, like our first couple guests like had like some some questions for them, just standard questions to see what other jewelers are thinking. But I'm curious if you're working, whether it be in the future in your basement or just in your shop and there's no no appointments, are you listening to music or what are you listening to in general?

SPEAKER_05

Um while you work so a lot of times nothing to be honest with you. Um but YouTube, you know, I I go on YouTube jags and and I'll dig the depths of God knows what. I mean, I like to collect weird stuff. I've got an old soda machine, you know, in my garage, and I'll just watch, you know, basically all the YouTube videos on how to fix those parts. You know, I've got a bunch of old cars, so I'll I'll go through you know how to replace an intake manifold on an O3 Crown Vic while I'm working, which sounds weird to the average person, but you know, we're we're jewelers and we fix things, it's just you know the way it is. So I I keep most of my time, you know, on the bench listening to things to educational stuff. But I'm also the weirdo that reads the manual to the refrigerator that he buys.

SPEAKER_02

So same. I think if um I am guilty of like I'll prop my phone up and I'll just especially for some reason if I'm working on something intricate or like stone setting, I I feel like I have to have something to I don't know if it's background noise or distraction, I don't know, but I'm the same. I will just play a YouTube video, even though we have music playing in the store. I will have um YouTube playing and I I know Brad, you watch your fair share of YouTube, but not while you're working though.

SPEAKER_04

No, no, because you were doing watches at home. What did you do? Same YouTube. Um man, it was so much better than working here.

SPEAKER_02

No, it might have been better, but it wasn't as fun. No, no, that's true. You were working on watches, it was not better.

SPEAKER_04

It was not better. Just the YouTube part.

SPEAKER_02

At least maybe one day you'll get to um maybe one day this year, you'll get to when you're scrolling YouTube while you're doing your hand engraving, you'll get to see me and Brad's face.

SPEAKER_03

There we go.

SPEAKER_02

It's coming, it's coming soon. I mean, with that said, I don't want to I'm not trying to end this by any means, but what I am gonna do is take just a moment for at least for me and Brad on our behalf to say, you know, thank you for your support and not only just listening, participating, but obviously we haven't mentioned it this episode, which we never do. But the buy me a coffee link is just kind of our intro into kind of how we can keep this going. And I'll let you elaborate. And this sounds feels weird to ask you to do this, but um, you did send me a message on like, hey, here's the reason I'm offering some type of support for what you guys are doing. And it was essentially, you know, I just wanted you guys to not get discouraged. If you want to elaborate, cool. If not, then I'll make it less awkward and and talk about something else.

SPEAKER_05

You know, I really like what you guys are doing. Um, and it it's great to listen to, and and I can highly relate to everything that you guys say. Um, and what I was really worried about is you guys would do five episodes and go, you know, this just isn't taking off, and it's not it's not what you know what we thought it was gonna be. So I made a couple of contributions that um I hope will help continu you help you guys continue to do what you're doing and expand you know your project. I think it's it's a really good project, and it actually kind of gives the the back industry of jewelry a voice, which isn't a thing. Um and you know that's why I have uh bought coffee so much.

SPEAKER_04

That's awesome, man. Because we and we say it uh uh over and over again, you know, we would do it if if nobody listened. So it's just it's an outlet, it's fun. I'm too far away from the mic, apparently. We haven't been most of the time, but whatever. I just looked at Dusty.

SPEAKER_03

Maybe I shouldn't do that motion anymore.

SPEAKER_04

Anywho, I gotta read it. But yeah, man, we we certainly appreciate it. It's it's no unbelievable.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, nope. If if we haven't made it clear, uh genuinely we appreciate you, we appreciate everybody. Uh I know some people are given like five dollars, and it means a lot that you would take an extra step and to uh click a button and just be like, hey, here's some money because I enjoy the show because we do want to, now that it has, I shouldn't say taken off, but it's got some traction and we have we feel like we're we've kind of getting into a groove here and we're like already thinking about the future, and you know, like we said before, all the future things they take time and they take money, and while we have a shop that's open to the public, it does limit us in some way, but this is our we're starting our second month of really being only open to the public four days, and essentially we this this one day we close now is yes, we get work done. We worked from you know probably 9 30 to 12 30 until we hopped on with you, and we get so much work done when there's people not in here, but also we wanted to allow time for us to uh make this a priority in our in our life and in our schedule, you know, doing the podcast, making memes and whatever, being stupid.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, I mean, I'm all for it. Keep it up.

SPEAKER_04

Thanks, man.

SPEAKER_02

When you retire, then you can just travel and you can just come down here once a month and just hop on in person, right? There you go. Have you ever been? Oh, I can't say where you have you ever been.

SPEAKER_05

You know, it's funny. I followed you guys for years before you started this. And I told you this the other night. Um, when my son was was in utero, you guys posted a picture of my bench with a little baby in front of it. And I went, That's my bench. And you know, it was one of those, you know, immediately I start texting my jeweler friends. Are you you you're jeweler bench jeweler memes, aren't you? And that that kind of started my fascination with your guests.

SPEAKER_02

Oh, that's awesome. I don't I wonder how long ago that was. I don't even I can't even keep track of when we technically like started it. And I think we were a little maybe I don't know. I think we were a little more looser back in the day when we first started, because I think I was like, Oh, there's only like 12 people seeing this, I can do whatever I want. Right. Yep. And now it's like now everything I post, I'm like, oh man. I mean how would this play? To it to a certain extent, I don't really care. We focus group this. Yeah, that's what Dusty says now. Yeah, that's what I say. But it's also the reason why I think we've you know, we joked so much early on about, you know, we should get a we should get a paid sponsor, and then we realize like, man, that just comes with strings attached. And I'm not saying that we won't, but I kind of like this just being a little more organic. The the Instagram started organic and the podcast started organic, and so part of me just kind of wants to keep it that way, um, for better or worse. I don't know. We'll see.

SPEAKER_05

We'll see if I can afford it.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, we're gonna need those. Uh no, no, no. You you've done your fair share, and um you got our um our our silly, very silly thank you gift. Hopefully you got it in person. I think it got delivered here.

SPEAKER_05

So it's probably just sitting in there.

SPEAKER_02

Same. Dude, we do the same exact thing. We just I hate checking the mail because I know it's going to be s either it's going to be bills or some work to do. Or catalogs. Or a catalog, yeah.

SPEAKER_05

Full of quality gold catalogs.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. So y'all, I w I wonder how they're going to send you all the quality gold catalogs when you go to your basement. They'll find you.

SPEAKER_05

I'm sure they'll still send them.

SPEAKER_02

The quality gold always finds jewelers. They're like, I heard you daddy.

SPEAKER_05

There's some 12 catalogs. I live on a three-acre property with a 700-foot driveway, and UPS and FedEx are always leaving stuff at the driveway. And a lot of times there's you know jewelry stuff in there that it's one of those it gets dropped off, and I'm like, geez, guys, come on.

SPEAKER_02

That would annoy me so bad. No, it's not.

SPEAKER_05

It makes me real angry.

SPEAKER_02

So I guess you don't around every I've noticed every area is a little different. Like they prefer FedEx or UPS, but like here, like we have the best UPS guy. As far as I don't mean like the best, he's not. He's he's some he's an interesting character. He's gonna hear us one day. He because he probably listens to podcasts. I'm sure he does not listen to us. But FedEx is like by far the worst because them in the post office, yeah, they'll just like here, just lay it outside the door before opening hours or after hours, and it'll just sit there all night.

SPEAKER_05

We'll set it by the road, it'll be fine.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, sure. Why not? Gosh. You got to get your uh driver's uh cell phone numbers like we have. There you go. And then just be like, hey, drive down the driveway, buddy, drop it off at my porch.

SPEAKER_04

Is that what you would tell them?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I would text them and say, Hey, I need this delivered to my porch. At least our UPS guy knows because obviously we're at jewelry store, so he knows that he's got something. I actually a lot of times it's absolutely nothing important, but he treats it, he treats it like it is. Like, thank you so much for making sure this was a priority of your day. It is a uh stickers for bench dorming. It's not a dominant. All right, I'm trying to think if we had anything that we just needed to get to today. We didn't do shop talk. Shall we pause for shop talk? Shop talk.

SPEAKER_00

Shop talk, shop talk, where we talk shop, shop talk. Let's talk shop.

unknown

Woo!

SPEAKER_02

All right, that's good. Um you want to start first, uh Ron, you want to talk shop talk? What's how's your shop looking? How's your repair basket looking? What's on the agenda for the next week? Are you behind? Are you ahead? Let's hear it.

SPEAKER_05

I'm pretty caught up currently. I got I got uh, you know, probably four customs that are in the pipeline for this week and probably two more that are coming up. And I try to get my repairs done as fast as possible. Um in fact, if it's a simple repair, I'll do it for them while they're there just so I don't have to book them a second appointment to deal with them. You know, if it's a chain solder or an earring post, I'm I'm doing it right now. Because if I don't, it creates a whole nother problem for me to get them back in the shop.

SPEAKER_04

So how do you guys handle that? Is is so let's say it's just a ring sizing, you they have to book a second appointment to pick it up, try to um pay for it?

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, so when when we complete it, we call them and you know give them, you know, hey, this has been completed, and we we book a time for them.

SPEAKER_02

Oh nice. So on the days that on the let's say it's a chimple a chimple. A chimple. A simple, if it's a simple chain solder, is that something you're like, hey, uh how long are your appointments booked so that you know, hey, I can just go ahead and fix the chain if you guys want to have a seat?

SPEAKER_05

Uh typically I book them for 15 minutes to a half hour, just in like design appointments I usually do for an hour just because it's you know a little bit more in-depth and you have to sit down and kind of read the person, get an idea of what they want. Um, but an average repair drop-off or pickup we book for 15 minutes, and there's two of us, so we can we can kind of double book sometimes.

unknown

Nice.

SPEAKER_02

And so if you if you see, hey, it's just a simple chain, if your sister's taking the job in, she could just hey, hey, can you just want to hang out for 15 minutes and you just knock it out? I'm assuming you're lasering it at that point.

SPEAKER_05

Um, I don't laser a lot of a lot of chain. Um, I use my laser specifically for like platinum sizings. Um if it's a cable chain, I'll I'll use the laser just because it's a you know it's a slice and clean deal. Um tips I use it for almost specifically, channel rebuilds specifically. Um every once in a while I'll solder a tip, but it's only if it's like usually I'll do it on a sapphire, you know, specifically because I don't want to pull the sapphire, and sapphires are really, really sensitive to laser.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. Yep. Are you rocking the same laser at work as at home?

SPEAKER_05

So at work I have a rollfin that is a hundred joule, and at home I've got a laser store.

SPEAKER_04

Okay. Nice.

SPEAKER_05

Do you have a preference? Um, so my actual preference, so we got we got into lasers in I want to say oh five, oh six, and my dad was always really, really good about finding tools in in not so normal places. So he went to a dental convention, and before Oro Tig was selling lasers to the jewelry industry, he bought the original Oro Tig laser for like 12 grand back in 05, 06, 07, whatever that was, which back then was like cheap for those. I mean, you couldn't get a laser for under 20 grand.

SPEAKER_06

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_05

And they wanted him to uh rep the lasers, and you know, he didn't want to do that, he's got other stuff going on. But you know, shortly thereafter they entered the jewelry market and started selling the oro TIG on the jewelry market. Um, but they do not have the gold box, they have a ceramic chamber, so um upkeep and maintenance is is much more simple.

SPEAKER_04

Nice. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_02

We're gonna have we're we hope to have at least a couple representatives from laser companies. Um was the who's the company that Stellar bought out? B and D. B and D. So we hope to have a lot of people. They are excellent to work with. Dude, yeah, I would imagine so. We hope to have somebody on from there, and then we're gonna have hopefully have uh Adam Kayson on from Cisma, and then we'll see who else we can get um just to talk lasers. I think it's such a an important tool for for bench jewelers um to have, which is so funny because when me and Brad were at our old job, we worked with this old um Armenian jeweler who was just like old school everything, and he was great at so many things, but man, he hated the thought of of lasering anything. It was so it was so common.

SPEAKER_04

It would be so inferior to to a torch in his eyes.

SPEAKER_02

Like I can size them way faster, way better. And he like refused to use it, but that was also like what 20 years ago or something like that. I don't know. But I love my laser. Sure.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, I I couldn't work without it, that's for sure.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, once you once you like really embrace it and see all that it is capable of, and like you said, you can if you want to focus it on like I'm using it for platinum and re-tipping. Um it obviously pays for itself, but I force myself because when I first opened my shop, it was like, man, this was such a big expense, and I was so scared to to purchase it. So I forced myself, like I'm gonna use this as much as possible so that I don't feel like I wasted my money. And um, man, I'm right trying to figure out how we can get a second one.

SPEAKER_05

Well instellar's really good about offering like zero percent on their lasers. Um when we got ours, I I want to say we got zero percent and we paid it off in like nine months. I mean, people do not realize how much money they generate.

SPEAKER_02

And for me, it was the um it wasn't like we were taking in more jobs, it was just the efficiency of like, man, I can solder, I can do these prongs and solder these chains way faster, a lot less clean up, and I was just amazed at how much more efficient I could be, which is hard to measure in dollars, but like it's it's lifesaver, you know.

SPEAKER_05

You know, it's it's one of those I I don't know that I would be faster or more efficient with the laser sizing yellow or white gold, platinum, surely, and and you definitely aren't gonna damage your stones. Um, but I'd like to see a race, you know, somebody who's been on the bench for 10 or 15 years sizing down ten rings versus somebody on the laser sizing down ten rings. Yeah, and for me, I I think it would always be the torch that would win last year. I would assume.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

I would think especially a little specifically in ring sizings, I I could agree that a torch is faster. I think but I think the thing that you we forget to factor in is there's still um there's still a seam of solder in there.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, and so it's like you know if you fuse it.

SPEAKER_02

Now you could argue fusing is even faster and even even better. Like, don't get me wrong. Um I don't know if you see the guy, Ron. Um he's in George. George, yes. Yep. Um I think his videos are the best. I actually we should we should try to figure out a way to get him on. He would be a great guest. He I love him because he's just like, hey, this is how I do it, and he makes everything look so easy, even stuff that I know how to do. I'm like, why did he make it look easier than when I do it? Because he's bad.

SPEAKER_05

I will say I I saw one of his videos and I did I wouldn't say I've started fusing white gold rings, but I've definitely done it more often. Um although it seems like there's more waste involved, you know. But we capture the waste and we sell it later on, so you know, whatever.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, exactly. I think that's what I enjoyed about I mean when we were talking with Chuck is um there's so many different I think I was hoping that was the takeaway is not that if we have someone on and they say this is how I do it, we're not saying that that is the best way, but it might be the best way for you, and the best way for me might be a little different. And I I know we're beating the dead horse, but if you do the job correctly, then there are multiple ways to do it. And I mean it's very few times when I see somebody, you know, do something and I'm like, that's just wrong. Like you're just that's not right. And I'm sure it happens, and I'm sure we can and we can all think of examples, but generally speaking, there's multiple ways to do a job.

SPEAKER_05

Always more than one way to skin a cat, right?

SPEAKER_02

That's right. Were you about to say something? No, I could have sworn I just heard you breathe, and I'm about to say something.

SPEAKER_05

I mean, in the end, you know, whatever works fastest for you, best for your customer, most economical. I mean, at this point, we're talking about in in the world we live in, you know, the stuff the materials we use are five thousand dollars an ounce and two thousand dollars an ounce. So, you know, you gotta take that into consideration too.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I mean the the with the price of gold, I I I've said this before, but I think there was like this brief time, and maybe it was you know a few years ago, within the last five years, where people had more money, and gold was I don't you could argue artificially low, or you can now say that it's artificial I don't know. I I'm not here to make that argument, but I felt like gold and jewelry was so easy to obtain that now it almost wasn't a luxury item anymore, and now it's back to being a true luxury item.

SPEAKER_05

Well, it's funny when my dad had his shop, he actually would buy like gold chain by the kilo, which which to me is just wild to think about. You know, it's astronomical. You know, a tiny little gold chain is four hundred bucks now.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, and it that's like one the chains are the one thing that I I hate to purchase because we just have a small little display of them because I I can't afford just to keep a whole crap ton of them on hand. But when we sell start selling a few and I have to go reorder like five or six, ten chains, I'm like, oh my gosh, it's like it feels so painful to do. And they're harder to sell now because people are like, oh, I want this little chain, and they're thinking hundred, hundred bucks, two hundred bucks, and I'm like, Yeah, a couple years ago it was, and now it's four hundred. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, tiny little box chains, four or five hundred bucks, it's nuts.

SPEAKER_04

It's crazy.

SPEAKER_02

It's absolutely and people are they and truthfully, like the customers they're they're shocked, but they don't understand, like, we're shocked too. Like when I when I have to say the price out loud and I know what the price was a year ago or two years ago, like it feels uncomfortable to say.

SPEAKER_05

Uh that's you know, just FYI, it's a $700 chain.

SPEAKER_02

And especially we're having it with the I think it just happened last week with the um like you know, people coming like, I just want to get my you know, my son's, you know, turning 14 and I want to get him a gold chain. And I'm like, I don't think you do, actually. You really don't. I mean you definitely want to, but I don't think you realize what you're asking. And then we're the bad guys, you know, because we came up with these outrages.

SPEAKER_05

How dare you try to make a living and and retire and feed your children?

SPEAKER_04

Well, we cornered the gold market, and that's why the prices are so high. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Jewelers, yeah. We knew exactly what we were doing the whole time. Um, all right, so let's see here. We talked shop talk. Brad, you actually you didn't um how's your basket looking today? Um too bad. It's pretty good. I I'm doing very well, actually. But so what I'm working on is um the thing I say for last right before we hopped on this call, I'd set one single solitaire. It is a 11-stone band, and it's gonna alternate sapphires and diamonds. Um, the issue is all the sapphires are being provided by the customer. I did uh post on my story just recently a picture of it because these are the worst cut sapphires I've ever seen. They're all different. Yep. And now I have to set them. I have to set six of them, and I spent probably 20 minutes just to get one set in there to where I'm happy with it. But all the other ones following are all different colors, different shades of blue, different sizes, different sizes, and I'm like, Oh, yeah, I am dreading this so bad. I think it's doing like two minutes.

SPEAKER_05

Get out your bulbers.

SPEAKER_02

Dude, it is. I was actually glad when I was like, oh, it's like 12. I should probably just you know stop working on this and get all this stuff set up right, hang out with Ron because I do not want to do this.

SPEAKER_04

Way more fun than sitting.

SPEAKER_05

Well, I'll tell you, when I'm working on a job that starts frustrating me, I'll set it down and come back the next day. Oh, yeah. I mean, there's there's nothing worse than than messing something up because you're angry with it or or frustrated. Yep. You know, give it give it a day, go go get something to eat, take, you know, go sleep, come back fresh the next day and go back after it. Yeah. That's a good tip.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I don't I have a feeling that this is gonna be one of those where I text a lady and say, Hey, I'm just gonna need a few more days on it because I know after I set two or three of these sapphires, I'm gonna be over it. I'm probably gonna end up setting like two sapphires a day and then just working on other stuff and then coming back to it. I I know me because I I already hate it. I hate looking at it.

SPEAKER_05

Call her in 2027 tell her it's done.

SPEAKER_02

That's right. She'll love it. Oh, and then and I'm I'm gonna try to set all the sapphires first because I know when I start setting the diamonds that they're all gonna it's just gonna look so weird, so I'm gonna have to set them uh completely uh probably much higher just so they look like they match when you look at the ring. Anyway, that's enough of Shop Talk because I'm now I'm getting irritated.

SPEAKER_05

Now you're frustrated.

SPEAKER_04

We should have a uh grumpy version of Shop Talk. The the jingle.

SPEAKER_02

It's a sad song. Dude, what were we what were we watching earlier? Choose a sad one right now. We had uh we while we were working, we had YouTube on actually, and uh I think it was some whiskey tuber, but they start talking oh, they they start talking about watches and Rolexes. Is that what they were talking about?

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, so they were um just two guys talking about bourbon and and how crazy uh bourbon tube is and bourbon collecting, yeah and just the collectors like it it's very strict, like, oh, if you're not cleansing your palate with limestone water from Kentucky, you're not doing it right. And and the guy literally said, Well, if you think that's bad, you should uh check out WatchTube, which he said, watch collectors are insane. I was like, Yeah, no kidding, dude. They sure are. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Well, Ron, you already mentioned it. You're you're a collector of things. What are all the things you're into collecting?

SPEAKER_05

Oh, phew. I got problems. Uh jewelry tools. Uh at this point, I've got five refrigerators at the house, but they're not really a collection, they're just full of stuff. Um I got uh like nine cars, I got uh I don't know, 30 watches, guns. Dang. It's it gets ridiculous.

SPEAKER_02

Man.

SPEAKER_05

So how do you anything anything that I can fix, you know?

SPEAKER_02

No, I understand that. And so how does your your significant other handle this this collection?

SPEAKER_05

You know, it's she makes fun of me about it, honestly. It's um we uh often joke about about old crappy cars that I find on Facebook Marketplace, and uh she'll send me them late night, and you know, our tastes are a little different. She sent me a Pontiac Sunbird the other day. Nice, just the epitome of oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_02

Dude, there is no I don't know though. I Brad would be this is why Brad's not on Facebook because he would have a problem to I think maybe not, but man, there is something about when you get on Facebook Marketplace, you just don't know what you're gonna see, and then you'll just find yourself like, Do I need that?

SPEAKER_05

I could probably you need that. Here's another one of my one of my little collections here. Is that a gator? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just a little golf cart. I I'd like to. Yeah, it's you know, gotta go get the mail and take the trash out.

SPEAKER_04

Well, yeah. And you don't want to walk 10 miles down to the road, 700 feet down to the mailbox.

SPEAKER_02

You're gonna that's gonna come in handy when FedEx and UPS drop off those uh two carat diamonds at the end of your driveway. That's right. Oh man. Let's flesh this out because I don't know of any women who are big into collecting things. Is it is it just a guy thing that we just I don't know. There's something about like we just have to be into something.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, I mean it it it it you know satisfies that itch. It's that hunt that we don't get, you know, the hunter-gatherer, I think.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, yeah. I think that's it. Yep. Because you're trying to find like a specific thing to to complete your collection. Right.

SPEAKER_02

Which is like I definitely which is you know why I do not have one of those spider coat knives that are hand engraved, but you know, had a season where I'm just like, you know, I just I just kind of want a bunch of knives for some reason. Dude, and you were you were on Amazon every day. Well, but I'm good because it's like, you know, I know there's nice expensive knives out there, and I know like I have no business doing that, so I can't control myself and I'd be like, I just want different kinds of knives, but I'm not trying to spend a fortune. But here I am trying to figure out how to spend a fortune on a knife.

SPEAKER_05

The downside to having real expensive knives and guns and whatever, you can't use them. You know, they just sit there.

SPEAKER_02

And you look at them, and then you have your friends over, and you're like, look at this. And then most of the time they're just like, Oh, that's cool, man.

SPEAKER_04

They're like, Can I shoot it? They have no idea what they're looking at.

SPEAKER_05

Nope, nope, don't even touch it.

SPEAKER_02

I just want you to look at it because it's cool.

SPEAKER_05

Keep it in that plastic bag. Don't, don't, don't get your fingerprints on it.

SPEAKER_02

But look how cool it is, though. So that's that's what I need you to focus on here, uh, wife and friend. All right, gosh. You think about ever selling these? Oh, absolutely not.

SPEAKER_05

Definitely not. You take something to one of your buddies that you think is, you know, the best thing on the planet, he just looks at you like it's a knife. You know, I don't know what you want.

SPEAKER_02

So what do you do? You just open up Amazon boxes with it, pretty much. Yes. That's exactly what I do with it. I would I did have a proud uh moment, which you'll you'll you'll you're gonna have these moments too. You're you know, you got a almost almost two-year-old, and um my oldest boy is just turned eleven, and so it was like a month or two ago. Um, I had a knife or something out, and I was like, hey, look, let me just show you because I had different you know, different ways to open knives, and I'm like, hey, let me just show you how to open these knives and like just practice opening it and closing it, you know, safely. And for some reason he just enjoyed that so much.

SPEAKER_05

One day, maybe. At this point, he's he's a little danger muffin. If he can put himself, he will.

SPEAKER_04

Just hand him a knife, just teach him how to open it.

SPEAKER_05

So at my dad's shop, we had uh Victoria Knox. So we had pocket knives, and I had a customer hand like a four-year-old a pocket knife, and he ran it right down the middle of his hand. It was one of those like, oh my gosh, moments.

SPEAKER_04

Oh my gosh. Yeah, that's insane.

SPEAKER_02

This will this will be this will be a funny way to uh end this if people get this far along. But um, speaking of like your knives and guns and stuff, so just this past uh weekend, I took a couple of the boys out to uh shooting. One one one had been shooting with me before, but it had been a few years and the other one had not. But um, and before because I hadn't been shooting in so long, so we I got everything I had got everything out and I was gonna clean it, make sure everything was good. But it turned into like a two-hour lesson on like gun and knife safety. And then while we were driving there, I made them like watch like a 15-minute video on it because um the c the closer it got time to actually handing them a firearm, I was like, Oh my gosh, like I need to drill in safety because I'm gonna die today if I don't.

SPEAKER_05

Yes, that's the most important part.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, sure is. Well, um, Brad, Ron, um, I and eventually speaking of children, uh, I do have to head home to go take a child to drum lesson. But um, we got a couple minutes. There's any final closing thoughts, Brad, that you have. No, this was this was awesome. This is this is what I hope this is is just getting to know other jewelers, just talking, chatting. Obviously, love hearing about your history and what you're into and sharing some little nuggets. Um, but I think this is the heart of when we have a guest on the this. Is what we want it to look like. Let's just hang out and talk. Ron, any final thoughts, questions, comments?

SPEAKER_05

I have a question. Why would you sign your son up for drum lessons? So a lot of people say that glutton for punishment, yeah.

SPEAKER_02

So we had this conversation just recently because we were telling someone that so we have we have five kids. The oldest is a girl, the last four are boys. And because the oldest boy plays drums, they all play drums, and we actually have two. I'm I feel like I now I'm gonna become a drum collector. We now have two full drum sets in our house, uh, a small one and a full size one, and they're they're not electronic, they're they're acoustic drums. But when you get to hear when your kids are actually like into it, now granted the small ones are definitely just banging on the drum to make noise, but they start picking up on what their older siblings are doing, so they're actually pretty decent. And so when you're downstairs and you're hearing you know one of your kids you know play a song or blast the music and you know they're keeping a beat, it's actually pretty cool. It is loud though, you I will admit. So you're a sadist. Yeah, it feels like it sometimes. Yeah, it feels like it. But um, it's so fun though, it really is. It's now we have electric guitars that are uh coming up in the house, and you can hear them up there. My one son that strums his electric guitar does not know how to play anything with his left hand, but he has mastered the right hand in strumming and turning the amp up really loud. It's all fun and game.

SPEAKER_05

It's all fun and games, so it's not.

SPEAKER_02

I I just hope and pray that your son is into drums, guitars, guns, everything loud. I hope he gets into.

SPEAKER_05

Uh well, the one of the older stepkids has um nine guitars or something like that. Dang, and he is he he goes after it. Perfect.

SPEAKER_02

You're you're raising these boys to to just follow in our footsteps of just collecting stuff for for no reason whatsoever.

SPEAKER_03

That's true.

SPEAKER_02

All right, Ron man, um, this has been an honor and a pleasure. Uh, thank you for taking time out of your maybe not so busy schedule today, since you have a calendar, you can clear it. And um now me and Brad have goals and things to look forward to, and so we will obviously be in touch. And like we tell every guest, I don't know when, but you're always welcome back uh in the future if you're if you'll have us. Oh, absolutely. I'd love to. I mean, it's just appreciate you guys having me on. Obviously. This is gonna be part of the podcast. But in a moment, we're gonna tell you bye, but you cannot hang up, okay? Okay. All right, Brad.

SPEAKER_03

Wait, did you have fun? I did. All right, I had fun. Ron, did you have fun? Oh, yeah. This is we have fun.

SPEAKER_02

All right, thanks everyone for listening. And uh just a reminder, since we're talking, if you like this episode and want to hear more, want to see us uh grow and do video podcasting, there is a link in the description um to buy me a coffee and make sure you subscribe on YouTube. Maybe one day we'll get monetized. In the meantime, just thanks for contributing, thanks for commenting. You guys have a great day.

SPEAKER_01

Well, that's another one done. Time to pack it in. Brad and dusty signing off with a tired grip. Got some stones to set and problems to fix before we're through. Thanks for hanging with us. We'll complain to you next week, too. Back to the best, back to the bed with a starting job to read the list, and the deadlines make you clips. We'll be right here, torch in hand, two guys trying to understand why every ring's a nail and every rush job's play. Back to the band. See you next week.

SPEAKER_02

A what or do you want to be featured as just us rambling at the end of the podcast again, Ron?

SPEAKER_05

Sure. That's the best part. Oh, okay. That is the best part.

SPEAKER_02

I started doing it on a as an accident. Not as an accident, I just wanted to just hurry up and get records so I wouldn't forget. And I was like, I wonder what because sometimes before I started doing that, Brad would start singing and stuff. And I was gonna try to hope for capture it, but now he knows I do it.

SPEAKER_04

No, so I ain't falling for that no more.

SPEAKER_02

No, he's not. Okay, all right. I'll do the little clap down. Actually, no count down, Brad.

SPEAKER_04

Three. What what are you doing? Clapping?

SPEAKER_02

I'm about to I gotta sync up the audio with him and uh did we do that the last time? Three one. All right, now we're good to go.