Editor’s Note
**Editor’s Note:** With the holiday season approaching, advertisers in the jewelry industry should take note of recent Federal Trade Commission revisions to the Jewelry Guides, which clarify rules on claims for precious metals, gemstones, and pearls to prevent deceptive advertising.
There have been big changes on how to advertise jewelry that you should make sure you’re up to speed on, especially with the holiday season coming up and the uptick in advertising and sales.
Last summer, the Federal Trade Commission announced revisions to its Guides for the Jewelry, Precious Metals, and Pewter Industries which address advertising claims for precious metal, gemstone, pearl and many other jewelry industry products. The Jewelry Guides explain how to avoid making deceptive or unfair claims for and outline the language that should be used to describe products at all levels of the jewelry supply chain. This means they tell us the way those of us in the trade are allowed to advertise jewelry, whether to an end consumer or along the supply chain – and a lot has changed. These rules apply to ads in both print and online. There have been major changes in several categories, this article will give you what you need to know in reference to diamonds. You can also watch a video here outlining these changes.
Exercise care when describing your items in all advertising mediums, such as websites, flyers, social media, hashtags, verbal conversations, invoices, contracts, reports, receipts and any others. The Jewelry Guides and the truth-in-advertising provisions of the FTC Act apply regardless of how you choose to communicate claims to customers. Even hashtags are covered by the Guides.
The Jewelry Guides state that you can use the following synonymous terms to describe your laboratory-grown diamonds and products containing laboratory-grown diamonds:
The FTC’s revised “Green Guides” caution marketers not to make broad, unqualified claims that a product is “environmentally friendly” or “eco-friendly” because the FTC’s own consumer research confirms that such claims are likely to suggest that the product has specific and far-reaching environmental benefits.
