Latest / The Scene Projects / Troy Perkins on Wearable Art, Jewelry Business, and Economic Insights
Transcript
- 0:03This program is part of the Scene Projects podcast network.
- 0:07Scene Project features interviews with independent musicians, comedians, and artists
- 0:12from across the Midwest.
- 0:15Become part of our community and support local art wherever you are.
- 0:28Welcome into this exciting episode of Real Biz.
- 0:31I am your host, Bubba Starts.
- 0:32And with me today from Platinum nineteen eleven, Troy Perkins.
- 0:36Troy, welcome to the show.
- 0:38Hey.
- 0:38Great to be here.
- 0:39Thanks, Bubba, for having me.
- 0:40So excited to chat with you.
- 0:43Yeah.
- 0:43Well, I'm glad you could be here with me.
- 0:45I think what you do is pretty incredible.
- 0:48And, you know, I I know that it's been a long journey to get to where you are now.
- 0:52So I'd like to start off with just, giving you an opportunity.
- 0:55Give us a little bit of your backstory, and then we'll kinda pick it up from there.
- 1:00Man, I've now been in jewelry, which is wearable art, for the last twenty years.
- 1:07Quick run through.
- 1:09Grew up in in Phoenix, Scottsdale, Arizona.
- 1:13Got my business degree from Northern Arizona in three years.
- 1:16Did a year of fashion school in New York City at FIT.
- 1:19Saw the second tower come down in person.
- 1:21That was crazy.
- 1:23Moved to, UT in or Austin to start my MBA at UT, dropped out of that, moved to Newport Beach
- 1:30to be a beach bum, found a bunch of jobs.
- 1:33One of them, was a high end training job where I trained, professional athletes, wives, and
- 1:39other rich people.
- 1:40One lady there was a jeweler, kept working for her company.
- 1:43It was called Jude Francis.
- 1:45Two women, worked there six and a half years.
- 1:48A family friend then taught me the estate business.
- 1:52And at first, I I was reluctant who would sell old jewelry.
- 1:55Then once I learned it, I fell in love.
- 1:58And, so I've been doing that about fifteen years.
- 2:01Did take a job in there with a big dealer in town, but I've been back on my own the last six
- 2:06and a half years.
- 2:08And God's blessed me with so many things.
- 2:11I I work really hard.
- 2:13I've got a wife and two kids, a wife of twenty years, a 15 and 11 year old.
- 2:18So just really god first, family second, and then work.
- 2:23And I call, you know, work is play because I, I always enjoy what I'm doing, and I I get to do
- 2:29what I want as well.
- 2:30So
- 2:31Yeah.
- 2:32Your job isn't, like, the most awful thing to have to go to.
- 2:35You know, as a former beach bum myself, I was in Venice Beach, you know, twenty some odd
- 2:40years ago busking, with my guitar, to babes in bikinis and the sun in the sand.
- 2:47It's a good life, but it doesn't pay the bills.
- 2:50So, really, I I love what you said off the top there.
- 2:55Right?
- 2:55Wearable art.
- 2:56And I think that gets glossed over in the jewelry business and and a lot with, you know,
- 3:01especially with gold and silver prices going through the roof now that, you know, it it is
- 3:05an investment for some.
- 3:07Right?
- 3:08But it's also art, and it it is also heirlooms.
- 3:11And I think that's something we touched on in our discovery call as well as these things that
- 3:15are passed down from generation to generation.
- 3:19And I know from personal experience, my in laws, you know, my mother-in-law, her father
- 3:25loved gold.
- 3:26And he always had gold rings and gold watches and things on, and these were coveted items
- 3:30when it came time you know, when they passed away and and those came down.
- 3:33Not for the value necessarily, but because it was a piece of their father and something that
- 3:40was very memorable, to them.
- 3:42So I loved a few things you touched on there.
- 3:45I would love off the top for you to just kind of talk about the difference working in jewelry
- 3:50as working for someone like a dealer and doing it on your own.
- 3:56I mean, look.
- 3:57I've in my blood is entrepreneurship.
- 4:00So I've been meant to do on my own.
- 4:02I did it on my own.
- 4:04Yeah.
- 4:04When when you work for somebody, I mean, look.
- 4:08That paycheck is nice.
- 4:09That paycheck is addicting too because when you go out on your own, there is no like, you are
- 4:14your paycheck.
- 4:15So it definitely is hard, and most people are afraid to not have that paycheck.
- 4:22As far as working, I mean, at the end of the day, you're someone's servant.
- 4:27And, look, bosses can be great.
- 4:28So I strive to be a great boss.
- 4:31I don't micromanage.
- 4:32I just say, hey.
- 4:33Here's the task.
- 4:33Get it done.
- 4:34I really don't care how.
- 4:35But if you're not doing it right and and maybe, look, I have some I I have a couple managers
- 4:39where I put my foot down in a couple areas.
- 4:43But at the end the day, I let that roll.
- 4:46Advice to employees then show up five minutes early, leave five minutes late.
- 4:50It doesn't take a lot.
- 4:52You know, learn your job so well and then ask to help out in someone else's job.
- 4:56So I just think as an employee, you have the opportunity to learn somebody else's business
- 5:01while you're getting paid.
- 5:02So there are a lot of positives to getting jobs.
- 5:05I've had so many jobs, and I've learned so much in every different area from I set up blow up
- 5:09bouncy houses.
- 5:11I've been a a caddy.
- 5:13I've I've been a janitor because because I made, like, big money.
- 5:16I mean and so you name it.
- 5:17I've literally done it.
- 5:20But then working for yourself, I mean, the sky's the limit.
- 5:24It's what you want it to be.
- 5:26So, I mean, I'll I'll I'll I'll work days on end and make no money.
- 5:30And then my jewelry sits, and I can make a bunch of money while I'm sitting on the beach
- 5:34with family on spring break.
- 5:36So, that's where entrepreneurship, depending on your business, you you get all the risk, but
- 5:42you also get all the reward.
- 5:44And you get your time as your time and not someone else's.
- 5:48You know, a big big issue that I had, especially working in the factory as a welder,
- 5:53was, you know, them coming up to me on Thursday and be like, cool.
- 5:56We're working a mandatory Saturday because we're behind in this area or that.
- 6:00And I was like, but I'm not I'm not behind.
- 6:02Like, I did my job this week, and my kids got a ball game on Saturday.
- 6:06And they're like, cool.
- 6:06Well, you know, you're gonna come in on Saturday or you're gonna take, you know, a a
- 6:11disciplinary point.
- 6:12And I was like, you can just give me the point right now because I ain't coming.
- 6:15Like, my kids come before this job every single day of the week.
- 6:18Right?
- 6:19So I I I don't know who you are and who other who else you deal with.
- 6:23But, yeah, if it means I get fired because I was at my kid's ballgame, then so be it, man.
- 6:28I would not give it up on you.
- 6:30That's I mean, that's factory work.
- 6:32Right?
- 6:32That and and that's what, you know, here in the community that we live, it's not in our town,
- 6:37but, you know, the the town 30 miles away.
- 6:39It's all manufacturing jobs.
- 6:41And to just kinda see that world for me, because I had never really entered the
- 6:45workforce.
- 6:46I was a rock star, Troy.
- 6:47I was I was out and, you know, playing music and, you know, other other things that led me
- 6:52down some different paths, but that, I hadn't really ever worked that regular consistent job.
- 6:58And and I could see why, I never wanted to do it again.
- 7:02I've always had an entrepreneurial spirit as you do.
- 7:05My dad's owned his own business my entire life, a landscaping company, whether it was in the
- 7:09Chicago area or when we moved to South Dakota.
- 7:11You know, he worked for a few years for a log home company, but that was even, like, an
- 7:16ulterior motive was just to get the cheap logs and building so he could build this house that
- 7:21he wanted to.
- 7:21Right?
- 7:22So I I've always kinda just seen a different way of doing things.
- 7:26But, something you touched on there, the jobs that you have had and kind of the way that you
- 7:30talked about being a good employee, how has the jobs that you've had, say, a caddy helped
- 7:35informed you now as a salesman and as an entrepreneur, you know, owning your own
- 7:40business?
- 7:41Well, actually, I would say that I I'm a golf I grew up golfing.
- 7:45The caddy job was about the hardest job I ever had.
- 7:48So I don't I mean, like, because you gotta be paying it.
- 7:51Like, you you can't space out.
- 7:53Like, you're paying attention, watching the ball ahead of the people.
- 7:55It's, like, nonstop carrying the bag.
- 7:57And I I worked at a course, a private course when I was in college called, oh my gosh.
- 8:03I'm spacing on the on that.
- 8:04But it was very hilly course, forest something.
- 8:08But, anyway, like, we walk, like, five miles.
- 8:11So, anyway, I would say that's the hardest job.
- 8:13Other jobs, I think what really hit me is as I delve into other and now I've been in and I
- 8:18have a handful of other businesses, and I've delved in so many.
- 8:23Most of the owners and they don't take this wrong.
- 8:25Like, they're not that smart, or they don't have something that I don't have.
- 8:29Maybe let's just say it that way.
- 8:30Like, there's not some secret.
- 8:32The secret is hard work and taking action.
- 8:36I mean, I think that's it.
- 8:37A lot of people are caught up in inaction, and they're caught up with busyness.
- 8:41I mean, if you look at your screen time report, if you have an iPhone that comes every week and
- 8:45you see that you're spending eight hours a day on your phone and those aren't business hours,
- 8:49like, what are you doing with your life?
- 8:51So if you take action and you're passionate about something, you will be successful.
- 8:57And I think that's something that every successful person kind of repeats.
- 9:01If you've gotten there, it's it's not because you are necessarily the smartest person in the
- 9:05room.
- 9:06I I think there's a certain degree of intelligence that everyone has to have that
- 9:09makes it to a certain level, but intelligence can be learned.
- 9:12You can learn by being in the room, and you're only in the room if you show up every day.
- 9:17And for business owners, we don't really have a choice.
- 9:20And I think some people get into business thinking that it's going to be like their nine
- 9:25to five, and it's more like a five to nine or five to 12:30 at night and then wake up and do
- 9:32it again and again and again and again, you know, times maybe twenty years before you can
- 9:38actually come back and say, no.
- 9:39You know what?
- 9:40I'm gonna work ten hours a day, and then I I have to give my time to my family.
- 9:44And I think a lot of people miss on how much time it takes to become successful.
- 9:48Things do not happen overnight.
- 9:51No.
- 9:52Totally.
- 9:53I mean, someone may see me now and say, oh, look at you.
- 9:56You're you're just an overnight success.
- 9:58But then I it's hard for me to even say, man, I started this twenty twenty years ago in
- 10:04jewelry.
- 10:05Woah.
- 10:05Do I I don't feel that old.
- 10:06I feel so young at heart.
- 10:10So, I'd love to get in a little bit, you know, the nitty gritty of the jewelry business.
- 10:15Obviously, Obviously, with the increase in gold and silver prices over the last year has been
- 10:21absolutely incredible.
- 10:22Does it become harder for you to do your job because the prices have gone up, or is it, is
- 10:30it a little bit easier because people are looking to get into the market, say, in the
- 10:34last twelve months as they saw the trends?
- 10:38I'm in a unique spot being in secondhand jewelry, so I can make money kind of in a in a
- 10:43in a boom and in a bust.
- 10:45Because when thing when people when the economy is doing well, people are buying jewelry.
- 10:50When the economy is not going well, they're selling jewelry.
- 10:53So I can make the money on the buy.
- 10:55So it's really I I can work both sides.
- 10:57So with what you're saying and what's happened the last six months year, I've really made a
- 11:02living on the buy.
- 11:03There's so much gold and jewelry coming.
- 11:05I'm able to buy right and, and and kinda make make a margin there.
- 11:10Now it's a smaller margin, but it's still a margin and the volume is huge.
- 11:14So, I think that that's one part of your question.
- 11:17The other part is, hey.
- 11:19Are people not buying?
- 11:21Yeah.
- 11:21It this definitely weeds out the lower end of the market, and it's it kinda sucks because if
- 11:27you, say, have a $1,000 and you wanna buy your wife a piece of jewelry in gold, you don't get
- 11:33a lot.
- 11:33It's a chintzy little necklace, a smaller ring just because gold is so expensive.
- 11:38So this really puts it into the market people that have that have more money.
- 11:44So for me right now, the 5 to $30,000 pieces are what's selling more, versus because there's
- 11:51just not a lot for a thousand.
- 11:54Well, exactly.
- 11:55And I think that's something that gets overlooked, and I'm very glad that my wife and
- 11:59I have been married, now for three years and that that ring was purchased five years ago,
- 12:04because I I don't know if we could afford the same piece now just because of the increase in
- 12:09the precious metals.
- 12:10And I think that's maybe a part that gets overlooked in this because we look at gold
- 12:14prices on the stock market or or, you know, in the markets, you know, not necessarily stocks,
- 12:19but that we we see that as just like gold bars.
- 12:23Right?
- 12:23And but it is everything.
- 12:25It's everything that gold touches.
- 12:26It drives up the prices of technology because we forget how much gold is used inside of our
- 12:32our cell phones, our computers, our tablets.
- 12:35It is a it is it's more to our daily lives than I think most people would understand.
- 12:44No.
- 12:44That that's correct.
- 12:45Yeah.
- 12:45Goal I mean, gold is reason gold's important even in the technology side is it's it it has a
- 12:52wonderful conductivity, and it's very durable.
- 12:56So now in tech I know in in in tech in the technology side, they're able to make real thin
- 13:01layers, like, thin, and they coat things with gold.
- 13:04It still holds up, but it still, it adds up when they're making, you know, tens of
- 13:08thousands of electronic devices a day.
- 13:11It adds up.
- 13:11You're you're correct.
- 13:12They're using that more.
- 13:14And I'm hearing in the silver market, they're saying they need more and more for the
- 13:18batteries and all these chips.
- 13:20I don't know what the truth is, to be honest.
- 13:22And I feel like a lot of these prices are manipulated by the big banks.
- 13:29I do feel with the US dollar now, everyone's talking about it being shaky and a lot of other
- 13:35countries wanting to get off the US dollar.
- 13:38I think that's going to stop some of the manipulation, but but but the big banks still
- 13:44know how to dump the market so they can buy back in.
- 13:47So, again, I'm jumping to another topic, but we're riding this roller coaster.
- 13:52It it's it's kind of a crazy time.
- 13:55Well and and, obviously, your business is in the jewelry side of this, but everything in
- 13:59what you're talking about and maybe this other rabbit hole, it it is very not just parallel to
- 14:05yours.
- 14:05It may intersect and and interweave with what you're trying to do in your business very
- 14:10intricately and can have massive effects on your business.
- 14:15So while it's not an end all, be all the price of gold for you because, obviously, you're
- 14:19working with diamonds and these things as well inside of the jewelry, but it definitely has an
- 14:24effect on it.
- 14:26Yeah.
- 14:27No.
- 14:27I guess, yeah, we're was in my head.
- 14:29I didn't say I also buy and sell bullion.
- 14:32So I do a lot of gold trading in my business.
- 14:34So I have customers that wanna put money into silver or gold.
- 14:39In fact, I just had a deal with a 100, one ounce gold coins.
- 14:43So if you can do the math real quick in your head, that's $500,000 of gold.
- 14:47So those kind of deals come through.
- 14:50I need to buy it at a small you know, a little bit less where I can sell so I make a make make
- 14:54a few percentage points, but, you're solving a problem on both sides.
- 14:59Yeah.
- 15:00Incredible.
- 15:00And and I think most people that, you know, don't have amounts of money like that aren't
- 15:05looking to invest into those things, although maybe they should even on a smaller level
- 15:10because now you've seen that if you would have bought some gold coins a year ago, some one
- 15:15ounce gold coins a few years ago, you would have come up quite a bit.
- 15:18That would have been a solid investment.
- 15:20I had friends that were telling me to, and I was like, look.
- 15:22I don't have the $1,200 for an ounce of gold right now.
- 15:26So much less, you know, now when gold is what?
- 15:29I is it approaching 5 or over 5 now?
- 15:31Don't think It was it it hit 52 yesterday.
- 15:34It pulled back to $51.50 this morning.
- 15:37Look.
- 15:38I I I do not I am not someone that says, hey.
- 15:42You need to put money in gold.
- 15:43Look.
- 15:43Gold doesn't make money.
- 15:45It doesn't pay a dividend.
- 15:46It only when it goes up, you have to sell it to make that money.
- 15:49So I definitely think it's a good hedge.
- 15:51I do have a lot of my wealth in gold, but it's mainly in jewelry because I can make a better
- 15:57margin than just the gold going up.
- 15:59But, you know, I love to encourage people on business ways.
- 16:02Hey.
- 16:03If you have like, invest in yourself first.
- 16:06Once you have money, yeah, you should diversify with some of the gold.
- 16:10And look.
- 16:10Because I'm an expert in the gold and the jewelry market, I do help people move in and
- 16:14out of it.
- 16:15And just so you know, yeah, coming up with half $1,000,000 is hard for me too.
- 16:19Every day, I'm I'm hustling, trying to make things happen.
- 16:22And it's not like I I'm I'm I'm working that to turn it just just to make the deal happen.
- 16:29Yeah.
- 16:29I so I have a unique story, with gold myself.
- 16:33I actually grew up in, Leeds, South Dakota, where the Homestake Gold Mine is, the largest
- 16:39gold mine in the world now closed and has become the Sanford Fermi lab, where they're
- 16:44studying neutrinos.
- 16:46But, we had a very close relationship when gold bottomed out in the late nineties, and and
- 16:51kinda dropped.
- 16:52And because they were digging down into the ground over a mile in some cases with these
- 16:56shafts, that the cost of getting the gold out of the ground for what they were getting just
- 17:00wasn't, it wasn't profitable any longer.
- 17:04And, we do still have some gold mines out there in the Black Hills of South Dakota.
- 17:07Black Hills gold, being, something its own, sector.
- 17:12Right?
- 17:12It is gold, but includes a little bit of the copper.
- 17:15And so I've grown up around it.
- 17:18I've seen the effect that gold prices can have on a local economy from the mining
- 17:24manufacturing, you know, refinement side.
- 17:29Yeah.
- 17:29Totally.
- 17:29I I, you know, most, new mines, it's gambling.
- 17:35Existing mines, like what you're talking about, it's it's it's a straight business factor.
- 17:40So if it costs, like, for okay.
- 17:42If if if to pull one ounce of gold out, however that is, if it costs a thousand dollars an
- 17:47ounce to get it out, then gold has to be over 1,000 an ounce to for it to be viable.
- 17:53If it costs $4,800 an ounce, it wasn't viable till a few months ago.
- 17:58Now that it's over 5, now they can start producing again.
- 18:01So, and, of course, costs have gone up.
- 18:04Few fuel is down, but the cost of labor is up, equipment's up.
- 18:09And then when they find gold in the earth, it's rarely in big nuggets.
- 18:14A lot of times, it's like, if you have a one ton or 2,000 pounds of dirt, sometimes they're
- 18:19microscopic dots in the rock.
- 18:21They have to crush it all down, then extract it.
- 18:24So that that costs a lot more.
- 18:26So gold you know, when we see gold doesn't come in, like, a fist sized nugget.
- 18:30If it does, that's, like, crazy rare.
- 18:33Yeah.
- 18:34Well and we had a few big ones that came out of the hills in the, you know, late eighteen
- 18:38hundreds.
- 18:38You know, Deadwood's famous for, the Potato Creek Johnny Nugget that I think was about this
- 18:43big.
- 18:43I think it was a a four or five ouncer.
- 18:46Pretty I mean, it was massive.
- 18:48Right?
- 18:48And in the late eighteen hundreds, they were just panning in the creeks, but the open cut
- 18:53gold mine I mean, so it was all shafts inside of the hill, and then eventually it imploded, I
- 18:58think, in the nineteen seventies maybe.
- 19:00And then they just started just piling it all out, massive trucks that would drive down into
- 19:05this hole and drive back out.
- 19:06It's right in the middle of our town, Troy.
- 19:08If you ever come and visit South Dakota, I think you would get a kick out of going there
- 19:11and be like, I've probably touched gold that's come out of this mine.
- 19:15Yeah.
- 19:15But then half of the town half of the town was the cyanide treatment plant.
- 19:19Right?
- 19:19They would bring it out.
- 19:20They would crush it down.
- 19:21They would treat it with cyanide.
- 19:23All of the environmental factors that comes along with that spewing into, you know, as much
- 19:27as they try to clean it.
- 19:29But, yeah, I mean, it it completely changed the look, nat the natural look of this town.
- 19:34And when the mine left, it left just as much of a change because, when it left, all the
- 19:40buildings came down, and the hole in the ground is definitely still there.
- 19:46Wow.
- 19:46Yeah.
- 19:46I definitely I definitely wanna wanna check that out.
- 19:49I do I have bought and sold Black Hills Gold.
- 19:52When I see that, typically, it's 10 to 12 carat, and it's it's like a tricolor gold.
- 19:58So they do it in yellow, rose, and white.
- 20:00That's what I know of.
- 20:01Maybe there's a company, Black Rose Gold, who started making that with, like, a leaf or a
- 20:05leaf or organic design.
- 20:08And then speaking on the environmental side, I know now they use different methods where they
- 20:13don't have to use cyanide.
- 20:14They do different acid leasings, which are actually safer.
- 20:19But something to touch on what I do, I'm basically a recycler.
- 20:23So I put new life into jewelry.
- 20:25So I'm looking for these jewelry.
- 20:27I even if I can take an ugly piece and take half of it, maybe I scrap half, the other half,
- 20:33I make into a new piece.
- 20:34So that's something cool that we don't talk about.
- 20:37What I do is pretty green to really help pieces, not not only from the heirloom side,
- 20:43but also for the environment side.
- 20:44Like, I'm keeping new pieces alive where a lot of jewelers that I buy from, if I don't buy it,
- 20:49they're just gonna melt it down.
- 20:51So I'm out there searching, or those dealers know I'm gonna pay a premium, so packages are
- 20:55coming to me on a daily basis.
- 20:57Incredible.
- 20:58Well, yeah, I I didn't realize this about your business, but you're actually, creating the
- 21:03jewelry, the some of the jewelry that's available on your website as well.
- 21:08You know, I manufacturing's a real small part, but but maybe I I wouldn't call manufacturing,
- 21:13but I I, I create, like we we call it a marriage.
- 21:17I I fix pieces, or I'll make it sellable.
- 21:20Let's say it's a big brooch, which is a pin that nobody's gonna wear, and I'll make it into
- 21:25a pendant.
- 21:26You know?
- 21:26Or I just actually took a broach, and one of my customers said, hey.
- 21:30If that was a ring, I'll buy it.
- 21:32I'm like, done.
- 21:33So that's actually came back this morning, and it's now a ring, and she's gonna come pick that
- 21:38up later this week.
- 21:39So we take things.
- 21:41So it may sit for years as a pin, but now that it's a ring, it's gonna get on someone's hand
- 21:46and in their collection and put smiles on their face.
- 21:49Yeah.
- 21:49That's incredible.
- 21:50And because of the pliability of gold, you have that that ability to, you know, go in, re I
- 21:57know.
- 21:57Is it re smelting it that that you would call to kinda melt it back down then?
- 22:01Well, I'm not doing that.
- 22:02Like, we're literally just taking one piece and then soldering another piece on it.
- 22:06Maybe we have to cut some other areas.
- 22:07But, yeah, what's great about fine jewelry is it's all repairable.
- 22:12You know, I mean, within reason, obviously, gemstones, if you crack it in half, you can
- 22:16polish it, but now you got smaller stones.
- 22:19But most fine jewelry is all repairable.
- 22:21We can redo it.
- 22:23So the reason I don't manufacture in general is you have all the labor costs, and people come
- 22:31to me for having that old jewelry or used piece because they're not paying for the labor.
- 22:36So they're saving that value.
- 22:38Well and because they mean something to them.
- 22:40Right?
- 22:41These heirloom pieces that maybe came from a a great grandparent.
- 22:45Right?
- 22:45They may be passed down for generations, and and they would like to wear it.
- 22:48They would like it to be something instead of just sitting in a box maybe somewhere or in a
- 22:52case that they could turn it into something.
- 22:55I think that's a very unique position that you have.
- 22:57Albeit a small part of what you do, there's probably very few people that are willing to do
- 23:01that at all.
- 23:03Yeah.
- 23:04No.
- 23:05At the end of the day, a lot of jewelers, hey.
- 23:07They're looking to make a buck.
- 23:09So, look, if someone wants to manufacture, I will.
- 23:12I know other jewelers will.
- 23:14Where my just my experience of seeing so many pieces of jewelry, I can be straight up and
- 23:20honest with the person.
- 23:21Hey.
- 23:21We can do that, or you know what?
- 23:22That's not gonna work.
- 23:24Your one question because I get this a lot.
- 23:26People take their old jewelry, and they wanna take the diamonds from that, melt that gold
- 23:30down, and use that gold to make one piece.
- 23:35Now at the end the day, you really can't do that because to melt one like, when gold gets
- 23:41melted, they do it, like, hundreds of ounces at a time.
- 23:44So to take your one little piece, it's just not cost effective.
- 23:47Now I've done it before.
- 23:48I told the customer, hey.
- 23:49It's gonna cost you a thousand dollars extra to do that.
- 23:53Most of time, they don't wanna do that.
- 23:54Some jewelers will just appease them.
- 23:56Oh, yeah.
- 23:56Yeah.
- 23:57We're taking your old gold.
- 23:58But if I just take their old gold too, the alloy mix, it may be it may not cast correctly
- 24:05or the it always creates issues.
- 24:07So I just I Well, in
- 24:08piece each individual piece is different in itself.
- 24:11We think of gold as just being gold, but like you said, the alloy are different.
- 24:15Some you know, the difference between ten, fourteen, 24 carats.
- 24:19Right?
- 24:20You can't just mix it all together, and it's gonna be perfect.
- 24:23Well, yeah, if you okay.
- 24:24So 24 karat gold, everybody knows that.
- 24:26That's a 100% gold.
- 24:28Then you have 18 karat gold.
- 24:30Well, the fraction 18 out of 24 is 75% gold.
- 24:34So there's 25% other alloys, and different jewelers use it different.
- 24:38Now 14 out of 24 is 58 and a half percent.
- 24:4210 out of 24 is, point four one one.
- 24:46So that other percentage is other metals, copper, nickel, palladium, different different
- 24:51metals.
- 24:51So every jeweler, every manufacturer used a different alloy.
- 24:57So that's why gold can come in different colors.
- 24:5924 carat gold is always the same color.
- 25:01Other carats, it's lower.
- 25:03So does that if that helps explain a little bit about gold.
- 25:06Yeah.
- 25:07It's a nice little tidbit in there for people who don't know, you know, all their
- 25:11terminologies and and what what it meant.
- 25:14Right?
- 25:14A lot of people know, you know, 24 carat gold just from Bruno Mars.
- 25:19Right?
- 25:19So there's you know, we all we all get our education from different spaces.
- 25:23Troy, what's your favorite part of your job?
- 25:26Is it the, you know, finding the heirloom pieces and dealing with people that are maybe,
- 25:31you know, looking to reclaim a piece, or is it, you know, getting out, selling at I know you
- 25:36were just at, you know, a a convention or or, you know, I I don't I forgot what you do.
- 25:40A trade show rather.
- 25:42You know, is it the people part of it and the selling and and bringing it out and seeing
- 25:47people kind of in awe of the pieces that you have?
- 25:49What's your favorite part?
- 25:52Well, you know, I'd say the the the best and most exciting part is every day, I don't know
- 25:57what I'm gonna get.
- 25:58Either a package comes in the mail or multiple.
- 26:01Someone comes in my office to sell, So you just don't know.
- 26:05I get you know?
- 26:06So I I get to see something new all the time.
- 26:08Or I I pop into a dealer's office, and I you don't know what I'm gonna come across.
- 26:13So, like, finding something new every day like, literally, I'm buying every six days a week.
- 26:18Usually, Sunday, not, but sometimes I get a text and I buy by text.
- 26:22So that's probably the most exciting.
- 26:25If I had to flip flop it, the least exciting now is I've got 17 or 18 employees now, and so
- 26:31there's every day, there's a fire.
- 26:33In fact, this morning, I just one of my employees had a car accident, so I'm trying to
- 26:38help him, as he's, you know, trying to get to work on on Lyft and Uber.
- 26:43We're just I'm I'm giving him a little bump here to help him on that.
- 26:46So that's just one example, but every day, that's that's probably the I wouldn't say I
- 26:51don't enjoy it.
- 26:52I I wanna help people, but it's just, like, it's just never ending the like, those
- 26:57challenges.
- 26:57So at least the excitement of seeing new pieces outweighs all the challenges.
- 27:03Right.
- 27:04The the problems that we forget about as a business grows, sure, you get to make more
- 27:08money, but then you need more people.
- 27:10And with more people becomes more problems, and you have to be you know, kinda solve those
- 27:15problems as the boss.
- 27:16It is what we do.
- 27:19Troy, a thrilling conversation here with you.
- 27:22I want you to go ahead and plug anything that you want on there.
- 27:24We got the pod or the website scrolling across the bottom on here on the video version, but go
- 27:29ahead and plug the website where people can find you and where they can bring their gold
- 27:32to.
- 27:33Hey.
- 27:34Thanks, Bubba.
- 27:35Okay.
- 27:35So platinum1911.com.
- 27:37I've got a couple thousand pieces up on the website.
- 27:40Beautiful pictures.
- 27:42If you want if you're in the Phoenix area, you definitely need to schedule an appointment with
- 27:46us.
- 27:46You can find our contact there.
- 27:48Yeah.
- 27:49If you've got jewelry to sell, you can email me pictures.
- 27:51I'll be honest.
- 27:52I can send you a label to send it in.
- 27:54If we can agree on a price, I can pay you immediately whichever way you want, or I can
- 27:59mail it right back to you if we don't agree.
- 28:02You can find me on Instagram at platinum dot nineteen eleven.
- 28:05That's probably a great place to connect.
- 28:08I also have a slew of other businesses I'm working on right now.
- 28:12I'm in the car business.
- 28:14So I do buy and sell NT classic cars.
- 28:16If you have that, you wanna toss my way.
- 28:19And I'm I'm also in the gun business.
- 28:21So, but platinum nineteen eleven is the most right now.
- 28:25And later on, I'll share all the tech businesses I'm working on, but I appreciate
- 28:29you, Bubba.
- 28:31About to have your own pawnshop show, Troy.
- 28:35I mean, yes.
- 28:37It it it could be there.
- 28:39You know, I I put off filming myself, but, I know a of that's TV too.
- 28:44But, yeah.
- 28:45No.
- 28:46There I we actually were in the works to do that with the last company I was at.
- 28:50We we had talked to TVs.
- 28:51It just I knew they're gonna they paint everybody in the negative light, so no one
- 28:57Well, we won't.
- 28:58Maybe we'll start our own show here with the scene projects, and we'll get Troy some more
- 29:02camera time because you're great on it, man.
- 29:05I appreciate you spending some time with me this morning, and I appreciate you being part
- 29:09of the scene.
- 29:11No.
- 29:11Thank you, Bubba.
- 29:12Yeah, man.
- 29:12What you're doing is awesome.
- 29:13Keep out there.
- 29:14Work hard, man.
- 29:15You're doing it.
- 29:16I don't have to tell you.
- 29:17But for your listeners who wonder, hey, man.
- 29:19How's Bubba doing this?
- 29:20He's putting the work in, and you're doing it, man.
- 29:23Great job.
- 29:24I appreciate that, Troy.
- 29:26Stick around.
- 29:27I wanna chat to you after we're done here, on on the pod, and, we have some more talking to
- 29:32do.
- 29:33So thanks for being here today.
- 29:34Thank you.
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