Have you ever been tempted by one of those late night shopping channels? You know the really weird ones where you don't even see the hostess, but you can hear her twangie voice preaching the accolades of piles of loose gemstones. Her fingers, adorned with long red fingernails, point and caress the piles of sparkling stones that swirl around on a slow moving lazy Susan-style display in front of the camera.

" Honey," she says, " You are never gona get another deal like this. I mean, I just can't believe these prices tonight!"

You've had maybe a little too much wine, but you start thinking that she's right. This is a great deal, way too good to pass up. You could buy all those stones and bring them to your local jeweler and have them set. Think of all the fabulous jewelry you could have and so cheaply!

Well, sober up! The old saying " you get what you pay for" holds true, especially when it comes to gemstones. The reason for those low prices, according to jewelry designer Richard Alan, owner of The Harbor Goldsmith, is that more than likely there are more than just a few things wrong with those stones: " It is a well known fact in the jewelry industry that most of the loose gemstones found in cruise ship boutiques and on late night TV are the dumping grounds for our "undesirables." Those of us in the wholesale business refuse to buy them because they are off cuts and they are also non calibrated sizes and many of the gems suffer from poor color saturation."

Richard offers some excellent advice and information about purchasing loose gemstones in this article from the Marco Island Sun Times: Don't get soaked with cruise ship gemstones