Are young people addicted to live broadcasts of opening clams? The tricks of buying pearls are complicated!

Recently, live broadcasts of pearls opening have become very popular. The popularity and price of pearls in the jewelry market are constantly rising. This article explains the development of pearl live broadcasts, analyzes the logic behind it, and predicts the future development prospects. It is recommended for students who are interested in jewelry live broadcasts.

"There are thousands of pearls, but one can determine the fate of the world. Sisters, hurry up and catch up."

"If you want big pearls and high-quality goods, you must be quick!"

"We select the goods directly in Pearl Town. You can get them by seeing them."

…

From the live broadcast of opening clams that became popular in the past two years to the "backpackers" rushing to the Zhuji pearl market this year, the popularity of pearls has been rising. In addition to falling in love with gold, young people are also addicted to the live broadcast of opening clams.

Akoya pearls are no longer attractive, and the prices of Australian white pearls, which start at 4,000 to 5,000 yuan or even tens of thousands of yuan, and Tahitian mixed colors, which start at 10,000 yuan and rise to 50,000 to 60,000 yuan, are becoming "hard to come by." Even the prices of freshwater pearls have soared, doubling continuously.

According to the "Douyin Jewelry Accessories Industry Report" released in June 2022, from January 2021 to May 2022 alone, the pearl industry grew by 18.71% month-on-month, second only to the gold category with a month-on-month growth rate of 50.12%, making it the second fastest growing category in the entire gold jewelry industry.

According to the latest data, as of the end of May 2023, the pearl transaction volume of Zhuji's largest pearl trading mall, East China International Jewelry City, has reached 23.2 billion yuan.

Jacqueline Kennedy once said that "pearls can never be mistaken", but human hearts are always unpredictable. In the face of overwhelming wealth, many live broadcast rooms have begun to falsify prices and mix pearls with fakes. The tricks of opening clams are endless and difficult to guard against.

1. Who made high-priced pearls famous?

"I didn't have much feeling for pearls before, but this year I saw many fashion bloggers wearing pearl necklaces and pearl earrings, and I was attracted by them after seeing them so many times." Liu Xinyue, 27, has recently fallen in love with watching pearl live broadcasts. She didn't know much about pearls before, but she searched for pearl viewing tips on social media platforms whenever she had free time, and placed more than a dozen orders in the past half month. "I can't afford expensive products like Australian white, Tahitian and Baroque, but I also bought a lot of freshwater pearls, spending about 20,000 yuan in total."

Liu Xinyue introduced to Zinc Scale that pearls are mainly divided into saltwater pearls and freshwater pearls. High-quality pearls such as Australian white pearls are saltwater pearls with high prices, while in fact most of the live broadcasts of opening clams in China are freshwater pearls, "but many popular buyers' live broadcasts will focus on high-quality pearls." Liu Xinyue usually looks at saltwater pearls in the live broadcast room to "satisfy her eyes and watch the rich ladies passionately place orders", and then waits for good quality freshwater pearls, "because I just think they are very popular this year and are a must-have for fashionable wear. I have even bought some imitation pearl jewelry."

Unlike Liu Xinyue, 34-year-old Jing Tong doesn't like watching buyers' live broadcasts, but only watching live broadcasts of clams opening. "I seldom wear jewelry, but watching people opening clams gives me the excitement of opening a blind box." Jing Tong said that in the live broadcast room of opening clams, although it can be seen that some anchors are acting, such as suddenly opening high-quality goods and wanting to buy them back from buyers on the spot, "and there are still many people who keep opening clams and getting small beads, spending tens of thousands of yuan."

After watching for a long time, Jing Tong couldn't help but open the blind box himself. "I tried to open the clams several times. I was very nervous every time, hoping to get big pearls, but basically they were all cheap small pearls. The anchor will constantly encourage you to persevere, and perseverance will bring good luck. So the price of opening clams became higher and higher. The most expensive time I spent 2,000 yuan, but still didn't get a good pearl."

With more and more fashion bloggers and celebrities wearing pearl jewelry this year, pearls have once again become a must-have in the fashion circle. Many young people like Jing Tong and Liu Xinyue have flocked to the live broadcast room, either to keep up with the trend or for some excitement.

On the social media platform Xiaohongshu, there are more than 500 notes about "pearls", of which more than 50,000 are about "pearl live broadcast". On Douyin, pearl-related topics have been played billions of times, and more than 50% of young people aged 25-30 place orders for pearls in live broadcasts; on Weibo, topics such as "Pearl purchasing agents line up to buy" and "Girl born after 1995 buys 20 pearl necklaces in 3 months" have also frequently appeared on hot searches.

Amid the craze, prices of everything from freshwater pearls to saltwater pearls and even imitation pearls have skyrocketed.

According to CCTV Finance, pearls that sold for 1,000 yuan in Shanxiahu Town, Zhuji last year have risen to 1,500 yuan this year. The price of ordinary pearls has increased by 30%-50%, while the price of the most popular pearls has increased by an exaggerated 80%.

"The Tahitian pearls that used to be all black have suddenly turned from bronze to king, and their value has increased several times. In the first half of the year, you could get a good string of second-level certified pearls for five or six thousand yuan, but now those that are under 20,000 yuan are almost invisible; not to mention the Australian white pearls. I saw a sister who originally wanted to buy a string of Phoenix substitutes, but her budget increased from a few thousand to 10,000+ and then to 20,000+, and she is still searching hard in various live broadcast rooms." A netizen posted a note on Xiaohongshu.

The price comparison of freshwater pearls is also very obvious. Zinc Scale noticed that many pearl jewelry that only sold for one or two hundred yuan before 2021 have doubled or tripled in value in the past two years.

2. There are risks in opening clams and there are tricks in buying pearls

The transaction volume of major live broadcast rooms has repeatedly hit new highs, and it seems that everyone on the Internet has a pearl necklace. However, there are many tricks in live broadcast rooms. Whether it is opening clams to get pearls or buying pearls on the spot, many people have fallen into traps and overturned.

"One night, I accidentally came across a live broadcast room where people were opening clams. The price was 3,000 yuan for opening two clams, and each clam had only one freshwater pearl. I thought the price was outrageous at the time, so I wanted to watch the fun in the live broadcast room. As a result, in the middle of the night, the host opened a pearl larger than 16mm, estimated at 160,000 yuan. The two buyers who opened the clams at that time each received 80,000 yuan. Later, buyers continued to open pearls worth tens of thousands of yuan. The host said that the big ones were the big ones. This myth of a bicycle turning into a motorcycle completely made me crazy." In July this year, Taozi accidentally came across a live broadcast room where people were opening clams to get pearls. After being addicted, she placed an order and opened two clams. "At that time, the pearls opened in the live broadcast room were just ordinary two freshwater pearls, but when I actually received the goods, I only received two imitation pearls. And the seller was very sure that he would not refund the money."

"You thought you opened pearls, but actually you opened bubbles." In order to appeal for a refund, Taozi began to squat in the live broadcast room to collect various evidences. "I found that the seller said that they opened live clams, but the clam meat was actually rotten after the clams were opened, and the beads still had artificial holes. It was obvious that the seller put the beads into the clam shells in advance." In addition, "the merchant has been unwilling to provide the purchase receipts for the clam shells." In the end, the official platform approved Taozi's refund application, and Taozi never watched the live broadcast of opening clams again. "As long as clams are opened in the live broadcast room, it will become unfortunate."

There are many people like Taozi who have been deceived by live broadcasts of opening clams. On Heimao Complaints, there are more than 200 related complaints when searching for "live broadcast of opening clams", many of which mentioned the routine that Taozi encountered. A recent complaint in September said, "I watched a live broadcast on Douyin and saw a video of opening clams to take pearls, so I bought three clams. The live broadcast was full of exaggerated words, and those who bought a lot of pearls were all given big and good pearls, while I bought less and was given bad and small ones. The merchant refused to exchange the goods when I wanted to, and the merchant also refused to refund my money."

Another consumer pointed out: "On the evening of August 18, 2023, I entered a live broadcast room of opening pearls from live clams. They said that they would definitely open valuable 16-inch super-large pearls, and said that they would give me live clams and other things to trick me into consuming. It was not until I lost more than 20,000 that I realized I was deceived. Their so-called live clams are actually some rotten dead clams. I have screenshots as evidence. This merchant opened a Taobao store without a business license, and the prices of the goods sold are seriously unreasonable, and the product quality seriously infringes on the rights of consumers!"

Of course, in order to raise prices, even if they don’t play the blind box game, many live broadcast rooms selling pearls mix real and fake products, or use freshwater pearls as high-priced seawater pearls.

On Heimao Complaints, there are nearly 3,000 complaints related to pearls, of which nearly 500 are related to "Pearl Live." "The product information deliberately avoided mentioning the pearl material. The live broadcast said it was natural pearls, but when it arrived, it turned out to be artificial pearls, and the customer service also admitted that they were artificial pearls." Such complaints are endless.

Among them, there were complaints that they had snatched a total of 90-105 pearls in the live broadcast room from September 3 to September 23, 2023, with a total amount of 5,000 to 7,000 yuan. Later, after inspection, it was found that all the pearls were dyed pearls and whitened and fluorescent pearls. The anchor in the live broadcast room kept emphasizing that he had been making pearls for three generations and did not sell fake pearls, dyed pearls or glossy pearls.

"Because the price of natural pearls is really too high now, the anchors' tricks are hard to guard against." Nanzi is a clothing store owner and fashion blogger. This year, she also went to Zhuji to select pearls in person. She told Zinc Scale, "First, the lighting in the pearl live broadcast room is a science. Many pearls look good under the lights in the live broadcast room, but it is completely different when you receive the goods; secondly, the anchors often emphasize various high-quality terms, which makes Xiaobai dizzy and think they have picked up a bargain; thirdly, some live broadcast rooms will prepare some seawater pearl jewelry, and then say that everyone can go to the link if they want, but in fact they will not go to the link at all, just to keep everyone in the live broadcast room to continue buying freshwater pearls."

“Don’t completely believe those who claim to be picking goods on the spot at the pearl market.” Nan Zi once discovered when she went to the pearl market to select goods on the spot that “some teams would show up at the pearl market with pearls prepared in advance. The so-called wholesalers, anchors, and customers who selected pearls were all from the same team.”

3. How long will the pearl tide last?

In fact, the soaring pearl prices in the past two years are closely related to the decline in pearl production.

According to data from the Zhejiang Pearl Industry Association, the national freshwater pearl production was about 1.2 million kilograms in 2019, which will drop to about 1 million kilograms in 2020, about 800,000 kilograms in 2021, and about 700,000 kilograms in 2022. In order to protect water sources, Zhuji also issued a strict "ban on freshwater pearls" this year, and the pearl farming area has also been greatly reduced.

However, the more important reason is that pearls are a commodity with a "one-pearl, one-price" policy and there is no clear price standard, which leads to the price of pearls being driven up by major live broadcast rooms, bloggers and wholesalers.

"Really don't buy pearls recently." Zinc Scale noticed that when the routines in live broadcast rooms are endless, many people are quitting or persuading others to quit. On Xiaohongshu, a pearl lover posted a note saying, "I feel like I'm going to offend people, but I still can't help complaining. The current price of pearls is very abnormal. I am speechless when I see this price now. In addition, celebrities have been crazy about promoting pearls during this period, resulting in a shortage of supply in the entire market. It is even more difficult to buy good quality pearls. It can be said that it is difficult to buy them even if you have money."

Some netizens also said, "Many people say that Pearl is a pitfall, but you don't have to jump in, and you don't have to rush in because of fear of price increases."

Nanzi believes that "in fact, many of the people who drive up the price of pearls are wholesalers. Many young people who follow the trend to buy pearls buy a bunch of so-called large pearl strings or strange-shaped seawater pearls, which actually have no room for value preservation and appreciation, and are difficult to resell. If you just want to wear them, you can choose freshwater pearls of decent quality. What's more, it is actually quite troublesome to maintain pearls. If they are not properly maintained, they are basically difficult to circulate in the second-hand market."

So, even though the "pearl trend" is coming in full force, who can predict what the fashion trend will be next year?

Author: Li Xuanqi

WeChat public account: Zinc Scale (ID: znkedu)