Putting a value on sentiment is always tricky business. What's a tiny seashell from the Dingle Peninsula in Ireland worth?
Debra Raboin of West Hartford wasn't even considering it after returning from a "special trip" to Ireland in April with her 81-year-old father, her two daughters and a seashell from the beach her grandmother walked as a young girl.
"We specifically went to see my grandmother's home on the Dingle Peninsula," says Raboin. "It was an incredible family trip."
To preserve the memory, Raboin brought the shell to La Perla Fine Jewelers at Blue Back Square in West Hartford to see if the shell could become part of a necklace.
"I explained the value of the shell," she says. "I wanted to attach a gold clasp or hook even if they were to apply some gold to one side of it."
Sadly, the sentimental seashell from the Dingle seashore didn't survive the conversion to jewelry. Raboin says she wanted the actual seashell integrated into the jewelry. La Perla made a gold facsimile of the seashell, which broke during the molding.
"She came in with a very fragile seashell and she asked for it to made into a pendant for her daughter," says Bob La Perla, the jewelry store's owner. "The shell was inadvertently broken by the goldsmith. It's a seashell. You know how fragile seashells are?"
The relationship between seashell owner and jewelry store owner fell apart almost as quickly. Raboin said she valued the actual seashell more than its 14-carat gold likeness. La Perla said he warned her the shell could be damaged and, because she commissioned the pendant, she was obligated to pay the $1,200 retail price.
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Raboin not only refused to buy the pendant but also wanted compensation for the sentimental seashell. In a complaint to the Better Business Bureau, she requested La Perla pay airfare to Ireland for a return trip to the Dingle shore where she could pick up another seashell.
Later, she told The Bottom Line she'd settle for a $200 store credit.
When Raboin first contacted TBL in mid-October, she said La Perla never called with an estimate and never detailed the pendant's design. After several months, she said, the jeweler called to say the shell, ready to go, was $1,200
"I said, 'Whoa, you never got back to me with a design or estimate,'" says Raboin.
La Perla says after Raboin was notified in July or August "we had not heard from or spoken to the client in over 60 days."
"We then called the client," says La Perla, "and asked what she wanted us to do. Should we put the piece in our [display] case to recoup or costs?"
La Perla wanted to be paid for the commissioned pendant. Raboin wanted to be paid for the destroyed seashell.
Bob La Perla acknowledges his store did not discuss price or design with Raboin until after the pendant had been completed. When Raboin said she had planned to pay no more than $500, La Perla offered her the pendant at that price and insisted she pay. The price, he says, is below the jewelry store's cost.
"She is obligated to pay the $500," La Perla told TBL in mid-November. "Sadly, very sadly, the goldsmith who created the piece broke the shell. More sadly, and to his discredit — but I'll take the bullet for this one — he threw the broken shell out because it was a broken shell. He never should have done that. And to my chagrin, the goldsmith went ahead and made the piece before giving me the price."
In a response to Raboin's October complaint to the Better Business Bureau, La Perla had said he would hold the pendant for her until Nov. 30 before putting it for sale in the store's display case.
"If it was me," says Raboin, "I would apologize repeatedly and send a personal note to that person, assuring them that I was not only sorry but that I don't do business like that. And I would offer them a store credit to get something for their time, trouble and loss.
" I will not be 'offered' to [put] $500 in his pocket for a mistake he made for something I didn't want. Would you?"
La Perla, after insisting on payment, finally wavered in his mid-November interview with TBL.
"I don't know where it stands now," he said. "I don't even know why I'm speaking to you. I don't know what to say and what to do with this client."
Then: "Let's just forget it. I'm not looking for anything from her."
