"The Gold Rush" Taken to the Next Level

This was a fascinating story today, about how Harrod’s is now selling gold bars:

The Knightsbridge department store yesterday began selling bars of pure Swiss gold bullion as part of a range that is being displayed in a miniature vault on the lower ground floor …

The store said it was seeing “high transaction values go through” after its first day of sales yesterday. A spokesman said it was catering to the tastes of its typical shopper. “It’s the Harrods customer who might make a serious investment opportunity.” …

“The fact that a company like Harrods is moving into the physical gold market is interesting,” said Adrian Ash, head of research at Bullionvault.com, the online gold trading company. “It shows gold is moving back into the mainstream, having spent two decades in the arena of cranks and gold bugs.”

The jewelry market hasn’t really been great about taking advantage of the inherent value of our products; the big price rise in gold has mainly led to people trading it in, instead of buying it. There was De Beers’ “enduring value” campaign last year, but that seems to have been abandoned (though it wasn’t a bad idea). Perhaps the industry is skittish because we know that what goes up, eventually comes down. But if people may possibly be willing to buy gold bars as an investment, shouldn’t they also buy gold jewelry?