The Diamond Dealers Club recently hosted Israel Week, which bought Israeli dealers to the New York City bourse for three high-spirited days of selling and buying.

The idea for the Dec. 3–5 event came when Israeli Diamond Exchange managing director Moti Besser was talking to DDC president Reuven Kaufman.

“We were discussing how the two leading exchanges should create ways to add value to their exchanges,” he says.

They eventually settled on bringing a group of Israeli diamantaires to the United States for a week, and subsidizing their hotel and other expenses.

“Normally the cost to find new customers is very high,” says Israeli Diamond Exchange senior vice president Motti Fluk. “But this makes it very low-cost. Insurance is cheaper, shipping is cheaper.”

As a result, the bourse floor was more crowded than it had been in years.

At an evening reception on its second day, Kaufman noted that the week was supposed to last only three days, but most of the Israeli companies were so happy that they wanted to extend it to four. He now says the event will be held annually.

Among the attendees at the evening reception was New York City public advocate Bill de Blasio, who hailed the diamond business as a “quintessential New York industry.”

JCK