There is a conversation we have been putting off, not because we wanted to hide anything, but because we wanted to find the right moment and the right words. We think we are there now.
This is a post about the rising cost of gold and silver, what it has meant for a small independent brand like ours, and what it means for the road ahead.
Over the last twelve to eighteen months, the price of gold has climbed to near record highs, up significantly year on year and showing little sign of settling. Silver has followed. For anyone outside the industry, those numbers can feel abstract. For a small jewellery brand buying materials in the quantities we do, they are anything but.
Large jewellery companies have buying power we simply do not have. They purchase in volumes that insulate them from market fluctuations, manufacture at scale, and absorb price rises across thousands of units without the customer ever noticing. That is not our world.
Our world is buying what we need, when we need it, at whatever the market is doing that week. When gold goes up, we feel it immediately and directly. There is no buffer. There is no safety net. There is just the cost of making something properly, and the reality of what that now looks like.
For the entirety of year one, we held our prices. Every piece you bought from us this year was priced before the material costs climbed to where they are now, and we chose to keep it that way. Not because we had to, but because it felt like the right thing to do for the people who showed up for us early.
That decision cost us. We made it anyway.
Our prices will be going up. Not dramatically, not overnight, but they will be going up because they need to. The alternative is cutting corners on materials or craftsmanship, and that is not something we are willing to do.
What you buy from Thorn & Thunder will always be worth what you pay for it. That commitment does not change. The number that reflects it honestly will.
We are telling you now, ahead of any changes, because that is the relationship we want with this community. No surprises. No quiet overnight updates. Just honesty, the same way we try to do everything else.
In the meantime, our birthday sale is still running. 20% off sitewide until 8th June with code TNT20 at checkout. If there is something you have had your eye on, now is the time.
Thank you for being here, for supporting us through year one, and for caring about where your jewellery comes from. It means more than we can say. We are not going anywhere — we are just getting started. And everything we make from here will be made exactly the way it always has been. Properly, and with everything we have got.
Claire x Thorn & Thunder
