Reclaimed Gold · The Closed Loop · Bedfordview, Johannesburg
South Africa dug this gold up once. Nobody should have to do it twice.
We are not a mine and never will be. Our whole gold model runs the other way: buy back the metal the country already owns, at a published rate, have it melted and refined by the refineries in our own building, and remake it into jewellery upstairs. Here is the loop, step by step.
The loop your gold joins
- 01
A drawer opens
A snapped chain, a single earring, a ring from another chapter. South Africa’s households hold a quiet reserve of gold nobody wears.
- 02
It is bought at a published rate
The live gold price, times purity, times weight, less our published 10% on gold that will be melted. Tested by XRF and weighed in front of the seller.
- 03
The refineries in our building melt and refine it
The metal never leaves on a courier truck to an anonymous smelter. Gold refineries operate in the same building as our viewing room, and that is where it becomes fine gold again.
- 04
Our workshop remakes it
The refined gold comes back upstairs to the SADPMR-inspected bench and is worked into the jewellery we sell. Stones from bought pieces are re-cut or re-set, never binned.
- 05
It is worn again
The same metal, a new life on a new hand. And one day, perhaps, back into the loop.
Steps two and five are where you come in. The rate for step two is published and live on the gold price page, and the sell gold page walks the five-step sale itself, XRF test, calibrated scale, written figure, FICA transfer.
Why this is the ethical position, stated plainly
Newly mined gold costs the earth something every time: rock moved, energy burned, water used. Reclaimed gold costs almost none of that, the metal already exists, already refined once, sitting in drawers doing nothing. Every gram we buy back and remake is a gram of demand that never reaches a mine. We publish no dramatic percentages and no invented carbon figures, because the honest numbers vary by mine and by study; the direction, though, is not in dispute. Re-use beats extraction, and a country with this much gold above ground barely needs to ask the question.
The same loop applies to stones: diamonds and gemstones in the pieces we buy are valued separately, paid on top of the metal, and re-cut or re-set into new work, never discarded. An unworn ring is not scrap. It is inventory for the next generation of jewellery, and we price it that way, starting with what is in your drawer.
Reclaimed gold, asked honestly
What is reclaimed gold?
Gold that has already been mined, refined and worn, and is brought back into circulation instead of lying unused: old jewellery, broken pieces, coins, inherited items. Once melted and refined it is chemically indistinguishable from newly mined gold, the same fineness, the same behaviour at the bench, which is exactly why re-using it makes sense. The only thing reclaimed gold lacks is the new hole in the ground.
Is reclaimed gold really more ethical than mined gold?
Yes, by the simplest logic there is: every gram returned to circulation is a gram that does not need to be newly mined, with none of the earth moved, energy burned or water used that fresh extraction demands. Reclaimed metal carries a fraction of the footprint of newly mined gold. We deliberately publish no precise percentage, because honest numbers depend on the mine and the study, but the direction is not in dispute anywhere.
Does Prodiam mine gold?
No, and we never will. We are a diamond cutting house and gold buyer in Bedfordview. Our model is the opposite of extraction: buy back the gold South Africa already owns at a published rate, have it melted and refined by the refineries in our building, and remake it into new pieces at our SADPMR-inspected workshop. We would rather re-mine drawers than the ground.
Is the jewellery you sell made from reclaimed gold?
The gold we buy back feeds directly into the jewellery we make, that is the whole point of the loop, refined in this building and worked at our own bench.
Where a design calls for specific alloys or findings we source them through the normal trade, so we describe the loop honestly rather than stamping a purity-of-origin claim on every piece: what we can promise is that the gold you sell us does not vanish into an anonymous smelter, it comes back as new work.
How do I put my old gold into the loop?
Weigh it at home, run the payout calculator to see the published rate, and WhatsApp us a photo, or bring it to Bedfordview by appointment. It is tested and weighed in front of you, any stones are valued on top, and the figure comes in writing with no obligation. The full process is on the sell gold page, five steps from your kitchen scale to cleared funds.