Hi!
My name is Mariella, and I am so very excited that you are reading our blog! We started Southern African Minerals about eighteen years ago! When I say we, I am referring to myself, of course, and my husband Christiaan. We started off with a little store in a coastal holiday town when I was four months pregnant. Our son is now thirteen, we have three very talented staff members, and we have broadened out online as well as into international Gem shows across the globe.
What makes us different from other crystal stores you may ask? Well, quite frankly, very little! But as they say, the Divine dwells in the details! So let me point form sketch a picture of what Southern African Minerals is all about:
1. We are an owner run business, so our service is personal, personable, and tailored to your requests and we make the time to get to know our buyers.
2. We've been doing this a while! We know our stuff and happily learn more everyday! Where the crystals come from, how they are extracted, how they are prepared and cleaned, how to ship them to you in the easiest safest way possible
3. We all love our jobs! We all love crystals!
4. We go as directly to the source as possible! Christiaan travels into the Namibian desert approximately five times a year, and to the Northern Border of South Africa; and at the gem shows we meet directly with prospectors and small scale miners from all over the world.
5. Our sweet spot: Because we go directly to the source, we can offer you the full range of what's out there, from the cute little clusters to Mineral Specimens for serious collectors. We look forward to seeing you in our store!
6. Ethics and sustainability: These are of great concern to us and we endeavor, on a constant basis, to make sure that our products are ethical, and sourced in a way that does not impact the environment over the long term, and because we get to look our suppliers in the eye when we source our products, we can ask them the hard questions and give you honest answers!
We are very excited to launch our store SouthernAfricanMinerals.com and look forward to seeing you instore!