Badge-like pendant?

[thetaj]

I've seen two of these go up on eBayyy from the same seller and I was wondering where they came from. Has anyone seen these for sale anywhere? Do you know who makes them? I can tell it's not an actual badge (no diamonds in the stars, a few incorrect details) and I'm curious where I could get one of these.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...T#ht_929wt_905

[thetygerlily]

Swerving, but there's something similar on HJ Greek: Link.

[ComradesTrue]

As someone who checks the Theta items on "that" site almost daily, I have seen the charms that you reference. I have also noted that the sellers constantly have Greek jewelry listed. If you read their bio, they claim that a family jewlerly business went out of business and they are selling off the inventory. Yet.. they have been doing that for years. (??)

kaokite, who is the absolute authority on Theta jewelry has posted to use caution when ordering from those sellers. While some (most?) of what they sell is exactly as they post, there have been times where they have conveniently left off that an item is pewter or gold plate/filled. Therefore, a naive buyer may think that they are getting sterling or 10K/14K. They have also listed items as "vintage" without specifying how they define "vintage."

I have purchased a few items from them and was pleased. However, I also have passed over many, many items because I could tell the item was not good quality.

All that to say... I, too, have been a little perplexed on the charms that you reference, and am a little uncertain of whether to purchase these items from these sellers. On the one hand, they say they are liquidating stuff from the closed family business. Yet, these charms have never showed up anyway before now, to my knowledge. (link above from lily noted) As one who collects items such as these, I would def have noted them before now from these sellers.

[thetaj]

^ Interesting. I didn't see anything about their jewelry business on this user's bio. They just seem to be an antique collector.. I haven't even seen other Greek jewelry from them.

The one that I linked to claims to be 10k gold, and that one sold for about $27 but the other one I saw sold for almost $40. And as for the whole "vintage" issue, they claim to sell antiques but this item was listed as new. I thought it looked a little dented maybe, and certainly not shiny or polished, so that was confusing.

Ultimately I would just like to have one as a necklace and was curious where this seller has gotten them. I guess it could be an old family jeweler, but it seems strange. It's not quite the same as the charm lily posted. That one's cute, but I like how the one from ebaay looks almost exactly like our badge.

The person who won this one appears to be a collector.

Curiouser and curiouser!

[katydidKD]

Lane swerve: My my, looking around on the hj site listed above, theta items are expensive! Esp compared to kd! $350 for CZ and silver?! Am I missing something haha?

[thetalady]

I got SO taken by a seller on "that" site a couple of weeks ago. Bought an interesting looking item...

Theta Sword Pin

I should have looked at the picture a lot closer. The tiny little Theta coat of arms was clearly just stuck onto a little sword pin and probably recently. It is clearly not original.

I don't even think the COA is metal... looks kind of like plastic in person. I had bought it to send to HQ for the jewelry collection. It is so stupid looking that I am not sending it.

Buyer BEWARE!

[thetaj]

^ Oh I'm sorry to hear that It looks really cool. Lol @ the item description, I'm surprised they couldn't figure out it was a Kappa Alpha Theta coat of arms.

[ComradesTrue]

kaokites ebaaaay warning a few years ago

Interestingly, it deals with J's seller and the type of jewelry that ThetaLady bought.

I just checked their bio. It no longer lists the family jewelry business.

[AZTheta]

From what I can make out, the pendant seller is not the same as the sword/coa seller.

Blondie93, do you have some inside information? I read kaokite's warning and didn't come to the same conclusion re: seller warnings for both sellers. PM if you need to. Thanks!

One thing I do know: how to recognize gold-fill badges and the like. I've been shocked at some of the prices that uneducated buyers have paid for gold-fill. SMH - caveat emptor, indeed.

[ComradesTrue]

Sorry, let me clarify.

The warning covers J's seller, as well as ThetaLady's product (coats of arms glued onto cheap jewelry). So, the sellers are different, but ThetaLady's seller did what J's sellar was doing in the past.

Therefore both cautions- be careful buying from the first seller, as well as be careful buying items with tiny coat of arms attached to what turns out to be junk products- still applies.

Hope that helps.

[AZTheta]

Ah, thanks. Now I understand. Hmmm. Good points, well taken and thanks again for clarifying.

[thetaj]

Very interesting, thanks ladies. I'll definitely be careful. I wish those pendants were more widely-available, they're super cute! But I don't think I'd pay $40 for it.

[ComradesTrue]

Let me know if you do find them elsewhere. I have both sterling and gold Theta-themed charm bracelets. The silver one dates back to my days as an active when those things were truly in style, every female on my campus had one, and there was a James Avery just down the street. The gold one I started more recently, as the convention charms are always gold. Obviously there are much fewer charms on that one, but that is fine.

So, I am always on the lookout for (good quality) pieces that I can add to either. I have found some great vintage charms from the above mentioned site, but I am less in tune with companies that market straight to the actives. There are also a ton of junky/cheap looking kite charms out there. Not interested!

[kaokite]

Hi Ladies,

just to chime in about that sword pin w/the coat-of arms... oddly enough that pin is likely vintage and original, in spite of the cheap look/feel. Sword pins were featured in the Balfour (one of our jewelers, prior to our change to BPA and then the merge with MOD/Herff Jones) catalog in the 40's and 50's.

It's funny to look at the catalogs because Balfour clearly just made all kinds of jewelry and slapped a coat-of-arms on everything. (Seriously, pages and pages of stuff!) In Thetalady's case, I wonder if someone didn't over-polish it and take the plating right off the COA down to the base metal? Usually they didn't make them in bi-colored metal-the COA should match the rest of the item. I have one of these pins I picked up a few years ago, and it's quite nice, but mostly because it has a nice healthy layer of tarnish.

Cheers,
-K

[thetalady]

KaoKite-

THANK YOU!!! Now I don't feel like such a sucker!