There's gold in them there drawers

Here's a thought for you, should today's spending cuts and slow house sales get on top of you: take a rummage around your drawers and jewellery boxes.

Once upon a time, desperate housewives held Tupperware parties.

But now there’s a more glittering opportunity – gold parties.

With the price of gold constantly hitting new highs, the idea is simple.

The party hostess calls her friends over for a glass or three of chilled Chardonnay and gets them to bring their unwanted gold, silver and platinum jewellery.

The valuer checks for the hallmark and divides the pieces up by carat; they are then weighed and the value calculated on an iPad which has a direct link to the day’s ‘spot’ price on the international gold market, to obtain the most up to the minute price for the jewellery.

The women go home happier and richer – as you would be, if you’d just managed to flog a wedding ring from your horrible ex-husband – whilst the glamorous hostess gets to earn 10% commission plus 3% if she can persuade any of her lovely friends to hold their own gold party.

Gold parties are big in the US, where house prices keep on tumbling, and are now beginning to pop up in the UK.

www.partycash4gold.com is one UK company which organises private gold parties.

Chief executive Stephen Pearson said:  “Our target market is smart women who don’t want to be taken advantage of. We offer a good price for items that are essentially lurking in a box unused. Plus the price is always right: we pay an average of three times the price you would get from a jewellers’ shop.”