A new UK-based technology platform is seeking to redefine how jewellery and watch retailers document, protect and maintain relationships around high-value items — a long-overlooked area in a market worth an estimated £9.6 billion.
Launched last month, ValuCert™ has been developed by industry professional Christopher Stoner, who believes the sector has operated for decades with a critical structural gap: the absence of consistent, professional documentation linking valuable assets back to the retailer who sold them.
“Jewellery is one of the few sectors where items worth thousands leave the store without a robust, standardised digital identity,” Stoner says. “That creates problems not just for insurance, but for long-term customer relationships.”
A longstanding industry disconnect
Despite the high value of many jewellery and watch purchases, the process of producing valuations and insurance documentation has traditionally been time-consuming, inconsistent, or treated as an afterthought.
In many cases, documentation is either completed manually, outsourced, or not provided at all — leaving both retailers and customers exposed to issues around insurance cover, valuation accuracy and proof of ownership.
At the same time, once a sale is completed, many retailers struggle to maintain meaningful engagement with customers, particularly in relation to revaluations, servicing and insurance updates.
ValuCert has been designed to address both challenges simultaneously.
From transaction to long-term relationship
At the core of the platform are two key components.
The first, SmartReport™, enables retailers to generate structured, insurer-ready documentation in a matter of minutes. The second, ValuVault™, provides a secure digital environment where each item’s documentation is stored and can be accessed, updated and shared by the customer.
Together, these tools aim to transform a single point-of-sale transaction into an ongoing relationship between retailer and client.
By creating a permanent digital record for each item, retailers can more easily initiate conversations around insurance, schedule revaluations, and encourage customers to return for maintenance or upgrades.
“It’s about turning what has traditionally been seen as admin into something commercially valuable,” Stoner explains. “Once that connection exists, it opens up a whole new layer of engagement.”
Built from within the industry
Unlike many retail technology solutions, ValuCert has not been developed by an external software company entering the sector. Stoner’s background is rooted in the jewellery trade itself, having worked directly with clients on bespoke pieces, valuations and sales for many years.
That experience, he says, informed both the platform’s functionality and philosophy.
“The jeweller should remain at the centre of the relationship,” he says. “Too often, that connection is lost to insurers or third-party platforms. We wanted to create something that strengthens it instead.”
The system has been designed to integrate into existing retail workflows, allowing documentation to be created at the point of sale or retrospectively for previous purchases.
Responding to changing market pressures
The launch of ValuCert comes at a time when several pressures are converging on the jewellery and watch sector.
Rising theft levels, increasing insurance requirements, and shifting consumer expectations around digital access and transparency are all prompting retailers to reassess how they manage high-value items after the point of sale.
At the same time, many independent jewellers are looking for ways to differentiate their offering beyond price, particularly in a competitive and increasingly digital marketplace.
ValuCert positions itself at this intersection — offering both operational efficiency and a potential new revenue stream through structured do cumentation and ongoing client engagement.
Early adoption and future ambitions
While still in the early stages of rollout, the platform is already being adopted by a number of independent retailers and small groups looking to modernise their approach to valuations and customer management.
Stoner’s longer-term ambition is to establish digital asset documentation as a standard practice across the industry.
“Our aim is to make this the norm,” he says. “Every valuable piece of jewellery should leave the store with a professional, digital record — something that protects the customer and keeps the retailer connected for years to come.”
If widely adopted, platforms such as ValuCert could signal a broader shift in how jewellery is perceived — not simply as a product, but as an asset requiring ongoing management, protection and verification.
