Barabash, Verragio’s client relations representative, was a vital member of the team and is remembered as being warm and full of life.
Stuller’s SwissBacks are back
The manufacturer has released the second version of its SwissBacks earring findings, which are meant to eliminate the need for earring backs.

New York—Stuller Inc. has updated its popular SwissBacks earring findings, which do away with the need for earring backs by allowing the wearer to put the post through their ear and flip up the back to keep the earring in place.
According to Stuller, with the first version of SwissBacks, multiple sizes were needed to accommodate different-sized ear lobes. The newest version has a hinge and allows the hinged bar to tighten on the back of the ear so that only one style is needed to accommodate all ear sizes.
SwissBacks are precision manufactured to pass through the wearer’s ear and then flip up, eliminating the need for an earring back, and also adjust to the wearers’ comfort.
The findings are “bench-friendly,” Stuller said, and are made compatible or adaptable to all types of earrings. They’re available in 14-karat yellow and white gold and average $90 each at retail.
WATCH: How the Swissbacks work and how jewelers can customize them with their own earrings
The release of the second version of SwissBacks comes shortly after an earring back debate on social media, which started when a Twitter user posted that she had discovered she could remove the plastic rings that encircle some earring backs.
Responses came from every corner of the network, with many women saying that they also had no idea they were meant to come off, while many others piped in saying that the plastic part was meant to stay on the earring back.
Ultimately, the inventor of the plastic backing, Ira Carlin, put the arguments to rest when he told the Toronto Star last week that the plastic part was meant to be left on to help support a heavier earring.
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