James Catmur

Hi, I’m James and I have been involved in the world of mineral collecting ever since I was a young child, when I used to collect in the mines of northern Derbyshire.  Spells of my life living in Mexico, USA, France, Singapore and Spain kept this interest live and also resulted in me learning Spanish and French.  Over the years I also picked up a degree in Engineering from Oxford University and ended up working in consultancy (for the US firm Arthur D. Little).

In the early 90s, while living in Madrid, I got to know Jordi, first as a customer and then in helping Jordi with translation of Spanish text into English.  In the mid 90s we talked a lot about the potential benefits of selling over the Internet, as it would enable people to see pictures of the specimens without the costs of color printing.  As I have always had an interest in new technologies, I realized that this was the chance to 'kill two birds with one stone' - learn how the net worked and create something interesting.  In early 1996 I built the first version of Jordi’s web site - it required lots of manual work and we still had a lot to learn back then.  Over the following few years we slowly learned what worked and what didn't and refined the look and content of the site.

As my career continued and I started a family I realized that there was too little time in the day for me to lead a consultancy, be father to two small children and keep up with the day to day management of the web site.  Something had to give! So I took a less active role in the site and now just help out with some of the text (show reports, mailings, etc.)

Small children have meant that collecting has come to a bit of a halt, but as they grow older I hope to get back out there and start field collecting again.

James Catmur