ALL that glitters is gold, the robbers must have believed. Or at least all the jewellery glittering in the shop display window.

There was actually a sign at the shop in the Albert Court Hotel arcade, indicating that it was only costume jewellery.

But that seems to have made no difference to the robbers, who smashed the glass yesterday and fled with an assortment of necklaces, bangles and bracelets.

Their loot is worth only about $4,000 as the pieces contain very little gold.

The shop's owners, Mr Rajan Sharma, in his 50s, and his wife Shivaani, in her 40s, said they arrived at 9.30am and found the place strewn with shards of broken glass.

The glass panel at their shop front, which was more than a centimetre thick, had shattered.

'We don't remove the jewellery pieces from the display window when we leave for the day,' said Mr Sharma.

'We never thought anybody would break into our shop because we are selling costume jewellery, which is not real gold.'

A piece of cardboard placed next to the jewellery stated that the items contained only between 1 and 3 grams of gold.

This is the first time Prince Jewellery & Crystal has been broken into in its four years of operation on the first storey of the hotel.

Four rocks, believed to have been used to smash the glass panel, were found lying inside the shop and on the pavement outside.

A passer-by, Mr Gurdev Singh, 67, said one of the rocks was about the size of a coconut.

The retiree was walking past the shop on his way to Sim Lim Square when he saw police officers interviewing the shop owners.

Mr Sharma said the stolen items were priced between $75 and $400 each.

They were all imported from India.

'The thieves made away with about 90 per cent of our stock. The remaining jewellery fell inside the shop and was beyond the reach of the thieves.'

Mr Sharma said he did not insure the stolen items or install an alarm system or security cameras because he never thought the costume jewellery would attract thieves.

Other items in the shop window, including an extensive collection of educational and self-improvement CD-ROMs, were left untouched.

'Luckily they didn't take my laptop, which contains a lot of important data,' said Mr Sharma.

The couple had been thinking of winding down their jewellery business to concentrate on their CD-ROM sales and astrology consultation services.

'Now that this has happened, we are even more discouraged and negative about the jewellery business,' he said.

He said they would probably stop selling costume jewellery once their remaining stock is sold.

Mrs Sharma, who was still reeling from the shock of the break-in, said she was concerned about their safety now as they sometimes take turns to man the shop till as late as 11pm.

A second-hand gold dealer said gold was trading at $32.75 per gram yesterday.

But the thieves won't be able to profit from the minimal gold content in the costume pieces.

Mr Lary Liang, 40, who owns 1st Jewellery, said: 'The amount of gold in each item is too low to be worth the hassle of extracting it.'

A hotel spokesman said a hotel security officer discovered the break-in while on his regular patrol.

The police were alerted immediately.

The hotel will be providing the police with security footage.

The police said investigations are on.

Other shop tenants whom The New Paper spoke to were taken aback by news of the break-in.

'I've been here for the past 31/2 years and never heard of such a thing happening,' said Mrs Rehana Abrar, whose boutique is two units away from Mr Sharma's shop.

The unit next to Mr Sharma's has been unoccupied for the past six months.

Another tenant, a tailor, who declined to be named, said he had not heard of security problems in the area in his six years of operation.