Dane Henze purchased his fiancee's champagne sapphire engagement ring and wedding band from Etsy shop EidelPrecious. (Photo credit: Ali Walker/Aliwalker.com)
Newlyweds today spend one-fifth of their wedding budget on the perfect engagement ring, which, at an average price of $5,855,
is four times what the typical bride will spend on her own wedding gown
and second only to the venue as the most expensive part of their big
day.
But some couples are bucking this trend,
looking for affordable alternatives to the traditional diamond
engagement ring on Etsy (ETSY). The online marketplace, which went public
in April, is probably better known for crafty wares like handknit
scarves and small batch soaps than its growing legion of independent
jewelers. A company spokesperson declined to share exact figures on its
jewelry market, but a search of the site turned up 1.2 million results
for “handmade rings,” which made up about 13% of all jewelry listings.
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Jillian and Dane Henze were in their mid-20s when they became engaged in 2011. Jillian was a reporter at a local newspaper; Dane worked for a nonprofit focused on the environment. “We were really poor,” Jillian says. Together, they casually browsed the velvet-lined ring cases at several local jewelers near their hometown of Turnwater, Wash., to find a ring that suited Jillian’s tastes and Dane’s budget. The one ring that caught her eye — a white-gold band with a yellow diamond perched at its center — turned out to cost $13,000. “I just about died,” Jillian says. “We had been saving but we didn’t want to have this huge debt.”
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Etsy’s
jewelry business is likely nowhere near as strong as that of leading
online jeweler Blue Nile, which banked $473.5 million in net sales last year and currently owns around 8% of the $4.7 billion online jewelry market in the U.S.
Ebay, long seen as a treasure trove for people looking to buy used and
vintage rings at a steep discount, is a stiff competitor as well. But
Etsy has a different kind of appeal altogether, especially for a younger
generation that is just as concerned with thrift as they are with personalization.
“Etsy is a place to shop for unique designs,” says Etsy merchandising
expert Emily Bidwell. “You can talk to the seller and ask for specific
aspects you want in your ring.”
Jillian and Dane Henze were in their mid-20s when they became engaged in 2011. Jillian was a reporter at a local newspaper; Dane worked for a nonprofit focused on the environment. “We were really poor,” Jillian says. Together, they casually browsed the velvet-lined ring cases at several local jewelers near their hometown of Turnwater, Wash., to find a ring that suited Jillian’s tastes and Dane’s budget. The one ring that caught her eye — a white-gold band with a yellow diamond perched at its center — turned out to cost $13,000. “I just about died,” Jillian says. “We had been saving but we didn’t want to have this huge debt.”
After
watching several friends get engaged, she knew she wanted something
unique. Inspired by the idea of a colored stone, she started browsing
bridal blogs and came across a link to an Etsy shop that featured rings
with different hued sapphires. The idea of purchasing a ring online was a
non-issue. “We’re young and we had already purchased so much online,”
she says. “It was normal.”
It
was also significantly more affordable. The ring Dane selected, a
champagne-colored sapphire on a white gold band dotted with miniature
diamonds, cost only $1,200. And other than a slight shipping hiccup — the seller,
based in Canada, had to delay shipping by couple of weeks after the
country’s postal workers went on strike — the process was smooth.
Jillian was mostly worried getting the right size, but it fit her
perfectly.
“People
still compliment me on my ring all the time,” she says. “And I get to
tell them, ‘Oh thank you, it was handmade by a woman in Canada!’ It’s
kind of fun.”
The online jewelry market is small but growing. Online retailers make up more than 10% of jewelry and watch sales so far
in 2015, up from 8.2% in 2010, according to market research firm IBIS
World. (However, their data does not include sales figures from sites
like Etsy and eBay).
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Jane Strauss,
60, has been selling handmade wedding and engagement rings on Etsy
since 2009. The Morristown, N.J., sales analyst runs the business on the
side with her older brother, a longtime gemologist. Strauss works with
customers to design and customize their rings to their tastes — they
mostly work with sapphire and topaz — while her brother sources the
stones and cuts them to their customers’ liking. Their prices range from
a couple of hundred bucks up to $6,000, but people rarely purchase
items over $1,500, she says (Etsy makes
20 cents off each listing and takes 3.5% of the transaction price).
Like many jewelers who sell on the site, they patent their designs,
which serves the dual purpose of thwarting copycats and giving customers
peace of mind that what they are buying truly is unique.
Strauss,
who once owned a boutique jewelry store in the 1980s, admits she’s
still secretly surprised every time she makes a sale. “It’s hard for me
to fathom people will buy jewelry online, especially an engagement
ring, but they do,” she says, which is why she goes out of her way to
make customers comfortable. “I’m big on educating my customers and we’ll
send them pictures during the whole process. Sometimes it takes 15
[e-mails back and forth] to close the sale.” 
“Most
people are interested in our unique ring designs, not the diamond,”
Hein says. “Instead of financing a diamond, they can put a CZ and they
can replace it in a year or five or 10.”
Mike
Neumayer, a 26-year-old from Vermont, purchased his fiancee’s ring from
Hein’s Etsy shop last year (he noticed his fiancee had pinned several of
Hein’s designs to her Pinterest board). Neumayer liked the idea of
supporting an independent jeweler but wasn’t sold on buying the ring
online. He ended up purchasing his fiancee’s engagement ring from Hein’s
shop with only the setting and picked out the diamond, in person, at a
local jeweler. Hein worked with him to ensure the setting would fit the
diamond.
“It
blows my mind that I was able to order something online, handmade, and
be on a first-name basis with the creator while I called her cellphone
to discuss product options,” he says. “It’s nice to know that the
majority of the money you're spending on the item goes to the people
creating and selling it.”
If
you’re thinking about buying an engagement ring — or jewelry in general
— from Etsy or elsewhere online, there are some best practices to
follow. “There’s always a challenge of buying online when you don’t
actually see something,” says Celia Gardner, president and CEO of the Jewelers Vigilance Committee,
an independent organization that regulates independent jewelers. “You
need to have a sense of who you’re buying from, make sure they are
reputable and that they will be there tomorrow.”
Read the reviews. There’s
a special team at Etsy dedicated to following up on user complaints and
ensuring sellers abide by guidelines. But overall, Etsy customers rely
heavily on user feedback. For sellers like Strauss who only sell a few
rings per month, even one bad review can hurt business.
Check return/refund policy. Etsy
sellers are free to use whatever exchange policy they deem fit, a
spokesperson says. Many sellers don’t allow returns for custom orders,
however. Petra gives most customers five days to return rings they
aren’t happy with. Strauss doesn’t allow returns on custom orders but
will take returns on items she had in stock already. A good repair
policy is important, too. Jillian Henze’s seller offers a two-year
warranty. When one of the tiny decorative diamonds on her band popped
out of its setting, the seller sent a replacement free of charge.
Ask for an itemized receipt. Amanda
Gizzi, spokesperson for Jewelers of America, suggests asking for an
itemized receipt that shows the cut, clarity, carat, and type of metal
the gem is set in, as well as the total purchase price. “That way, when
you do get an independent appraisal, which you’ll need for insurance
purposes, you’ll be able to know exactly what you paid for.”
Ask about resizing.
Some Etsy jewelers may not offer to resize rings, so check the fine
print first. It pays to get fitted for a ring before shopping online.
Neumayer’s fiancee realized her engagement ring was too large and they
had an independent jeweler resize it.
Get it appraised and insured. It’s highly recommended to insure your engagement and wedding rings, which requires an appraisal. Strauss recommends going to an independent certified jewelry appraiser.
It’s a smart idea to get the appraisal during your seller’s
return/exchange window, too. If the appraiser raises any issues with the
stone’s quality, you may have a better chance of getting the seller to
rectify the matter. Etsy doesn’t require sellers to send certificates of
authentication with its jewelry, so it’s up to buyers to read the fine
print or ask the seller what their policy is. A good sellers should be happy to have an independent certified gemologist check the ring out or send it directly to the Gemological Institute of America for certification. Just be prepared to pay an additional fee, generally $200 to $400, Strauss says.
Use your credit card. Like
any major purchase, it’s safer to use your credit card when buying a
ring online than your debit card. Some credit cards have pretty liberal
purchase protection policies. If the deal goes bad or you feel you’ve
been wrongly charged and the seller won’t refund you, there’s a good
chance your credit card will. Review your credit card policy beforehand.
Keep an eye out for fraud. All
Etsy sellers, whether U.S.-based or international, have to adhere to
Etsy’s strict seller policies. Reselling — purchasing something from a
store and passing it off as “handmade” — is arguably the biggest no-no
of all. Etsy has a special team dedicated to weeding out bad actors, but
the company has faced criticism on that front for some time, even driving some long-time sellers to abandon their shops
in protest. The biggest clue that a product has been mass produced is
the price tag. Dirt cheap and handmade rarely go hand in hand.
Culled from yahoo finance
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