In this segment of "Industry Focus" on Motley Fool Live, recorded on Dec. 7, Fool senior analyst Asit Sharma discusses the next-generation process of buying an engagement ring from Brilliant Earth (BRLT 0.49%).
Asit Sharma: This reminds me in some ways of my experience in hearing about Carvana (CVNA -4.00%) for the first time, where I was chatting with someone who is a little bit younger than me and he was saying, I'm never buying a car again, where I have to go somewhere [laughs] and take a look at it.
That's a big-ticket purchase. Even if you're buying a used car, let's say on a platform like Carvana, you could easily spend $5,000, $10,000, $15,000, $20,000. It doesn't seem so much of a stretch to order your engagement ring online, especially if you can utilize technology that let's say is a digitally native person, a younger person you are already familiar with.
Maybe for older people like me, that may seem like a weird experience, but you know this combines some traditional aspects of engagement ring buying with this cutting-edge technology.
I remember when my wife and I were shopping for engagement rings, we were living in New York City, we had to make appointments. We made appointments at some boutique-type shops, and we also went and made an appointment with this independent designer, Nathan Levy.
For any of you who are into this type of realm. He's a very noted designer, he passed away. But we went to his apartment. This old guy, he was a Sephardic Jew, which is a diminishing ethnic group, and just a fascinating guy. We spent a couple of hours there, and I thought it was such a cool experience, just this whole thing of shopping for something meaningful.
This combines that because, yeah, if you really have that emotional attachment, you've tried on that experience, used their virtual reality. But you're not sure you can always schedule that appointment. It'll feel similar. You have your own special appointment that you go in, you talk to them.
I think this is in some ways really that next-generation expression or something that traditionally has been part of American culture. Of course, we're going to talk about this. They are still very much a North America-centric model.