Build Your Business by Marketing To the LGBTQI+ Community

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Blair recognizes that, "People are going to be looking for jewelry that resonates with them, not necessarily their gender identity or sexual identity.”

Perosi adds, “When someone is shopping for wedding jewelry they should be guided over to the entire collection of all available wedding jewelry and asked what they have in mind. Let the customer guide the initial conversation and give them plenty of freedom and comfort to gravitate towards the wedding rings they are interested as well as select the pronouns they want to use to describe their significant other. Never assume the pronoun for their significant other, even after they reveal the other person's name.”

Language matters. “It’s time to lose the word bridal and replace it where applicable with wedding or commitment jewelry,” said Bosen. De Beers already figured this out: starting in 2019, it dropped the word “bridal” and put all engagement and wedding jewelry under the umbrella of “commitment jewelry.” customer to "tell me about him and his tastes." When someone is shopping for wedding/engagement rings by themselves—or any gift, for that matter—he suggests a jeweler always refer to their significant other as "the lucky person" or similar gender neutral phrasing. Language experts now have designated “them” as a gender-neutral alternative pronounm for “him” or “her,” not just as a plural reference to a group of people.

Worried what other customers might think? “Many jewelers are still afraid they will alienate their existing customers by creating marketing campaigns that would show samesex and gender neutral couples sharing tender or casual, everyday moments at home or in public,” says Perosi. He suggests reimagining ads with a couple of men, a couple of women, or a couple of people whose genders are not apparent.

A study published by Statista in October 2020 revealed that nearly 50% of respondents said that the appearance of a same-sex couple in an ad would not change their purchasing behavior, and only 18% said that they would be less likely to purchase a product because of those ads.

Perosi agrees. “Above all else, the entire jewelry industry is guilty of using the word ‘bridal’ to refer to the entire collection of jewelry that is intended for engagements, weddings, and anniversaries. I hate how ingrained the word ‘bridal’ is in the hearts and minds of retail sales staff, jewelers, designers, and manufacturers. Even when I ask a jeweler what lines of ‘wedding jewelry’ they carry, they always answer with references to their ‘bridal lines.’”

Similarly, he says a jeweler should no longer ask a man shopping for a wedding ring to “tell me about her,” or to ask a woman

“If the display of same sex couples together is something that a jeweler is not willing to commit to, then the easiest way to portray inclusivity is to show a groom by himself or a bride by herself rather than always heterosexual couples pictured together,” he suggests. He also notes that attitudes against same-sex marriage tend to be stronger among older demographics, many of whom either already have or soon will slow their jewelry-buying habits. That theoretical 18% of customers that jewelers are afraid to lose may not be contributing much to the bottom line anyway.