Engagement ring

Engagement ring – Tips & Tricks by Matt Frost, Sparkles for her

Are you planning to purchase a diamond engagement ring? Whether you already have ideas or are starting to look for one, these expert tips will help you select the perfect ring.

Matt Frost from Sparkles for herwill explain how he can be useful when buying the engagement ring without affecting its quality.

Who is Matt?

I am a private jeweler based in Charleston, South Carolina, USA. I help people all over the world get the absolute best deals on engagement rings, diamonds, and other fine jewelry. My wife, Savannah, and I love traveling, meeting new friends, spending time at church, and go-kart racing! My wife is a very talented wedding photographer so her and I get to work together with couples quite a bit!

What is the process of finding the best ring? Why can you get people the best deals on engagement rings?

For my clients, it’s a pretty simple process – our first conversation over the phone takes between 15-30 minutes and in that conversation I can help people move from whatever step they are in to knowing exactly what is possible for their budget and desires! We will go through everything they need to know as they are buying their engagement ring for their significant other such as: what type of gems (mostly natural or lab-grown diamonds for engagement rings), what type of metal (white gold, yellow gold, rose gold, or platinum usually), what style of setting, and all the details they may not have thought of.

After our call, most of my clients feel totally confident they will be getting exactly what they are looking for and getting the best possible deal on their ring. The reason they know they are getting the best deal is because I don’t have the same overhead as a normal jewelry store and I don’t have to keep any inventory – I have suppliers all over the country who I work with to get the best deals and I don’t have a storefront or employees!

How much can the client save?

Usually my clients are not diamond and engagement ring buying experts so I usually have a lot of tips that help them save thousands on their engagement rings. One recent example is from a client named Betsy: She was looking for a very specific design so we ended up creating a custom 1.7 Carat lab-grown diamond engagement ring and wedding band for her in rose gold. I gave her a few tips related to the type of metal and the color of diamond that would save her the most money while also looking great in the setting and that saved her over $1,000 alone! When she received the set from me, she said she originally thought the deal was too good to be true but after working with me, she was excited about saving about $6,000 on the $6,000 set that she got from me!

What are the most requested shapes and colors of the rings?

The most requested shape of diamond is the Round Brilliant Cut by quite a bit – that is actually between 60-80% of all engagement rings! The next most requested are pear (teardrop) and oval shaped stones (fun fact, you can save a good amount by going with a shape other than round as well!)

The most requested color of gold currently is white gold but there have also been a lot of solitaire and vintage-style engagement rings that are requested using yellow gold. That color is gaining in popularity currently!

Can you help clients create a custom ring? If so, how long does it normally takes? Do you ship your products anywhere?

I absolutely LOVE working with my couples to create a custom ring. It’s a very simple process:

  1. They send me a couple pictures that they find showing different features they would like on their custom ring
  2. After getting a good understanding of the design they would like, I send it over to my designer to create a CAD (Computer Aided Design) using what my couple and I have created
  3. We get the CAD design back in about 2-3 days and if it’s perfect, we can have it produced and at their doorstep, anywhere in the world in about 7 days (~10 days if it’s international)! If there are modifications that are needed, we want to make sure it is perfect so we can go back and forth with my designer as many times as necessary to make it the vision they have in their mind.

Usually including going through a couple rounds of CAD, the process takes between 10-20 days from initial design to final product. Most jewelry stores take between 4-8 weeks to do the same, and will charge much more!

Custom rings sound like they might be expensive but actually, many times you can save money and get exactly what you would like because you don’t need to get additional features or design elements that you don’t want.

One of the greatest benefits I have is that I can duplicate almost any setting with the tweaks and design changes that make it special to you!

Tell me 3 tips and tricks on finding the best ring.

I have so many! But my top 3 (these alone can cut your cost in half or give you double the size of your diamond for your same budget!) are:

1. Laboratory-grown diamonds (NOT Moissanite or Cubic Zirconia/etc.) are 100% real diamonds and are about 30-50% less expensive than a natural diamond! (Really cool video on how they are made –

These have had HUGE changes in just the past 3 years so I would look up information on them if you don’t know much about them or ask me – I have a lot of documentation and sources. One great BBC article – https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200207-the-sparkling-rise-of-the-lab-grown-diamond
2. You don’t need a perfect color or clarity! Color starts at D and goes through Z and it’s much more expensive to get a D vs a G for example. For a yellow or rose gold ring, many people go with a D/E/F color diamond but you don’t need to! The color is hidden very well by the color of the gold so you can go with a lower color like G, H, I, or J and it will still look amazing! Clarity is the same way but what you are looking for is “Eye-Clean”, you don’t need it perfect! Go for VS or maybe SI but you don’t need VVS.The most important of the 4 C’s is actually cut.
3. People are always concerned about the carat size but the cut quality is what actually causes the light to be reflected back into your eye and allows it to draw attention from across the room! As the Gemological Institute of America states, “A well-cut round brilliant delivers that unmistakable, stop-in-your-tracks light-show that telegraphs “diamond” across a crowded room. If the diamond is well cut, most compromises in clarity, color and even carat weight can be forgiven.” If the diamond is cut either with an excellent or Ideal cut, that will reflect the most amount of light. The best cut diamonds actually look bigger than a diamond that is larger but not cut as well!

Are the rings certified?

We only sell main diamonds that are certified by third party independent grading laboratories. The certification we use for natural diamonds is GIA (Gemological Institute of America) and IGI (International Gemological Institute) for lab-grown diamonds. These will have certification numbers laser inscribed on the girdle of the diamond so you will always be able to verify the diamond you have is exactly what you purchased.

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