You’re About To See Way More Engagement Ring Advertisements

DeBeers, of ‘Diamonds Are Forever’ fame, are back on the advertising bandwagon…

DeBeers are arguably the most famous diamond company in history, although they’re not as all powerful as they once were. Founded in 1871 during the onset of the South African diamond rush, they more or less held a monopoly on the entire planet’s diamond supply for most of the 20th century. They can’t claim to be the most ethical company in history (this is the diamond industry we’re talking about, after all), but in the past few decades as the market has opened up, they’ve made some headway in redeeming themselves.

As a result of doing things the ‘right’ way however, DeBeer’s market share and profits have fallen. They traditionally focused on mining and trading rough diamonds as well as retail, but now they’re all set to make retail their number one game. The company’s Forevermark brand had retail sales of around $750 million in 2016, so they have now announced plans to spend a whopping $140 million on diamond jewellery advertising.  

It’s their biggest advertising spend in almost a decade, and they plan to use the cash injection to increase consumer demand for diamond jewellery – particularly in the booming market of China, as well as the US and India. So what does this mean for you? Basically if you hadn’t heard of Forevermark before now, you’ll soon be way more familiar with the brand. Because you’ll be seeing it everywhere.

The most vital target for DeBeers’ advertising money? Millennials, believe it or not. They claim that the younger demographic is already one of the top spenders when it comes to jewellery, racking up $26 billion across the four biggest markets. We suspect if engagement rings were taken out of the equation, the stats might say something different. But what would we know?

The most famous and iconic DeBeers advertising campaign is the instantly recognisable ‘Diamonds Are Forever’ slogan from 1948, which was proclaimed ‘slogan of the century’. So if that’s anything to go by, we’re in for a good show.