Breaking the Stigma Around Breaking it Off with For Richer Jewelry

Brittany Lacey: I think it's important to acknowledge that the ring, itself, just because something ended, it doesn't make it bad. I think that there's this idea that the ring becomes damaged, or it's there's this negativity associated with it, and that's just not true. They are things independent of the meanings 

that we give to it. So we call it "pre-loved" because it was pre-loved. It was loved, it symbolized this love for this couple at this time, and it no longer does, but now it can create that symbol for you, and it can continue to have a happy ending. Just as, you know, you're creating this new happy ending.

So it's not "pre-worn" or "pre-used," it's pre-loved and you can continue to love it. 

Chris Hill: Welcome to We Built this brand, the podcast where we talk to the creators and collaborators behind brands, and provide you with practical insights that you can use in growing your own business. Today we're talking with Brittany Lacey and Stephanie Burett, the founders of For Richer Jewelry, a company that is empowering women to resell jewelry on their own terms.

Now, pretty cool story here. We got connected through a past guest of ours, Megan Britton, of the mayor. If you haven't checked out that episode, highly recommend you go back and check it out. After you finish this one. Of course. Um, and after our interview, she was really excited to introduce us to her friends, and thus this episode was born.

So Megan, thank you for making this episode happen. Now, I really enjoyed this talk with Brittany and Stephanie. Their approach to jewelry resale is very unique and in this episode. We talk about how they developed the idea for their business, where it is today, and what they hope for in the future. They were a pleasure to talk with and I'm sure you'll really enjoy this interview.

So without further ado, here's my conversation with Brittany and Stephanie of four Richer Jewelry.

Well, Brittany, Stephanie, welcome to We Built This Brand. 

Stephanie Burset: Thank you. Happy to be here. 

Brittany Lacey: Thanks, Chris. Excited to talk. 

Chris Hill: Yeah, it's great to have y'all on here and great to be talking with y'all today about For Richer Jewelry. I'm really excited to dive into that story and learn a little bit more, from you all on what motivated you all to start it and how you've built that brand since.

So where I always like to start is just with a little bit of background. So where did you get your start and how did you two meet? 

Brittany Lacey: Sure. So Stephanie and I met in 2019. We were working at a, direct to consumer startup in Nashville. together. We were the early hires on the brand team. 

and we both had more of a CPG background, so we were excited to work together in building this new consumer brand for this startup. We got to talking about this business. We were working, we had a photo shoot for the startup. We were working at one rainy, dreary, gray Nashville January day, and I was kind of lamenting to her about how I had a ring from a relationship I was no longer in, and how it's the one thing I can't seem to find a viable solution, to sell or get rid of.

I had tried online. jewelry reselling options. That always felt like I wasn't getting the full value of it. I took it to jewelry stores, and I really wasn't getting the value for it, and we were just kind of chatting about what a bad experience it was. And in true. brand manager fashion, "There's gotta be a better way!"

And, kind of just chatted through what an actual solution could be, 

and that was the humble beginnings of it, but it's kind of grown from there, but I think Steph and I immediately latched onto each other as having similar CPG brand backgrounds. And we have a really similar way of approaching problems and looking for that big solution and trying to, connect to a solution.

So that's. I think what drew us together to start. 

Stephanie Burset: Yeah, Brittany nailed it. That is definitely our origin story. We always laugh, you know, if you listen to some other podcasts, they'll say like, "Oh, you know, I used to be a consultant," and management consultants are always the one to be entrepreneurial.

It's totally brand managers. It's totally us. We're the ones. Always invest in a brand manager because we're the ones, you know, like we found each other. You're launching a product, you're dealing with retail, you're having to evaluate creative. Sometimes you're doing the creative yourself. True, left brain, right brain situation, and Brittany's a hundred percent right. 

We found each other. It's like such part of our lore. It was January 2nd, it was the day after Christmas break, and we were at an unsuccessful photo shoot, dying a slow death, and it was really nice to find each other and say like, "This is a great idea. Let's go be the CEOs of our little tiny side business while we work 

full-time." So yeah, pretty nailed it. That's exactly our origin story. 

Chris Hill: Yeah. I love the idea of building a side hustle. I mean, that's. honestly how this business got started, not the podcast, but the business that I run got started was, "Hey, I'm gonna do this as a side hustle until I can find my way out the door."

So, that's really neat. So is this full-time then for you all now? 

Stephanie Burset: I wish it were Chris. We're still side hustling along. You know, we've both switched jobs a couple times. We're still working full time, each of us, in our, kind of, director level marketing job. So we make time every single week to meet, and we knock it out when we've got a minute.

I think I probably text Brittany 47 times a day being like, "What do you think about this post for social media?" And then she like nods and smiles at me. But yeah, we're still chucking along. I mean, that was 2020 that we founded the business, so we're. still going five years later. 

Chris Hill: Yeah, 

that's still, that's really great.

So tell me a little bit more about the idea behind For Richer Jewelry. 

Brittany Lacey: The idea behind it was, "How can we make reselling feel like a destigmatize and positive experience for both the buyer and the seller?" So me being on the feller side, I. continue to hit kind of roadblocks in the options that were available.

Something about a pawn shop feels icky, for lack of a better word for a consumer. I was afraid to even go to one, so that's not what that I did. I met with some local jewelers, actually. Stephanie and I made a whole day of going around Nashville to different jewelers, and getting my ring, an offer for what they would pay, and it was, there was like a $10,000 range between the lowest and the highest that I was offered.

So there doesn't seem to be a lot of rhyme or reason in what you're getting, and it's also a significant drop from what the ring was bought for, and even more significant for what it was appraised at, and so there's a lot of confusion on the consumer side of like, "What is this ring actually worth?" And then I also looked into the online reselling options that exist, 

and as I started to go down that rabbit hole, I found that, a lot of these companies are owned by larger jeweler brands, so it's really similar to selling to a brick. and mortar in that they benefit from buying the ring as low as possible because they're also going to turn around and resell it for a profit.

So there wasn't really an option that sold directly from the seller to an interested buyer, and that felt like such a miss for us, especially wanting to solve problems. Like, that is at the core what a brand manager and what Steph and I's background is. 

So as we were brainstorming it, we were like, "What if. there's a way for a seller who's interested in selling to be able to sell directly to someone who wants to buy it. The benefit being the buyer gets it at a significantly less discount than they would get at a jewelry store, but then the seller also would be able to sell it for more than they would get in a jewelry store." So we're like, "It's a, 

win-win-win. Why is no one doing this?" And the more we investigated it, we were like, "This feels very, very real." So that led to the business coming to be, and then from there, we just, like Steph said, I mean, we're doing this as a side hustle. So, we met here and there and we mapped out this business, and from 2020 it kind of snowballed. and grew from there as we actually made it an actionable. 

and real business. 

Chris Hill: So you grew it from there when, I mean, getting it started is always the hardest part. You gotta build a website, 'cause this, correct me if I'm wrong, this is a fully digital business at this point, right? 

Stephanie Burset: That's right. 

Chris Hill: So there's no storefront or anything. So you're building a digitally. You gotta get social media interest in it. 

You gotta get people engaged in the product. When did you all realize that it wasn't just a good idea, that it was gonna be something that could be profitable and beneficial? 

Stephanie Burset: That's a great question, Chris. So we did what any good brand manager do we would do, we started with consumer research. So this was like the spring of 2020. 

Everybody was at home. You know, we had a little bit of time in our hands. We had both gotten furloughed, so we were like, "We have a month. We have plenty of time to work." So we started with a pretty easy survey to our friends and family, just like trying to suss out the idea. You know, "What does this make you think?" 

"How do you feel about it?" And then from that qualitative research we went to. quantitative research. We sent our survey via SurveyMonkey, and we really got a ton of data back that allowed us to think like, "Yes, this is a real business." We heard, first of all, I'm gonna quote some stats here.

So 93% of people that had sold an engagement ring sold it to either a pawn shop or a jewelry store, and we said to ourselves, "Okay, there's really only those two options. If with a little bit of education folks get excited about an online jewelry resale option, that could really work for us." Then the other part that we heard that really encouraged us to get going, 

we heard that 83% of the people we surveyed were somewhere on a spectrum that said, "Yes, we would buy or sell a pre-loved engagement or wedding ring." So some folks were totally unbothered. They were like, "Yep, sounds good. As long as the rock is big, I'm in." Some people thought, "I'm open to receiving or purchasing. I'd like to know a little bit more," 

and then some other folks thought, "Yeah, I'm interested in buying secondhand. As long as it's a good value." So that's 83% of people surveyed, and we were like, that's a real thing. Let's go get done. Let's get going. Yeah, and then from there, I feel like we, took quite a few steps.

Brittany and I were like wearing every hat. 

Brittany Lacey: Every single hat. 

Stephanie Burset: Every hat. LLC. Trademark. No thanks to any lawyers. We did those ourselves. So we maybe should have gone to law school instead of becoming marketers. We did, yeah. I mean. 

Brittany Lacey: We built the website. 

Stephanie Burset: We paid somebody to build the website first, and it wasn't very good, 

so then we built our own website for free. We did, the PNL. I mean, we just put every hat on and we got it done. 

Chris Hill: That's awesome. So you pretty much pull, bootstrapped for the most part, everything. 

Stephanie Burset: Oh yeah. 

Brittany Lacey: Yep. 

Stephanie Burset: Sure did. 

Chris Hill: It's a lot of fun building and crafting a business like that though.

There's a lot of heart and soul that goes into it, and, you know, you've thought through everything that you could possibly think through when you've built like that, so. that's really neat. 

You said something that I found really interesting. You said "pre-loved rings." How does that positioning play into it? 

And I think I know the answer, but I wanna know your perspective on saying things like "pre-loved" in your marketing and messaging.

Brittany Lacey: I think it's important to acknowledge that the ring, just because something ended, it doesn't make it bad, like what all has happened. And so to call something, I think that there's this idea that the ring becomes damaged, or it's like, there's this negativity associated with it, and that's just not true.

Rings are, 

they are things, independent of the meanings that we give to it. So we call it "pre-loved" because it was, pre-loved. It was loved. It symbolized this love for this couple at this time, and it no longer does, but now it can create that symbol for you. It still, it can continue to have a happy ending as you know, you. 

are creating this new happy ending. So, it's not "pre-worn" or "pre-used." It's pre-loved and you can continue to love it. 

Stephanie Burset: And we also, just as a side too, I love that, Brittany. I'm like, "Let's use that in our social this week." That was so good. We also don't only get rings, you know, that are the product of a divorce, right? We've had several that are the product of an upgrade, which means, like. 

pre-loved, like your spouse is gonna upgrade your engagement ring, which means there's a lot of love there. We get some that the folks, maybe they just didn't like the style for themselves, but they're still planning on getting married, or they still are married, or even, you know, they might have inherited it from somebody else, and it isn't their style.

So we do source from a bunch of places and that kind of encapsulates that. there isn't bad juju. The ring is a gorgeous piece of jewelry ready for its forever home. 

Chris Hill: I think. I think that's a good point, 'cause I could see how people would be maybe off put by it if it was just "used" or if it was, you know, "pre-worn" That just doesn't have the same cozy ring to it that "pre-loved" does, 

and I think that's a great perspective on it too, 'cause it's not just always a divorce or always, you know, someone passing away that you're getting rid of this ring. It's other reasons too, so that's great. 

So take me through the process then, from the buyer's perspective. What is it like to deal with For Richer and, what does it mean to that person that's coming into this process?

Brittany Lacey: So on the buyer side, we, Steph is our social media guru. She's got such a heart for it and creates some really great content, but that's like a great lead pool for us. It's creating an audience of people that are really interested in both buying and selling. So we start there. Reaching out to our leads, sharing the rings.

Steph and I feel pretty happy with the copy that we write for our rings too. Every ring has a little story behind it. It's named after the person who's selling it, and we create a relatability to this potential new buyer to share, you know, the right person this is for. Like, we have a classic All American ring.

Do you love that first crisp day of Fall, or you 

know? 

Stephanie Burset: Taylor Swift, Diet Coke, Chris, you know, we always write all of our copy together for the rings. We like, that's like our sacred time together, and I feel like the two of us have just the funnest vibe when we're like, "That's it! 

That's the perfect one!" So if you ever look at our listings, you could just picture us now, behind the camera, just like yapping. 

Brittany Lacey: So I think it really starts with good copy. Like, we know who we're talking to, and that allows us to relate to this. Like, we really try to get into the mindset of this buyer and who's looking for it, and then write to them.

And then other than that, it's meeting them where they are. So interesting on the buyer side is that it's. both men and women. What we've found with our past buyers is the woman finds it, and she'll forward that to her partner, and then the partner will reach out and say, "Hey, my girlfriend sent me this."

And then we work with their partner from there. 

Chris Hill: I mean, I'm thinking about my own like, you know, engagement ring process and the buying process. For me, it was about finding something that was very, something that my wife would enjoy and really like over the years, but also something that I picked out, if that makes sense.

Like I have input on it, I have a thought to it. And that's its own process. So that collaborative process, I'm sure quite often, and even in my wife's case, I remember going in. I had already picked out a ring and still like pretending to shop with her. 

Stephanie Burset: Love it. Love it. 

Brittany Lacey: I love that. 

Chris Hill: and pushing towards rings that she would absolutely hate just because I was teasing her and I was like, "What about this one? 

It's got that diamond shape that you really hate," and she's like, "Yeah. No, no, no, no." So, no, it was a lot of fun. 

Stephanie Burset: What does it look like? What does their engagement ring look like? 

Chris Hill: Oh gosh. I'll have our editor put an image up of it, because it's hard for me to, it was a pillow cut.

I remember that. It was a pillow cut, and then it's got an inlay. It was kind of a combination of wedding and engagement ring. 

Stephanie Burset: Pretty. Okay. 

Chris Hill: So it's got an inlay of diamonds on the engagement ring and an inlay of diamonds on the wedding band itself too. 

Brittany Lacey: I love when they work together like that. 

Chris Hill: Yeah, it's really, I love it. 

It's really pretty. That was the thing for me. I didn't wanna just get something where she was like. "All right, I picked it out of the catalog. Go buy it," you know? I wanted some of it to be, for me, since it's such a financial investment on the husband's part here. So, but when I did that, my only complaint with it is the diamonds, 

some of the diamonds tend to fall out. So, getting that replaced has been a problem, and not really a problem over the years, 'cause we went to, here in Knoxville we have a, jeweler you all may be familiar with, called Markman's Jewelers. And they've done a great job supporting that ring, for us over the years, and it doesn't cost too much to replace those small ones, 

but. 

Stephanie Burset: A little paves they do find out they do fall out.

Yeah, that'll happen. 

Chris Hill: Yeah. So that's the only unfun part is, okay, there's just an ongoing cost to this thing, but it's worth it. It's worth it. That's really fun, and I love the creativity behind that. I think that that adds a lot more character to what you're talking about too, because how do you, the only other way I guess you could go about naming the rings would just be to make it very boring and be like, 

"the pillow cut," or the whatever diamond cut, you know, is popular right now and just put that name on there if be very blase with it. But you're selling something important to that was important to someone else. So.

Brittany Lacey: And I don't think we need to shy away from that. You know, like you were saying with pre-loved, let's own that and that's the stance that we've taken.

Stephanie Burset: And it makes us also keep the people in mind. So obviously one of the benefits of going with us is that we're a little small business. Like, you're dealing with us, and so when we're dealing with, you know, the Brittany or whomever else is in our inventory, we really are picturing the people we're communicating with and making sure, "Oh, hey, did you email. 

Frankie back?" "Did you get back to Brooke?" so that we're keeping those people top of mind because it is like an emotional time for them too. They're saying goodbye to something that maybe. signifies that they thought their life would be a little bit different or what have you, and so, they're like true people, and we get to know them a little bit through communications and emails and we think of their personalities when we're writing the copy a lot of time.

So it's nice for us too. 

Chris Hill: That's great. 

Is there any situation where you've had to not sell a ring or had to take it back or cancel or anything like that. When they're ready to send it off, I guess they just send it to you. They're emotionally, they're ready to go. 

Brittany Lacey: I think the good part, we haven't had that yet, and I think one of the ways that has helped us is that you, the seller's able to hold onto their ring until it sells. 

So a lot of competitive options have you start the process by selling in your rings. You have no idea what it's gonna go for, if it's gonna be worth it, so we maintain a level of confidence on the seller side because. you are able to hold onto it. So, we get, images. We have the seller send all their images, 

in. We write the copy. We do all of that with the owner holding on to it so then once it sells, we're able to say, "Hey, it sold for the price we agreed to. Are. you ready to sell it?" Everyone so far has been up for it because we've been pretty open along the way of the price and, how it all works, but I do credit that with being able to hold onto it the whole time because then there's no, you know, loss of a sense of security and like, "Where's my ring? Was I really ready?" 

You, know what you're getting yourself into. 

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Chris Hill: So tell me a little bit more about the future of For Richer. Like, where do you all see it going, you know, now and maybe in the next five years or so? 

Stephanie Burset: Okay. So I think, we think, we continue to think every single week. We're like, "This is a great idea. This is a great business. We've got a great financial shape." 

We literally tell each other that in our weekly meeting. We're like, "This is an idea. We're doing it. It's happening. We're doing it." 

Brittany Lacey: Every time something big happens, we go, "We're really doing it!" 

Stephanie Burset: "It's happening. We're doing it!" 

Nothing like some positive self talk. Good, good vibes over here. But we think there's a huge untapped customer base. 

for our business, right? I mean, we are pretty much talking organically to the customers so far that we've gotten, haven't invested a ton of money, even in a lot of paid marketing. And so we think that based on the good idea, based on the giant customer base that's available to us, we think we can keep growing this business and be able to reach and help people. 

nationally and possibly even internationally. I mean, I think there's, we did the stat at the very beginning of our business, and I'm forgetting what they are, but there's like x many divorce millions of divorces every single year. Not to mention woulda hood, not to mention upgrades, not to mention inheritances, 

and so every single year it replenishes over time, right? And we also know that based on economic factors, based on sustainability habits of, you know, younger millennials and Gen Z, folks want a really good deal. They're not like, "Oh, let me go spend three months salary on an engagement ring from Tiffany's," anymore.

Although we do have Tiffany ring in stock, and she's very well priced, but they're also very big on sustainability. No one is looking for a blood diamond. Nobody wants, very few people want net new anymore, and so we just think the consumer insights are there. The market is there, and you know, I think there's kind of no limit to the upside here.

Chris Hill: That's awesome. You're talking about expanding out beyond just engagement rings then it sounds like. 

Brittany Lacey: I think eventually, we're open to that. We're proving the concept out. 

with rings. We didn't want to overwhelm ourselves with trying to take on too much too fast, but eventually, there's definitely an opportunity to get into jewelry in general, and I think if we really let ourselves dream, we love the idea of being able to be more full-service and like resize rings and maybe reset rings because that gives us a little bit more of a market to address, but like Steph said, there is a huge untapped market just in engagement jewelry. 

So that's where we're focusing on to start. 

Chris Hill: Well, and it's good to have a nice, solid niche as you're building your brand. 

Stephanie Burset: Exactly. Especially with just us two. It just really helps to make sure, you know, we have the financials straight, the process straight. We continue to learn every single time we sell a ring, 

so. You know, nowhere to go but up. 

Chris Hill: That is exciting. 

Well, as we talk, you know, I always like to ask on this program as we're, learning about brands and learning about you all too, you know, always curious to know, what is top of mind outside of, I know we talked a little bit about the future, but what is top of mind for you all in the industry right now? 

Like, are there concerns about. the economic future that make you excited or concerned? 

Brittany Lacey: I think sustainability is only getting to be more and more popular, especially as you think about the mindset of Gen Z as they start entering into this consumer space that we're in. And even on the economic side, there's more of a focus on. 

being mindful of how much you're spending. I mean, exactly what Steph just said. Long gone are the days of how much, "How much money can I spend on this ring?" It's more, "How do I celebrate this partner that I found and found a lasting way to commemorate that." So we're trying to hone in on this idea that it's the bond that you have with this person that matters more so than. 

it's spending $30,000 on this like huge three diamond ring. Like no, no. 

Stephanie Burset: It's so funny too. Like there's always been discussion about lab, right? Or Moissanite, versus lab grown, versus natural. You know, the gold market is way up. Should you just bury your engagement ring in the backyard and wait for it to appreciate? 

Don't do that. I think folks are just really. savvy, you know? As they're shopping, they're very price conscious, and you know, I think there is still is that insight that frankly sometimes depends on your style. Sometimes bigger is better. Some people want that.

You know, we always call it "finger coverage," and you can really get that at a very reasonable price, especially pre-loved with lab. 

and  Moissanite. We have some enormous rings. for sale right now. So yeah, I think it's just gonna be really interesting to see, where we shake out in the next couple of years with the economy, with the younger generation getting to be, you know, that engagement, as far as they know, they're still getting married, so that's good for us.

They don't go out anymore, but I think they still get married. 

Chris Hill: Yeah. So far.

Stephanie Burset: This sounds good. It's good for us.

Chris Hill: Not quite turning into. what's happening in South Korea where marriage is way down and women are choosing to be more independent longer, which no problem with that, but it's just an interesting dynamic. 

Stephanie Burset: Also. 

cool. Yeah. Also cool. 

Chris Hill: You know, also cool, but not good for business. I'm sure. At least not the engagement business. 

So one other question that I had for you, and I find this really important, is like the photography of the rings themselves. So you're getting these from the people selling them, but you're not actually taking, physically touching them and handling them in the moment. 

How do you coach them on how to get good pictures and how does that part of it work? 

Brittany Lacey: Yeah, that's a great question. 

Stephanie Burset: We're in the trenches with that one right now. Well-timed. That's a great question. 

Brittany Lacey: The photo instructions are something that we're constantly adjusting based on learnings, real-time learnings.

So we've created. 

something of a landing page on the site that details out how to actually take them, so when you submit, you get a page, that step-by-step, the angles that we want, how to light it appropriately. So we have them submit photos. We usually have to go back and forth a couple times to make sure we're getting the right clarity of the images, that they're sharp, that they're well lit.

One thing that's really important to us is that the site looks uniform. One thing we don't like is if you. go to some reselling websites where it's just kind of a free for all, and one background's blue, one's on a finger, this finger has black nail polish, it's just like madness, and you're so distracted.

Your eye doesn't know where to look on the page, and it's hard to shop. 

So it was important to us that we had more or less white backgrounds. The rings were on a stand. We didn't wanna have a lot of hands in there. We really wanted the focus. to be on the ring. We do our best to edit in ways, and AI very recently has been a help to us there to pull backgrounds out and to just help it look more uniform.

But it's something that we continue to fuss with, and it's important because when you're selling something that's this high of value, 

you want someone to feel really confident that they know what they're getting and that it feels as premium as it is. So, the photography is so important.

Stephanie Burset: We're on a journey. And I'll say too, you know, one of my high school best friends, her parents owned a jewelry company in New Jersey where I grew up, and she gave us some feedback a while back that was like, "Listen. 

You have some gorgeous rings on here. Your photography needs a little bit of work."

It's exactly what Brittany said. If you were asking people to spend $12,000 in a ring, it needs to look like it's a $12,000 ring. And we kind of sat with that, and then we recently had a customer that was considering reselling with us and opted to go a different route. 

And she was like, same thing.

"Listen. I love your business. I love you two. I think everything you're doing is great. I just don't feel like, I can make it look as good as I need to sell." And I remember feeling very sad about that. We texted each other like, that kind of hurt our feeling. 

That hurt our feelings.

But you know what though, just the week after that, I had dinner with a friend of mine here in Nashville, shout out to you, Kate Parity, who also has a jewelry business, and she was like, "Listen. I have a program for you. Pull it up, let's see if we can work removing the backgrounds," and it has been awesome.

So we're currently in the process of updating a lot of our photography and you can kind of tell which ones have been updated and haven't. Removing the backgrounds, putting them on models. Our friend who owns a design agency has let us use some of her shutter stock photos. If you see like some gorgeous hands and faces, Jackie Temkin, Afton Design Co.

Thank you so much for that. But it's true. It's like, it's a labor of love. We're always learning, you know, and this one is really important 'cause it is our front door, and we want people to feel very confident that they're looking at a high quality site, you know, a Blue Nile, or like a Tiffany's, or whomever else.

So we're learning and we're going, and, you know, we're excited to let people know that their rings are gonna look better and better as we learn more. 

Chris Hill: I mean, it can be a hard thing too, to get someone to get the right photo in the right way, the right look. I've done product photography and stuff in my background, so I'm very familiar with all this stuff, and yeah, it's really hard to get good lighting. Consistent lighting, consistent color, 

even the monitor you look at, you know, stuff on is going to vary the color of the ring and everything, so you gotta be careful about that. But, yeah, it helps to see the original too. I mean, just drawing from personal experience with camera gear and things like that, I've bought some used stuff, and there's a site that I now use almost religiously called MPB, which if y'all are ever looking for media gear, MPB is the place to go. 

When you ship your stuff to them, now you do ship to them, and then they resell it, but they buy it from you first. That's kind of their model. They actually have a really good trade-in values, side note, but they photograph all the gear that they bring in, and they show you the gear they photographed as opposed to just putting up a stock photo of the product.

It makes a big difference in understanding what you're getting, what it's gonna look like when it comes, and what you can expect from it. 'cause I don't mind buying something with a few scratches on it, as long as the scratches aren't over the, you know, the monitor or, you know, damage the unit. 

Stephanie Burset: And it's priced to reflect it.

Exactly, exactly, and that's a good insight too, because I think folks are really used to buying things. I mean, eBay, Poshmark, like they're used to buying things used in that model, so that kind of helps us with that hurdle, but it's so true. Like, you just wanna know what you're getting, and you wanna know the size, you wanna know the shape, 

you wanna know that the diamond sparkles and. that it's firmly attached.

So we're hoping to. convey that with our photography. 

Chris Hill: Well, that's definitely, I can tell y'all are definitely on the way to doing that, so that's great. I noticed, in fact, the consistency is, the thing that brought it up was all the white backgrounds and the way you've got kind of a white on white look for most everything. It was like, "Oh, I see some consistency here. 

Are they shooting this themselves or what are they doing?" So that's cool. 

Brittany Lacey: Oh, that means a lot that you called that out. 

Stephanie Burset: Great to hear. We've been sweating that. We've been sweating that for months, so that's awesome. 

Chris Hill: Well, you heard it here first. 

Well thank you all so much for coming on the podcast.

it's been a lot of fun. Before we go, I always like to ask, a fun question and that is, you know, we're talking about brands here. So what brand do you really admire the most right now and why? And I'll ask each of you that question. So Brittany, I'll start with you. 

Brittany Lacey: I love direct-to-consumer brands. 

I think that they do a really good job of understanding who they're going after. My personal favorite right now is, Oura Ring. I have one, but I think that their branding and the way that they understand their consumers is pretty unmatched. Like, they go above and beyond to understand how their consumer is using their product, and then they innovate ideas. 

to make the experience, even better. And as far as I know, it's not even things that like people are asking for, they just, they understand how people are using it, and then they use their team to kind of think, "How can we make this better?" I think they also do an exceptionally good job of talking to their consumers on social.

They truly understand. who their customer is, how to talk to them, and how to create like little means and jokes that you only get if you're part of the Oura community. And I think as far as a brand that really gets their customer? It's 

Oura right now. That's my, fave. 

Chris Hill: That's great. Stephanie? 

Stephanie Burset: That's a good one. You're influencing me.

I don't have one, and I'm like, "Do I need one?" Okay. I will go with a more classic consumer brand. So I've got ELF: eyes, lips, face makeup. I realized that I have a full face of it today and I slowly but surely have converted over to it as a great drugstore brand. for a couple of reasons. A.) I just think their packaging and their shelf presence is really slick.

Like it's just fresh and bright. It's so clean. It literally just has the brand name. It's really pretty. And I just think the price point is there at a place where you can go to Sephora and be spending hundreds of dollars for a very, like a Dior lip oil, and this is pretty much the same product for whatever it was. $6.99?

I think it's a great mix of, it's actual quality, good wearability, good affordability, fun brand. They do some nice stuff, you know, on social too, so. Yeah, I like influenced myself into having a face full of ELF today, so hopefully it. looks good. 

Brittany Lacey: You look great. 

Stephanie Burset: Thank you. Thank you. Also, I will say our like North Star, patron saint, 

we love Sara Blakely. from Spanx. We just love her. She flies all of her friends in a private jet everywhere to somewhere fun. She is like one of the. first female self-made billionaires. I feel like she uses her power for good, and the inside of Spanx. I'm not, I love Sara. If you're listening to this, Sarah, but like, her most recent sneaker collection was like a little bit wild, but her clothing line is like always on point, good quality, inside driven, and all that good stuff.

So we love Sarah too. 

Brittany Lacey: She also bootstrapped her business from just $5,000, so like, that we're like, "If she can do this, we can do this." And she just did it by like, she just made it happen. She walked into buyers at Neiman Marcus. She just isn't afraid to put herself out there, so we're like, "Be like Sarah, 

get it done."

Stephanie Burset: That's it. Next step, PJ. Easy enough. 

Chris Hill: Well, I think y'all have a good thing going here, and I hope that more people will, through this podcast and all your other efforts be able to learn about For Richer and, start to engage with y'all, 'cause I think it's a cool thing, and there's plenty more people out there that would love to know about this.

So, on that note, where can people find out about For Richer? 

Stephanie Burset: Yeah. Visit our website www.forricherjewelry.com. And then come see us. Same handle social media. I am. chronically online, so I love TikTok. Come see us on TikTok. Come see us on Instagram. We're always having a good time. We'll always respond to you, so like, and follow and share, and let us know what rings you see.

And you know, feel free to go shopping. 

Chris Hill: Awesome. Alrighty. Well, Brittany, Stephanie, thank you all so much for coming on today. 

Brittany Lacey: Thank you so much, Chris. This was so fun. 

Stephanie Burset: Thanks for having us. This is great. 

Chris Hill: Thanks for checking out this episode of We Built This Brand. Don't forget to like, follow and subscribe on your player of choice.

You can also keep up with the podcast on our website at webuilthisbrand.com. If you like this episode, please give the podcast a five star review and be sure to tell all your friends about it so we can continue to build this brand.