Female Opps: Brilliant Earth expands into additional malls under new top marketer (Score 74)

Sales Lead: Jewelry e-retailer Brilliant Earth (BE) recently expanded beyond its e-Commerce presence with three new physical stores in various suburban malls.

• Thanks to this addition, BE now operates 37 stores, which will reportedly get the company's sustainability-oriented products in front of a larger consumer base.
• The new stores are in Roosevelt Field (NY), King of Prussia (PA), and Roseville Galleria (CA).
• All of BE's stores offer unique jewelry and bridal services such as same-day purchases, made-to-order products, and one-on-one jewelry specialist appointments.
• The company will likely:
  • Ramp up localized advertising around its locations
  • Continue pursuing expansion
  • Keep increasing spend
  • Conduct agency reviews under a new top marketer (more below)
• Target demographic: 
  • Gen-Z and millennial
    • ​​​​​​​Primarily women, secondarily gift-giving men

Recent leadership shifts:

• BE appointed a new top marketer, marketing SVP and head Pamela Catlett, in April 2023.
  • Catlett previously served as the founder and CEO at Catlett & Co., which provides strategic, brand, and executive counsel to various founders and CEOs.
• The company made several other hires within the past year such as creative director Constance Foster Caubet (April 2023) and senior director/head of brand Colleen Clarke (May 2023).

Additional spending insights:

• Digital and social insights (digital ad spend, effectiveness, impressions, and performance)
  • YTD spend: Since the beginning of 2023, BE has spent approximately $12.3m on digital ads, already 16% more than the approximately $10.6m spent in all of 2022.
  • YTD data: The company has earned ~2b digital impressions YTD via Facebook (39%), desktop display (32%), Instagram (21%), YouTube (3%), desktop video (3%), and mobile display (2%) ads.
    • ​​​​​​​Top site destinations for this year's desktop display ads include YouTube (46%), yahoo.com, politico.com, urbandictionary.com, and allrecipes.com.
  • Last year: BE spent roughly $10.6m on this channel last year, less than half of the roughly $21.7m spent in 2021.
• Additional channel insights  
  • The company has, in the past, teamed up with other companies such as LA-based jewelry designer Logan Hollowell on specific collections.
  • BE invests in Google Ads along with email, digital, Instagram, Facebook, and online video (primarily via Youtube Android and Youtube.com) ads.
  • The company sponsors podcasts such as Stories from NPR, The Grave Talks, The Viall Files, BEYOND THE VELVET ROPE, and Murder Sheet.

Additional agency insights:

• Opportunity: The recent top marketer hire could lead to agency reviews, so reach out soon to get on Catlett's radar.
• Current agency roster:
  • ​​​​​​​No current agency relationships yet confirmed

Insight Sources:Digital spend insights estimated by Pathmatics; email channel insights by Bombora; additional channel insights estimated by Vivvix; podcast insights by Podchaser.​​​​​​​