Monday, November 30, 2009

A perfect match!

While Mr. Spaniel and I considered whether we were willing to drop the extra cash on an imperfect match of a wedding band (or buy a plain ring instead), we thought we'd visit a few other jewelry stores and see if we found anything better. Although I was pleased as pie with my engagement ring, I was just plain mad that the shop was so unhelpful in finding the matching band, and I didn't want to give them more of our money. In fact, I was willing to spend (a little) more to give our business to someone else who hadn't already annoyed us.

We ended up walking into a big chain store after our first failed attempt at ring shopping, hoping that we'd find something closer to the original and apparently unavailable band just through the law of large numbers—with so much variety, surely they'd have something that would work! I am so glad we gave it another shot before we went and bought a ring I wasn't as excited about, because we found a Miss Spaniel-can-hardly-complain-about-it-it's-so-similar wedding band at Robbins Bros! It's true that the profile isn't quite as high as my e-ring (part of the reason is that my e-ring is too big and needs to be re-sized), but everything else lines up pretty much perfectly.


The salesperson we met with asked to see my engagement ring, disappeared for about 90 seconds and then came back with the perfect band. AND it was $5 less than the original one. $5! What a savings. ;)

Even better, they cleaned and dipped my engagement ring (re-plated it with the rhodium that keeps white gold white and sparkly), and now it looks as pretty as the day we brought it home the first time.

I know we would have spent a lot more if we'd bought my engagement ring there (the same shop where I first met Ritani and the accompanying overpriced diamond), but I almost think it could have been worth it. The service we've received there was tremendously superior to what we've experienced from the shop where we bought my engagement ring. Oh well! I guess now we know for... next time? An upgrade? :)

Would you be willing to pay more for better service down the road, or did you look for the best deal upfront?

7 comments:

  1. Your rings are gorgeous!!! I love how they look together!

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  2. The rings look perfect together! My fiance and I bought my setting from one store and were so unhappy with the way the owner flipped out when he realized his employee quoted us a ridiculously low price that he had to honor, that we wouldn't buy the center stone from him. So we went to another jeweler to buy the center stone which is gorgeous. But now the fiance thinks he should have received an even better deal from the 2nd jeweler so he doesn't want to use him in the future either. :)

    I just took my ring into a local jeweler that my friend recommended and if they do a good job sizing and fixing it up, I will most likely keep them as a personal and regular jeweler for the future. Especially when I need them to dip it in the rhodium just before the wedding! :)

    I agree that it's hard to give someone your business when you are frustrated with them. Glad it worked out for you!

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  3. Beautiful wedding band! I hope I get as lucky as you and find one soon too.

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  4. Glad they showed you the retail love! Those rings are so pretty.

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  5. Oh it's beautiful! Yes I would have gone elsewhere too!!

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  6. I love how the rings look together! My ring was an inside job (yeah, I called in a favor for it...haha), so I couldn't be more satisfied that we got an extremely discounted price on my bling. However, my fiance didn't purchase the band at that time, so we're forced to shop for it elsewhere...kind of stinks!

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