Earrings Guide

Earrings should never be bought casually since there are too many financial risks.  The best way to reduce the risk of buying earrings is to familiarize yourself with the specific earrings you want to buy.  While you may not be able to make the same judgment as a professional jeweler who has scientific training and years of experience, you can learn to judge the gems within the earrings based upon cut, clarity, color, brilliance, and weight.  Learning about these factors and spending time shopping and researching will help you get what you want at a fair price.

Make an effort to learn as much as you can about the earrings you want to buy.  Examine the earrings owned by your family and friends.  You may also want to ask a friend to accompany you when comparing earrings at different jewelry stores, mall, or gallerias.  A second set of trusted eyes is always a good thing.  Moreover, it gives you an edge when you and a friend are speaking with a salesperson as opposed to just you alone.

There are a few simple questions you want to ask yourself before you begin shopping for your earrings.  First, what is your desired color or style?  Second, what shape are you looking for?  Third, do the earrings match your personality?  Finally, are the earrings within your budget?  There is a big price difference between ruby earrings and silver earrings.

Once you have found the earrings you want to buy, there are four basic rules you need to follow before making the purchase.  If you are looking for pearl earrings, make sure the earrings are clean.  If you are working with a jeweler, ask them to clean the earrings for you.  If you are looking at diamond earrings or gold drop earrings, make sure you get a current appraisal.

Second, place the earrings under proper lighting. Many jewelers use multiple incandescent or fluorescent spotlights, usually recessed or on a track lighting system.  The purpose it to make the earring gems look super brilliant.  However, once you bring the earrings to a typical place with normal lighting, the gems will not have the same brilliance.  Simply take the earrings away from the display glass and look at them in normal light.

Third, rotate the earrings in order to view them from different angles.  Lastly, if you are using a loupe, focus it both on the surface and into the interior.  To focus into the interior, shift the gem up and down until you are able to see all the depth points.  Leave no stones unturned since this will likely be an expensive purchase.

The internet is a wonderful tool and it has opened up options that were never available previously. If you wanted to buy a pair of silver earrings or drop earrings, you would have to go down to the local mall or shop several jewelry stores in order to pick through the selection. If you wanted to shop around it would mean driving from store to store, fending off the advances of the store clerk who tried to get your business and their commission. Of course, the internet has introduced its own problems to the mix, but overall the online experience is far greater than the old way of doing things.

The selection is the biggest advantage. You will have dozens of stores to look through and see inventory that is always available, not just what was left in the store. The amount of choices will make the experience much nicer and allow you to buy the perfect earrings. The ability to bounce from retailer to retailer as you look for the perfect set of sterling silver earrings (for example) is wonderful and you won’t feel pressured or rushed by any sale associate. The ability to do research as well about the company, the materials used in the earrings, and the styles, makes for a much better shopping experience overall.

The discounts are what really draw people to the internet though. Whether you are purchasing wholesale or just a few pieces, you will find discounts that are almost unheard of at an actual store. Of course, be careful when you are looking at discounts, something simply unbelievable could very well have fake gemstones. The idea of wholesale may not mean what you think it means either. Most of the time wholesale represents buying a bulk amount, but in the jewelry area, it can pertain to the amount spent. So if you have extra cash to splurge, you can save a ton of money and get a lot of jewelry at a fraction of the cost.

Buying earrings online is not as hard as it may seem. If you take the time to look over many retailers you can find exactly what you are looking for. The discounts, the lack of pressure and the inventory will keep having you return to the internet to find your next earring or jewelry purchase. Plus, becoming internet savvy with purchases will help you purchase a lot of things online and at a discount compared to what you are normally paying.