The Future of Bridal
December 21, 23
Marriage ain't what it used to be. Fewer people are tying the knot than ever before.
Many are waiting until they're more financially secure before marrying. Or not marrying. And not buying a ring.
And even now the lingering effects of that dreaded passion killer, the Covid pandemic, are being felt.
Bridal has always driven diamond sales, but two years of on-off lockdowns means there aren't so many brides around.
You might have thought the ripple effects of Covid, in terms of romance, would have worn off by now.
But only this week Al Cook, De Beers CEO, told the Financial Times that he expects the so-called "engagement gap" to still be hitting diamond sales into 2026.
"People didn't meet each other, people couldn't date. It all stopped," he said. "It'll probably take another two to three years to get back [to where things were]."
The average time from the first date to marriage is currently three years and three months, according to internal research for Signet, the US's biggest jewelry chain with 2,800 outlets.
The company blamed the engagement gap for falling ring sales earlier this year, saying the sector would have to grow by 25 per cent by 2026 to return to pre-pandemic levels.
There were encouraging signs that people were dating again, according to Jamie Singleton, Signet's president and chief consumer officer.
But dating and marriage no longer go hand in hand, as in earlier generations.
A steady 2 million or so people have been getting married every year in the US since the 1970s, even though the population has been growing. In real terms that's a steep decline.
On top of that, people are enjoying an extra decade of "freedom" before deciding to take the plunge. The average age for a first marriage in the US last year was 30 for women and 32 for men. In 1950 it was 20 for women and 23 for men.
The underlying trend is that fewer people are getting married, and they're waiting longer before they do it.
Will the Covid effect prove to be a medium-term blip, or is it possible that it's having a more fundamental effect?
The pandemic taught us that Zoom can replace air travel, that the sofa can replace the office.
There's an inevitable pendulum effect, and dating will always be a thing. But marriage? Maybe not.
Al Cook said it could be another two or three years before we were back at pre-pandemic levels.
The US was still officially in Covid mode until May of this year, so the math kind of works.
But I can't help suspecting that the whole pandemic thing has made marriage just a little less fashionable. And that we're due a bit of a re-think on the dominance of bridal in the diamond industry.
Have a fabulous weekend