In Episode #79 of the Joy Joya Jewelry Marketing Podcast, I interview Deb LaBudde, the founder and CEO of Memo, a highly-curated ecommerce fine jewelry retailer that offers customers a very unique and innovative shopping experience – at home.

Launched in December 2016, this first-of-its-kind ecommerce site completely transformed how consumers shop for fine jewelry, since they can try the jewelry before they buy it for three days. Some of Memo’s earliest designer partners included Lalaounis, Emily P. Wheeler, and Jane Taylor, all of whom are still on board.

You’ve likely heard the industry term “on memo”, which refers to jewelry retailers allowing their special clients to wear a piece before buying it. Inspired by this practice and seeing a need for it in the ecommerce space, Deb left her previous career as a corporate executive and founder and managing general partner of a closely-held venture capital fund to create Memo. Full disclosure: Memo has been one of my clients since 2018, and I’ve loved seeing the company grow and evolve over time.

In this episode, we chat mostly about how consumer expectations around shopping for fine jewelry are changing and how Memo is disrupting the industry with the new-to-launch Home Try-On (HTO) Program. We cover questions like:

Who are your target customers? What do they like most about the Memo model?
How do you attract new customers and retain existing ones?
In your opinion, will the HTO program change how consumers expect to shop for fine jewelry?
What do you envision for the future of the HTO program?
…and more!