Wondering which jewelry retailer is better, Clean Origin or Ritani?
Perfect, you’re in the right place! In this expert Learning Jewelry guide, you’ll learn:
- Who provides the best shopping experience?
- Which company has the better warranty?
- Where can you get the best value for the price?
- What are customer reviews saying?
Shopping Experience
When we talk about shopping experience, we’re talking about what a jewelry store- online or physical- offers their customers. From selection, to grading reports, to showroom options, the shopping experience is what a store brings to the table.
Clean Origin
Chances are, you’re probably unfamiliar with the Clean Origin name. They’ve been around for a short time, having only formed in 2017. However, the crew behind the name has over 60 years of combined jewelry experience.
They only sell lab grown diamonds. There are no natural diamonds in the entire inventory. Lab created diamonds are real diamonds, just put under similar conditions in a lab rather than mined from the earth.
Clean Origin carries a large selection of lab diamonds with about 14,000 in tow. For 1 carats and above, they carry around 11,000 diamonds of various shapes and sizes. In addition to colorless lab diamonds, they also have around 70 fancy colored ones as well.
Not only do they carry loose lab created diamonds, all of their diamond jewelry is lab grown as well.
When you’re checking out a loose diamond on Clean Origin’s website, you’ll notice they have a couple different types of viewers.
One of these viewers I really like and it’s the V30 viewer. They have extra features to try out. Not every V30 viewer has all of the features shown in the video below.
The other viewer you might run into is the less fortunate looking one, the DiaCam viewer. These viewers vary in distance from the diamond. If you don’t control it, the diamond spins fast and it’s hard to see inclusions.
If you do drag it, it gets pretty glitchy and the light reflection off of it is really bad. I wish they’d just have the other viewer on all their diamonds.
If you don’t love your engagement ring from Clean Origin, they have a 100 day return policy.
Ritani
Ritani is one of the biggest names in designer engagement ring settings. They’re most often compared to Tiffany. Blue Nile’s ex-CEO Brian Watkins joined the company in 2012. That’s when they first started selling loose natural and lab-grown diamonds. Watkins has since left the company.
They’ve got a pretty large collection for only serving up loose diamonds for 10 years. However, I suspect their partnerships with other retailers definitely give them a leg up.
Currently, they carry about 100,000 loose diamonds of varying grades and weights.
Customer Service
One of the biggest reasons companies lose customers is because of the service. Both Clean Origin and Brilliant Earth have bias-free advice for their guests as they are not making commission or needing to meet a sales goal like a mega jewelry retailer.
Clean Origin
Clean Origin’s customer service is reachable via email, phone, or live chat on their website. Their customer service hours are Mon-Fri from 8am EST to midnight. On the weekends, Saturday from 10am-7pm and Sunday from 10am-midnight.
Even though it’s not 24/7 convenience like other online retailers, they do give you the opportunity to book an appointment with their diamond experts if you need it. The hours are decent enough, but 7pm seems a little early to close on a Saturday in my opinion.
It feels like Sunday and Monday’s hours should be switched given the average jewelry customer’s availability.
Finding a general consensus about Clean Origin’s service proves to be a bit difficult. They’re not a widely known brand and not everyone has been looking to buy engagement rings during the pandemic.
Trustpilot is probably your best bet for learning what people think about them. Most of the Clean Origin reviews are positive. There are some negative reviews as well.
I do notice a couple people have noticed flaws in their ring settings and had diamonds come loose. That seems to be the most common complaint of the small amount of complaints. Overall, most customers are very happy with their experience.
They have one showroom customers can visit in Dallas, TX, so most of their customers shop online. They have free FedEx overnight shipping available or free 2 day shipping. All loose diamond returns (lab or otherwise) have free returns as well.
Ritani
You won’t read too much about Ritani’s customer service through reviews online, but that’s because most people don’t know about them.
From an objective point of you, I can say Ritani’s policies and convenient features are a great example of their dedication to customer service.
Let me explain…
Like Clean Origin, Ritani mainly operates online. But they also understand that not everyone is okay with the whole shopping online thing. No judgment, it can be a scary place.
For those customers, Ritani has partnered up with different jewelry stores around the United States. They offer customer a free “in-store preview” at a partner retailer near you.
You can build your lab or natural diamond engagement ring online and have it shipped to the nearest partner. There’s no obligation to buy.
I also like the market analysis Ritani gives customers who buy diamonds from them. People are so skeptical about the diamond industry today, from conflict diamonds to inflation prices, it’s hard to gain customer trust for a company.
In an effort to help that, each loose diamond in Ritani’s inventory shows you the break down of the price. You see how much the diamond costs Ritani from the manufacturer. You can also see the shipping and customs fees, as well at Ritani’s markup cost. I mean, they do have to make money.
The last thing I’ll mention they offer customers for convenience is hassle-free returns. If you decide you don’t love your Ritani engagement ring, they’ll schedule a FedEx pickup for you so you don’t even have to leave your home.
That’s a great feature for those who are disabled, without a vehicle, or even the elderly. Ritani’s policies seem to really be designed with customer convenience in mind.
Warranty
A lot of people will bypass a jewelry warranty if offered. The last thing they want to do is spend more money after finally deciding on the engagement ring. They love a free lifetime warranty, but not every company gives one out.
Clean Origin
Clean Origin offers all a lifetime manufacturer’s warranty on all of their lab diamond jewelry.
So what’s that mean?
Basically, if you buy a ring from Clean Origin and there’s a design flaw or something wrong with the production of a ring, they should cover it. But maintenance like rhodium, retipping prongs, and tightening center stones and melee stones, you’ll be out of pocket.
This is one of the biggest faults within the company in my opinion.
You do get 1 free resizing if you buy the wrong ring size within 100 days.
Ritani
Ritani definitely has Clean Origin beat in this category. But for how long, who knows. A little birdie told me CO might be offering a warranty with their engagement rings later in 2022.
But back to Ritani.
To add to all of their convenient features and offers, Ritani gives their customers a free lifetime warranty. This warranty covers routine maintenance like rhodium plating white gold rings, tightening stones, and retipping prongs.
There’s two catches, however.
- You have to sign up for the warranty online. They ask you do it in 45 days, but if you forget, you can sign up anytime.
- The ring setting must be a Ritani branded ring setting.
Read also: The Full Ritani Review
Price vs Value
For most people, how much a ring is going to cost them is at the forefront of their mind. Often before features and added benefits. But sometimes you can get an excellent priced diamond with no benefits, or you could find yourself paying a little more on your debit or credit card, but saving money in the long run.
Sometimes it’s not about the price tag, but the overall value of said price tag years down the road.
Lab diamonds are between 20-70% cheaper than their mined counterparts. They’re still expensive when compared to other diamond alternatives like moissanite or cubic zirconia.
When you compare the prices of Clean Origin’s diamonds and Ritani’s diamonds, there’s a clear picture of who is the more expensive.
Clean Origin’s diamonds tend to be more expensive than Ritani’s lab grown diamonds. They’ll beat Ritani’s natural diamond prices, but lab diamonds not so much.
However, there’s one thing you have to understand.
The type of lab grown diamonds each of these great brands offer is vastly different. I’m not talking about hpht vs cvd diamonds either.
Your options for lab grown diamonds with higher clarity and color grades are big with Clean Origin. With Ritani, they’re not.
Most of Ritani’s lab grown diamonds have JKLM color grades, which are at the bottom. It was extremely hard to find a 2 carat princess cut diamond with high grades at Ritani.
The one 2 carat diamond that was compatible with Clean Origin’s was less expensive. But there were no other options. It’s very limited.
Selling lower diamond grades, it’s no wonder Ritani’s diamonds are less expensive.
On Reddit
While there’s a lot of customer reviews on the internet at places like the Better Business Bureau, Google Reviews, and Yelp, most people only file complaints about the retailer. This can be helpful, but we always take reviews with a grain of salt.
Instead, we check out Reddit and many subreddits that speak of diamonds and engagement rings. Here you can read both positive and negative experiences.
Clean Origin
Clean Origin is becoming increasingly popular from where they were 6 months ago on Reddit. In past matchups, I’ve mentioned their dismal presence on Reddit. But over the last year, posts have been popping up.
Here’s what one customer comments on someone’s Reddit thread asking about the company:
See, it backs up my assessment of the color grades in Clean Origin’s diamonds compared to others. Of course, some people prefer warmer diamonds, so that could be a great deal for you.
Another comment on the same thread:
Ritani
When I search for Reddit posts about Ritani, there’s about three of them. None of them really offer any information about customer experience but rather asking if it’s a good diamond.
One person asked in a post if they thought they could barter with Ritani and try to get them to go 10% lower on their prices. Some said it couldn’t hurt to ask, and another person said their diamonds are already so cheap.
So, once again Ritani’s prices are cheaper. Their rings settings however, aren’t.
Since Ritani is a brand name company and a ring setting designer.
Bottom Line: Clean Origin
In the battle of Clean Origin vs Ritani, we’ll have to go with Clean Origin as the winner.
Here’s why:
- Clean Origin has better diamond grades than Ritani
- Clean Origin’s ring settings are less expensive
- Clean Origin only sells lab grown diamonds, and they’re an expert
- More people have purchased from Clean Origin than Ritani, despite prices
- Clean Origin has a 100 day return policy
