How James Allen Cracked Open the Big Question With OpenFortune

James Allen is one of the largest online jewelers in the U.S., selling custom engagement rings and lab-grown diamonds from $550 to $6,000, entirely without the commissioned salesperson hovering three feet away. The brand put the entire ring-shopping experience online, from the first browse to the final stone selection, and built a category following by treating customers like adults who can pick a diamond without being upsold on a velvet box.

Engagement rings have one of the longest consideration windows in retail. Most people spend months, sometimes years, quietly thinking about the purchase before they make it. The usual performance channels are great at reaching people who are already shopping. They're less useful for reaching the person who hasn't thought about it consciously yet, but probably should. James Allen needed to show up earlier in the timeline, and in a moment that felt less like an ad and more like a nudge.

James Allen partnered with OpenFortune on a national campaign that leaned into the category's built-in comedic tension. Front slips carried fortunes built for the moment, including

"A very important question will change your life for the better," the kind of line that lands differently depending on who you're sitting across from.

Back slips took the swing: multiple witty creative variations featuring ring photography, the James Allen logo, and headlines like "Does Size Matter?", "Will It Be Bigger?", "Go From Yes to Yes Yes Yes," and the crowd favorite, "SIZE DOES MATTER."

Each paired with a QR code and dropped into restaurants where couples were already, quietly, having exactly that kind of dinner.

60.3% unaided brand recall without a single prompt. 17.2% searched James Allen after their meal. Both strong numbers for a category where the customer is usually months away from opening their wallet.

But the real win was the QR code data.

James Allen ran a parallel subway advertising program across more than a dozen creative variations. The results per placement ranged from 7 to 90 unique scans.

OpenFortune's cookies generated over 3100+ scans at a 3.7% scan rate, a benchmark that clears most out-of-home QR performance by a major 7X+ margin.

The social reaction did the rest. "My BF is starting to feel the pressure!" posted one user, tagging the brand in a TikTok. A woman on a first date shared her fortune with the caption: "Out to dinner and I got this... omg this made for an INTERESTING convo to say the least."

When your ad becomes the most memorable part of someone's first date, the campaign has done considerably more than its job.