[HN Gopher] The economics of the Birkin handbag
___________________________________________________________________
The economics of the Birkin handbag
Author : wallflower
Score : 153 points
Date : 2024-06-23 20:26 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.wsj.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.wsj.com)
| tromp wrote:
| https://archive.is/wwZ1k
| BJones12 wrote:
| > A Birkin bought at auction in 2010 would sell for around 50%
| more today... Hermes's own stock has been a much smarter
| investment than the Birkin, rising more than 20-fold since 2010.
|
| The more time goes on the more I think a good rule would be
| "however much I spend at the company, spend on the company (in
| shares)". I look at my Spotify sub, my MSFT sub, and an Apple
| IIgs sitting in a box and wonder 'what if'.
| nimish wrote:
| Shares do nothing except gain or lose value. The other stuff
| can actually, you know, do things! Some people value the
| ability for things to do other things.
| paulcole wrote:
| I think it's not buying the shares "instead" of buying the
| thing, it's also buying the shares and the thing.
|
| Because yeah, not buying things you want to watch your money
| high score go up is a pretty sad way to go through life.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| An expensive bag or watch "does" nothing different than a
| less expensive one, so it is not functionally different than
| a share in that its purpose is to gain or lose value, so the
| owner can show off.
|
| Except a publicly traded share is much more liquid.
|
| An expensive watch does even less than less expensive
| watches, especially smart watches.
| parhamn wrote:
| Thats a good idea. Portfolio of your own verified consumer
| sentiments.
|
| Quick check: iPhone 1 was $500 at launch. Apple shares were $5,
| apple stocks 41x'd since. If you bought the same amount in
| shares you'd have $20k, not bad.
| amelius wrote:
| Does not scale. If everybody followed this rule ...
| teruakohatu wrote:
| Also, Apple shares also do not replace the functionality of
| a phone, so the true opportunity cost of buying a premium
| phone instead buying a cheaper phone and spending the
| remainder on shares.
|
| Nobody bought a iPhone because they thought it would
| appreciate in value.
| samatman wrote:
| It isn't nobody, as evidenced by the continued existence
| of new-in-box original iPhones, which sell at auction for
| nosebleed prices.
|
| The trick is to identify products which will be
| considered iconic, while they're still on the market.
| This is crystal-ball-gazing, and that kind of game isn't
| for everyone, but it only takes one smash hit to make a
| profit on the total investment. There are certainly
| people who do this as a hobby / side hustle.
| Retric wrote:
| > If everybody
|
| You can absolutely guarantee everyone isn't going to follow
| that rule so why bother considering it? Also, nothing says
| you need to keep investments forever, a rolling fund where
| after X months you sell the stocks and repurchase based on
| current spending habits could work just fine at scale.
| rch wrote:
| Everybody is more than welcome to buy into my long
| positions.
| jncfhnb wrote:
| If "everybody" continuously purchased the same stocks then
| those stocks would be precisely the ones you would want to
| buy
|
| The price of other stocks would plummet from low demand
| lovethevoid wrote:
| Stock price isn't based on demand, so no that wouldn't
| work the way you think it would. These same stocks would
| be overvalued, with no fundamentals backing them as
| everyone wouldn't be buying the products/services to
| create those fundamentals.
| jncfhnb wrote:
| Stock price is 100% based on demand and nothing else
| (well aside from new issuances or splits).
|
| Demand is ideally a function of fundamentals.
|
| The stock price being overvalued is irrelevant if
| "everyone" is buying it. This is a hyperbolic example but
| it plays out in the valuation of the sp500 when legions
| of folks just dump into an index fund.
| user90131313 wrote:
| what if they followed the Apple stock advice in movie
| Forrest gump? They would have millions already.
| posix_monad wrote:
| Vast majority do not have the disposable income to invest
| in stocks.
| fbdab103 wrote:
| That seems like cherry picking winners knowing that Apple
| roughly ends up on top. If your stock basket resembles other
| home purchases, you are going to see more modest returns.
| vineyardmike wrote:
| I happened to buy a blackberry instead of the original
| iPhone. I can confirm that this is cherry picking.
|
| My 2007 GE kitchen appliances for my new home funded with a
| WaMu mortgage may are similarly unimpressive as investments
| in 2024.
|
| (And cherrypicking history is easy!)
| OJFord wrote:
| And even if you did it properly, you're basically
| guaranteed to be overweight on luxury 'consumer
| discretionary' sectors because you have the surplus cash to
| do this, making the 'consumer defensive' part an inherently
| modest portion of your budget and therefore portfolio.
|
| And your mortgage probably makes you wildly over/under (but
| not correct) weight on residential real estate according to
| whether you consider it a payment you need to reflect in
| your portfolio or a part of your portfolio and therefore
| it's mising a justifying expenditure.
|
| And you'd presumably have no exposure to industrial real
| estate, defense, anything b2b, ...
|
| But it's a fun idea and I'll admit to similar irrational
| thinking when I was annoyed by Amex charging (and refusing
| to refund) me and my wife separately while I was in the
| middle of trying to talk to them about merging them/closing
| one. (Which reminds me, must do that soon before it happens
| again..)
| jayd16 wrote:
| You'd probably have far more Nestle, Ford, Kellogg's, Nike
| and AT&T stock this way too. Apple is on the far far end of
| successes with this strategy.
| number6 wrote:
| And you would end up with an MSCI World Index - I recently
| invested in Intel rather than AMD or NVIDIA. In hindsight,
| NVIDIA would have been the better choice. I also have some
| money in Index Funds - half a year ago it composed mostly
| of Apple, Microsoft and Meta, now NVIDIA is on top of the
| composition.
|
| The lesson for me: I don't know enough of the industries to
| base any financial decision on it.
| dboreham wrote:
| You were following logic, so NVIDIA made no sense, since
| they're basically a meme stock now.
| distances wrote:
| This has been my long-time takeaway too. I see the
| opportunities as obvious only in hindsight, it does not
| appear to me to invest at the time. Then again, that has
| probably saved me from quite many bad investments too.
|
| 3D cards, web, smartphones, search, social media, CPU
| advances, chip manufacturing and shortages, blockchains,
| AI, the list is endless I suppose. Like most here, I've
| read about them all from the early demos all the way to
| the mass adoption.
|
| I'm very happy to invest in index funds and observe tech
| only from the tech point of view, without stressing about
| picking the winners.
| dboreham wrote:
| I did this (bought Apple stock at iPhone launch). I did it
| for a non-standard reason -- I'd worked around the telephony
| space and found it amazing that Jobs had been able to
| persuade AT&T to a) not charge $100/mo for data service and
| b) not lock down the device. That was such an incredible feat
| that I felt they were going to sell large numbers, because
| the greed of the telcos had in my mind been the impediment to
| the success of older similar devices. It had nothing to do
| with all the normal Apple-fan stuff.
|
| Of course I subsequently sold when I felt Apple had jumped
| the shark (I think they were making iPods in multiple colors,
| something like that). Around 2012 probably.
| randerson wrote:
| In that particular example, an unopened iPhone 1 sold at an
| auction last year for $190,000, a 380x return!
| Frummy wrote:
| Yeah I figured Id do that after watching a video of a summary
| of 'one up on wall street'. I bought tons of stock in my newest
| favorite energy drinks brand as well as my favorite nicotine
| pouch brand. i sold after half a year because it went down
| slightly. Now, the energy drinks stock has tripled, and the
| nicotine pouch company got sold and went private, buying out
| all stock for a lot higher as well.
| jliptzin wrote:
| Essentially that's what I do. I've made more on company shares
| than what I've spent on the companies' products, including
| Tesla. This is especially true for Costco and Apple.
| GrantMoyer wrote:
| The Efficient-market Hypothesis[1] posits that someone with
| more resources than you has already made a similar analysis, so
| the prices of those shares already reflect the true value,
| including the value of potential future returns. Lucky for you,
| all those stocks are probably represented in large index funds,
| which are much less volatile than individual stocks.
|
| [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Efficient-market_hypothesis
| WorkerBee28474 wrote:
| The thing about hypotheses is that they can be either true or
| false. And seeing NVDA triple in the past year, even while
| there are many people devoting their working lives just to do
| financial analysis of the stock, tells us the hypothesis is
| false.
| Iulioh wrote:
| The Nvidia situation wasn't predictable as they sell an
| unique item with pratical applications.
|
| There are no alternatives to Nvidia GPUs if you want to
| efficiently train an AI, they have an effective monopoly.
|
| Personally i would have invested in TSMC/ASML or Intel as
| this point. Buy the shovel maker.
| bluecalm wrote:
| NVidia make those things for quite some time you know?
| They also have done heavy investments in software side
| and had total dominance there for years. It's not like
| your needed to know 10 years ago.
|
| >>TSMC
|
| Relatively low margins, few good well negotiating
| customers. Can't grow fast.
|
| >>ASML
|
| What do you think market could have missed there? Good
| company with simple business model. Very unlikely to grow
| fast.
|
| >>Intel
|
| Terrible company with long track record of stupid
| decisions and deception. What make you think they will
| suddenly turn around and start innovating?
| Iulioh wrote:
| Good points but they have the fabs.
|
| That's why my bets are on them.
|
| Everyone is reliant on ASML and unlikely to change.
|
| Intel has fabs and is too big to fail, the us government
| won't let it happen.
|
| I'm making a safe bet on the long term, not a speculative
| one based on a technology that will or won't be worth
| that valuation.
| michaelt wrote:
| I share your skepticism, but the EMH doesn't mean stocks
| would never move in price.
|
| After all, if it's election day, my analysis says FooCorp
| is worth $50 under a Biden administration and $100 under a
| Trump administration, and the candidates are neck-and-neck,
| that means the shares are worth $75. But tomorrow the
| shares will have either gained or lost $25.
| WorkerBee28474 wrote:
| Yes, that is true.
|
| But as detailed recently in Going Infinite, Jane Street's
| losses around the 2016 election were because they didn't
| know outcome was worth the example $50 and which was
| $100.
| hiAndrewQuinn wrote:
| It's not that kind of hypothesis. It's more like a
| mathematical proof, with some underlying assumptions that
| aren't actually true in reality.
|
| Figuring out which ones, and to what extent, is an
| unorthodox but effective path to wealth.
| _gmax0 wrote:
| Cue the classic joke:
|
| A finance professor is walking across the University of
| Chicago campus with a student. They come upon $20 lying on
| the ground, and the student leans down to pick it up. The
| professor said, "Don't bother. If it was really there,
| somebody else would've already picked it up."
| 55555 wrote:
| You should read that entire wikipedia article because the EMH
| is useful but clearly extremely false.
| underlipton wrote:
| John Harvard statue of a comment.
|
| 1) Someone with more resources than you has different aims
| and incentives than you; the prices of those shares likely
| reflect their valuation, not a "true" value.
|
| 2) Because of 1, the the future returns that are reflected in
| the price of the stock are not necessarily for the company
| alone, but also of future returns of other companies and
| ventures that are connected to the stock in question through
| this hypothetical someone.
|
| 3) Volatility is good if you're poor. I want my money with a
| winner before everyone else knows it's a winner. Index funds
| are slush for smart money's liquidity scams.
| samatman wrote:
| The Efficient-market Hypothesis has been proven to be true
| only if P=NP.
|
| https://arxiv.org/abs/1002.2284
|
| What's your bet on the latter? I'm... skeptical.
| GrantMoyer wrote:
| I'm skeptical of that "proof". Specifically, for example,
| one of the first statements in the proof says:
|
| > We ask our question, call it question 1: "Does there
| exist a strategy that statistically significantly (after
| accounting for possible data mining) makes money (after
| accounting for transactions costs)?" An answer to that
| question essentially tests each of the possible 3n
| strategies.
|
| which is non-sequitur. It's like asserting the only way to
| find the shortest path between two vertices in a graph is
| to exhaustively check every path, because _waves hand_.
|
| Also note that paper doesn't appear to have undergone any
| form of peer review.
| PaulRobinson wrote:
| If the Efficient-market Hypothesis was true, it would not be
| rational to buy (or sell), any stock, commodity, currency or
| other investment vehicle as an investment alone. Yet plenty
| of professionals and amateurs do, and many make a profit,
| which suggest the hypothesis is not provably true.
|
| One way to think of trading is you're kind of in a ponzi
| scheme. Not an illegal one, but you're buying stock today
| you're hoping somebody else will buy off you at a higher
| price one day in the future. If you short a position, you're
| hoping that somebody will sell you stock at a lower price
| than it is today for some reason.
|
| All of this suggests to me that markets are not the perfectly
| rational machines people insist they are. Sure, most people
| would do better to buy and hold indexes than to time trades
| on individual stocks (by a long margin), but the argument
| that all value is priced in all of the time is just daft.
| xwolfi wrote:
| But if everyone does this, companies have no client and only
| shareholders. Like GME.
| Temporary_31337 wrote:
| A much better strategy is to just buy an index for the
| equivalent amount every time you decide on a disposable /
| luxury purchase. That way there is no guilt about being able to
| afford it and generally you hit your savings rate etc.
| rsynnott wrote:
| I mean, on average you would expect this to be true if only
| because the markets tend to go up, whereas the value of an
| actual item tends to go down.
| TacticalCoder wrote:
| > The more time goes on the more I think a good rule...
|
| That's my main investment rule. I invest in companies who's
| products I like and own. But then I also buy the dip. So when a
| company I like/whose product I use is at a discount, I invest.
|
| It makes me feel better too when I buy something from them:
| "oh, some of that money I just paid is going back to me"!
|
| There are people here who bough NVDA at a bargain with the same
| reasoning.
|
| I did an exception for Meta (no FB, no WhatsApp, no instagram:
| all the Meta CIDR blocks are blocklisted by my firewall and all
| the Meta domains are blocked by my DNS resolver: that's how
| much I hate that turd) which I hate with a passion because the
| stock at $100 in 2022 (was it 2022?) was just too good to be
| true. But then I do use React so there's that!
| The28thDuck wrote:
| I find the habits of the very wealthy fascinating. What
| incentivizes your behavior when you have own all the traditional
| incentives?
| medion wrote:
| Depending on your definition of very wealthy, a lot of luxury
| spending over the last decade is not from actual ultra rich,
| but mostly the middle class trying to signal something.
| pineaux wrote:
| LMVH is very succesfull in selling luxury to the middle and
| lower classes. They really found a growth market there.
| Ekaros wrote:
| Problem with selling to ultra-rich is that there isn't
| actually very many of them. On other hand there is plenty of
| middle-class and even lower class that are ready to sacrifice
| other things for specific signal... So targeting them makes
| lot more sense.
| chasd00 wrote:
| Plus, a fool and their money are soon parted.
| arethuza wrote:
| The "ludicrously capacious bag" thing in Succession makes fun
| of this very point - Tom (who is from a relatively modest
| background and therefore sensitive about such things) makes
| fun of Greg's girlfriends bag:
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2023/mar/30/succession-b.
| ..
| VirusNewbie wrote:
| I'm in a weird bubble, because I don't know anyone in my
| friend group who does this, despite most of my friends in
| their late 30s early 40s being successful tech professionals.
|
| Many have bought fancy houses (and some modest houses), a lot
| of them have nicer cars, but I literally don't know anyone
| who would fit the 'upper middle class' definition who spends
| money on high fashion, expensive watches, high end wine, etc.
|
| The only people I know in my extended circle who buy that
| sort of thing either have many millions liquid from
| successful tech exits (as in, coudl retire) or inherited
| millions.
| ForHackernews wrote:
| You might like "Primates of Park Avenue" - it's the memoir of a
| sociologist who married a rich guy. There's a couple whole
| chapters on Birkin bags. She sends her husband to get hers in
| Tokyo because they're easier to get there than in New York.
| hilux wrote:
| I assume you meant "none" of the traditional incentives.
|
| I know some very rich people, and I've thought about this
| myself.
|
| My conclusion is that we ALL need ongoing challenges in life.
| For most people, working to pay the rent is enough of a
| challenge.
|
| But those who face no financial obstacles need to "create" new
| challenges. Having lots of kids is one way. Or having an
| experience (space, or bottom of ocean), or a handbag, that none
| of your friends has.
| n4r9 wrote:
| I think this is another way of saying that sating desires
| does not get rid of desires. The brain will simply look for
| more things to desire.
| LUmBULtERA wrote:
| >Having lots of kids is one way. Or having an experience
| (space, or bottom of ocean), or a handbag
|
| One of these is definitely not like the others though. I
| suppose that's subjective, but a handbag is just a handbag.
| HeyLaughingBoy wrote:
| A handbag can be more than a handbag.
|
| I'm not much for fashion and the appeal of Chanel and
| Birkin bags leaves me scratching my head. But there are
| some handmade bags out there that are truly works of art
| and sell for considerably less than the many thousands that
| you'd need to part with for one of those.
|
| But since no one has ever heard of their makers, nobody
| cares about them.
| HDThoreaun wrote:
| Not in this case. A birkin bag is proof that you convinced
| the salesperson that you de3srve one or can afford
| secondary market prices.
| kaibee wrote:
| Is this some kind a humiliation fetish I'm too poor to
| understand?
| HDThoreaun wrote:
| convincing hermes that you should be allowed to buy a bag
| isnt exactly easy. Bragging that you did it is exactly
| the point of these bags, not holding shit
| onlyrealcuzzo wrote:
| > My conclusion is that we ALL need ongoing challenges in
| life.
|
| Is existentialism really a "challenge"?
|
| > For most people, working to pay the rent is enough of a
| challenge.
|
| This seems like a bleak worldview. The average person is
| living for more than just surviving.
| hilux wrote:
| The average person (in the world, perhaps not in Atherton)
| most definitely has ongoing stress about paying the bills.
| onlyrealcuzzo wrote:
| Just because you have stress doesn't mean the entire
| reason for your being is paying rent...
| patwolf wrote:
| I always come back to this review of Paul Fussell's "Class: A
| Guide Through The American Status System" when I'm trying to
| make sense of wealth. I don't know how well it really holds up,
| but it did get me thinking about the difference between wealth
| and class. Birkin bags sound like an upper-middle-class
| phenomenon. The effort involved in trying to obtain a Birkin
| would go against the spirit of the upper class.
|
| https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/book-review-fussell-on-clas...
| medion wrote:
| I'm glad the author pointed out rock bottom interest rates -
| basically free money has created a nightmare and we are in the
| adjustment period now - curious to see how the luxury sector
| goes.
| llamaimperative wrote:
| The luxury sector will crush it. The wealthy have become
| wealthier across the board.
| medion wrote:
| It's not the wealthy making LVMH stock rise. Look at the
| stock max history and you'll see it 100% coincides with low
| interest rates - in a low interest rate economy it's those
| who can't afford it and borrow that spend the most. The
| genuine wealth class are not spending more because they can
| borrow more, although they are likely making more money
| because they are an asset class who's assets are then
| artificially inflated.
| llamaimperative wrote:
| I'd be very cautious of trying to read stock charts like
| this. There were literally countless other things that
| happened during this period as well, including for example
| the birth of the wealthy Chinese consumer class.
| cletus wrote:
| I find these systems fascinating. Hermes does make high-quality
| bags but really where they shine is in marketing.
|
| You see a similar thing play out in the mechanical watch world.
| Rolex is the master of marketing. They make a good product, make
| no mistake, but they don't over-produce models, still have
| scarcity despite selling millions of watches a year and have a
| limited inventory so Rolexes have the strongest secondary market.
|
| Compare this to Omega who simply produce too many watches and too
| many watch variants such that you just don't have the strong
| secondary market that Rolex has. This is despite Omega producing
| in some cases a better product in utility purposes (eg Planet
| Ocean vs Deepsea Sea-Dweller).
|
| But there's a dirty little secret with all these brands,
| including Hermes. As much as they say it's about spend ratios and
| the like, ultimately it comes down to whether or not they _like_
| you. If, as a woman, you 're attractive, stylish and likely to be
| seen with their products (eg red carpet events) you will have WAY
| more offered to you than your spend ratio might otherwise
| warrant.
| FpUser wrote:
| >"but really where they shine is in marketing."
|
| I guess they do since they can sell their stuff. But not to
| people like me. When I see product priced just for being status
| symbol my first reaction is - fuck off, go find yourself some
| suckers.
| pineaux wrote:
| I am not saying you shouldn't tell them to fuck off, but have
| you entertained the idea that the person who is the sucker is
| actually you?
|
| These watches are part of a status and this status allows
| these people to dictate to the rest of us how they'd like
| their omelette.
| FpUser wrote:
| Well I work as an independent company, I find clients,
| develop products for them on my own premises and get paid,
| sometimes it is licensing fees. I am not rich but do well
| enough and can retire. So no, except the government nobody
| tells me what to do and as long as I pay taxes the
| government not really interested in people like myself.
| paulcole wrote:
| > But not to people like me
|
| I love the Enlightened Hacker News Commenter who can't wait
| to share how they are different from other people when it
| comes to marketing.
|
| Who's the sucker, the person buying the Birkin or the person
| commenting hundreds of times on a website that's a marketing
| campaign for a VC firm?
| Y_Y wrote:
| ?Por que no los dos?
| paulcole wrote:
| Neither of them are suckers.
|
| It's fun to post online and it's fun to buy things that
| make you happy.
| FpUser wrote:
| >"Who's the sucker, the person buying the Birkin or the
| person commenting hundreds of times on a website that's a
| marketing campaign for a VC firm?"
|
| Does that really matter? I just expressed my opinion. And I
| am not that different. I bet there are more people like
| myself than the ones who would pay $10000 for a purse.
| dagw wrote:
| _I bet there are more people like myself than the ones
| who would pay $10000 for a purse._
|
| Obviously. But are there more people 'like you', than
| people willing to pay 'too much' for something they know
| is irrational, just because it brings them joy. I might
| not want to buy that specific hand bag, but I'm not going
| to sit here and judge since I too have made plenty of
| irrational purchases in my life, many of which have
| brought me great fun and joy.
| FpUser wrote:
| I do make plenty of irrational choices too. Same people
| who do not mind paying thousands for a gun laugh at me
| when I pay $5000 for an EUC. Hard to explain but I think
| it is a bit different than paying for "status symbol"
| paulcole wrote:
| > Hard to explain but I think it is a bit different than
| paying for "status symbol"
|
| That is very fortunate for you because after all you'd
| never buy a status symbol!
| rsynnott wrote:
| > Hard to explain but I think it is a bit different than
| paying for "status symbol"
|
| I mean, yes, this is what all buyers of status symbols
| think. No-one is going out buying a Birkin bag or a
| Ferrari or a Rolex or a monkey NFT or whatever saying
| "better go buy a status symbol today". Or, at least, very
| few people.
| mwexler wrote:
| EUC as in an Electric UniCycle?
|
| Just wondering; didn't know this one.
| et-al wrote:
| Excellent Used Condition
| paulcole wrote:
| But an Excellent Used Condition what?
| FpUser wrote:
| Yes, Electric Unicycle
| paulcole wrote:
| > And I am not that different
|
| Your entire comment was saying how you aren't like those
| people and calling them suckers.
| CPLX wrote:
| The comment absolutely should not be downvoted it's highly
| perceptive.
| cletus wrote:
| I don't know anything about the secondary market for Hermes
| bags but it seems like it's pretty healthy.
|
| But watches from certain brands (and certain models) can be
| sold immediately for a profit. For example, a Rolex steel
| Daytona retails for $14k from an MSRP. You'll sell it in a
| heartbeat on the secondary market for $30k. The Rainbow
| Daytona a handful of years ago was $100-150k IIRC. It's now
| closer to $500-600k.
|
| The market is off its peak of 2021-2022 quite a bit but I've
| bought several luxury watches that could be sold for a
| healthy profit if I was so inclined.
| TheRoque wrote:
| What makes some of these products go crazy heights, while
| (I guess that) some other just lose value or never gain
| value ? Are those products better than others or is it just
| some pure coincidental mix of factors ?
| cletus wrote:
| It's really difficult to predict and has to be managed
| well by the company. But a big one is when a model gets
| discontinued because at that point no more will be made
| so supply is fixed.
|
| So the current generation of professional (ie steel)
| Daytonas have a ceramic bezel. This is to avoid scratches
| but means they can shatter with enough force. The ceramic
| itself is baked in a plasma furnace. The tech behind
| these things can actually be really cool.
|
| So Daytonas have historically sold above MSRP on the
| secondary market but not by this much. About 10 years ago
| the new ceramic Daytonas were released and what happened
| was a lot of people sold their previous DAytonas to
| "upgrade". This meant that what was 6 months earlier a
| $13k MSRP watch was selling for $10-11k and that seemed
| crazy to me given it was now discontinued so I bought
| one. At the peak of the market, that watch would sell for
| $30-35k. Now it's probably under $25k but that's still a
| good investment.
|
| But steel Rolexes never really appreciate _that_ much
| because the volumes ard really high. You 're not going to
| get rich buying a steel Submariner. There's simply too
| many of them out there.
|
| But one exception is the really vintage Daytonas,
| particularly what are called Paul Newman Daytonas [1].
| These were watches that back in the 1980s sat in a
| display case for years (at $500 or less) because no one
| bought them but an association with Paul Newman
| skyrocketed them in the public consciousness to the point
| that a 1960s era Paul Newman Daytona in mint condition
| can easily be worth $500k-$1m+.
|
| The market dynamics are really fascinating but it's now
| become essentially impossible buy an in-demand watch from
| an AD unless you're a big spender on other products there
| (they're all typically jewelers as well). The history of
| Rolex was in utility not luxury (eg the GMT was invented
| for Pan Am pilots who suddenly were flying cross-country,
| the Submariner is a dive watch, the Daytona was
| originally for racing drivers, etc).
|
| [1]: https://www.bobswatches.com/paul-newman-rolex-
| daytona
| TheRoque wrote:
| Thanks for that small piece of history, that's indeed
| fascinating
| bbreier wrote:
| A mix of quality, management of scarcity, x-factor (call
| it what you will, some kind of intrinsic appeal to the in
| group who buy this sort of thing or otherwise inherent
| desirability), and marketing
| bluecalm wrote:
| Yup and it's not so easy to buy them, you need to get into
| a queue and wait. People with access shops/employee
| privileges (sometimes you can buy a watch out of the queue
| if someone doesn't show up to get theirs) are making a
| killing.
| FpUser wrote:
| Well, this is a bit different. It is a way to safely park
| one's money. Not paying 10x price for a thing with the
| whole purpose being to show that I am fucking rich.
| CPLX wrote:
| > When I see product priced just for being status symbol my
| first reaction is - fuck off, go find yourself some suckers.
|
| This phenomenon is (or must be) so fundamental to existence
| that it has been produced over and over again by the process
| of biological evolution.
|
| There clearly is a utility in a social setting to showing off
| the fact that you have sufficient resources to waste quite a
| few of them just visibly showing that you can.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| > _There clearly is a utility in a social setting to
| showing off the fact that you have sufficient resources to
| waste quite a few of them just visibly showing that you
| can._
|
| That's the whole deal with engagement rings, and more
| generally with romance.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| > There clearly is a utility in a social setting to showing
| off the fact that you have sufficient resources to waste
| quite a few of them just visibly showing that you can.
|
| The modern world has much better ways to show this than
| relatively low cost jewelry/clothes/accessories.
|
| Real estate, employer, board seats, private jet flights,
| yachts, and the simplest, vacationing often to destinations
| you have to fly to.
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| > _Real estate, employer, board seats, private jet
| flights, yachts_
|
| Those are all way too expensive for regular folks.
|
| > _and the simplest, vacationing often to destinations
| you have to fly to._
|
| That's _too cheap_ to work as a status symbol for regular
| folks, plus provides all kinds of value (entertainment,
| relaxation, etc.) so it 's not even a good way to burn
| money.
|
| Regular folks show off by e.g. buying engagement rings
| that are multiple of the fiance's salary, or making other
| purchases whose defining characteristic is that others
| know it's expensive.
|
| Jewelry, clothes and accessories are good for showing off
| because the more expensive ones aren't more useful or
| pretty at the margin. You're not buying utility for
| spending extra, other than that conferred by status
| games.
| kaibee wrote:
| Yeah, but you can't carry those with you.
| crote wrote:
| Why not waste your money on _literally_ anything else?
| Build a museum, fund a public library, get your name
| plastered on a university by giving tuition to some poor
| kids!
| michael_vo wrote:
| The whole Debeers diamond ring scam has worked for decades
| until the last few years where synthetics are crashing the
| market.
| OJFord wrote:
| And so they should be, there is absolutely no reason to pay
| more a mined diamond than lab-grown, it's synthetically
| produced but it's not a synthetic product if you see what I
| mean, it's not like say cotton vs polyester.
|
| It only makes sense to mine diamonds if it's cheaper to do
| so than to manufacture one of equivalent quality.
| PaulRobinson wrote:
| There's a great documentary about this called _Nothing
| Lasts Forever_ which I think I caught on Netflix.
|
| The outfits with big skin in the natural/mined diamond
| sector have told a story about something that's been in
| the ground for eons and being pulled out and turned into
| something special as a symbol of love, and hoping that
| turns people away from synthetics. It's just story
| telling. You can see the romance in it, but the price
| differential is huge.
|
| There are various attempts to keep the synthetics out,
| and/or identifiable, but even the main players are
| admitting that a significant percentage of synthetics are
| now in the naturals market, nobody knows how many, and
| that they're undetectable. That means the naturals market
| has to come back to actual costs plus some markup over
| what they've been for 100+ years: costs plus _insane_
| markups.
| crote wrote:
| It's such a _weird_ market segment to me.
|
| Sure, they are obviously very high-quality products, but they
| are _clearly_ not worth the money you are paying for them.
| You 're very obviously paying primarily for the opportunity
| to brag that you've got a "genuine Birkin". It's like those
| silly restaurants putting gold flakes on food: you can't
| taste or smell it, so you're paying solely for the
| opportunity to be ripped off.
|
| If you've got money to burn, why not get a fully-custom
| product made exactly to your wishes by a local atelier and
| end up with a far superior product for the same price? What's
| the point if you can't even fully enjoy the fruits of your
| labor?
| twixfel wrote:
| Yes, I know a guy who is of old Indian royal family stock
| (of course they have no special rights any more), and he
| will just show pictures of expensive bags and so on to his
| tailor and get them made for orders of magnitude less than
| retail.
| lupire wrote:
| It's entertainment.
|
| It's just as right or wrong as buying tickets to watch a
| sporting contest.
| jajko wrote:
| Same goes ie for Ferrari. For those that don't know - you can
| buy 'cheap' V8 ie Californias, 458, 488, F8 etc, pretty much
| just like anything - you pay and get into queue, and once its
| your time, you get what you've selected with sales rep.
|
| Not so much the better V12 / hypercars which they do in
| carefully limited amounts. You _have_ to be previous owner of
| series of lesser ones. You have to be their customer for quite
| some time, with flawless trail as a stellar customer. You have
| to have very good relationship with their company (so like
| Justin Bieber got his car painted on some color that they didn
| 't approve and Ferrari banned him for life). Unique extremely
| limited series are all this but 10x or 100x, since all know
| this is darn good investment right out of gate, if you don't
| screw up maintenance (and at those price levels nobody sane
| does that). Those are basically not driven, each km would be
| ridiculously costly in total costs and depreciation.
|
| You can skip most of this if you buy second hand, for adequate
| inflated prices. This won't work for Bieber style of situation
| of course.
| 331c8c71 wrote:
| Fascinating, thank you. What staggers me is how the very
| well-off people who can afford the Ferraris put up with this
| nonsense. In my book the whole point of being rich is the
| increased freedom which surely includes not complying to
| idiotic requirements (and I don't mean the social and legal
| norms here).
|
| I guess an urge for status signalling is very hard to resist.
| arethuza wrote:
| It's probably _because_ of this "nonsense" that people see
| these cars as exclusive and therefore worthy of putting up
| with the nonsense...
| technothrasher wrote:
| Having dipped my toes in the Ferrari world, there are three
| very different groups of Ferrari buyers- Status people, car
| people, and super rich people. The status people play the
| silly game with the dealers. The car people buy used from
| the status people after the new model isn't flashy any
| longer. The super rich people buy original era cars (before
| Fiat bought out the company in the 1970's) and use them as
| investments.
| rsynnott wrote:
| Well, the main reason that you'd buy a Ferrari in the first
| place is status signalling, so if it's extra-difficult to
| get, that makes it _better_ at status signalling. Kind of a
| variant of a Veblen good; the presence of whatever the
| special model is in their driveway indicates that the
| person has completed the rich-person equivalent of throwing
| a ring into Mount Doom, so is impressive to people who are
| impressed by that sort of thing.
| jajko wrote:
| Well, I've driven one basic (458) on a track circuit and
| let me tell you... If TCO would be below 1% of my net
| worth, I would buy it in an instant. It literally puts a
| smile on your face. And its a marvel in engineering
| compared to cars for regular Joes.
|
| But completely useless in regular traffic, in fact much
| much worse than normal cars. And all kinds of idiots want
| to semi-constantly race you. So sort of great deal on the
| paper, actual reality not so much.
| theideaofcoffee wrote:
| Same, I drove a factory-fresh F140 v12 GTC4Lusso straight
| off the line in Maranello while they were still being
| produced, and having background in German-built cars,
| it's light years of difference. If I could have bought
| that same day I 100% would have. They're that good.
| gedy wrote:
| They are amazing cars, but damned if they don't look like
| a hatchback Corvette
| gambiting wrote:
| Not a ferrari, but I had a Mercedes AMG for a few years
| and it was exactly like that too - put a stupid grin on
| my face on the track or on the autobahn(5am drive at
| solid 160mph for like 30 minutes near berlin will always
| remain my favourite driving experience), but day to day
| it was awful - loud, uncomfortable, ruinous on fuel, and
| people wanted to race you constantly, every now and then
| people wanted to take pictures as well etc - which I
| imagine with a Ferrari it's even worse. Nowadays I
| settled for a completely inconspicious family car that no
| one would even look at twice, but which still has enough
| power to go fast if I want to. But owning "flashy" cars
| is definitely not for me anymore.
| kjellsbells wrote:
| I confess to having a soft spot for sleeper cars. Dont
| know what the equivalent term would be in Germany. But
| anything that looks convincingly like a family car but
| can do 0-100kph in a flash would qualify.
|
| Example: Volvo V60 Polestar wagon, or the legendary Ford
| Taurus SHO
|
| Im sorry to say that in my corner of the US, an AMG Benz
| screams man-child rather than car enthusiast, because
| they tend to be driven by idiots. Ditto any BMW M.
| gambiting wrote:
| My current car is actually an XC60 T8 :-) It's a bit of a
| barge, but the 400bhp is "enough" to go fast should you
| want to.
|
| >>Im sorry to say that in my corner of the US, an AMG
| Benz screams man-child rather than car enthusiast
|
| That's fine, everywhere is different.
| oblio wrote:
| The EX30 does 0-100kmph in 3.5 seconds.
| alistairSH wrote:
| _I guess an urge for status signalling is very hard to
| resist._
|
| Buyers who just want an exotic don't have to jump through
| Ferrari's hoops. There's the used market. Or, it's
| relatively easy to buy a new McLaren, Lotus, etc.
| TacticalCoder wrote:
| > In my book the whole point of being rich is the increased
| freedom which surely includes not complying to idiotic
| requirements...
|
| That's precisely why there are people flipping Porsche and
| Hermes Birkin bags for a living.
|
| There are certain rich people who have absolutely zero
| patience and won't deal with that car
| configuration/salespeople/six months of wait bullshit.
|
| So what do they do? They buy the car _now_ , the day they
| see it brand new but second hand, at a price above MSRP.
| theluketaylor wrote:
| Ferrari broke their model this cycle. Their high end
| customers have put up with this for decades since the
| hypercars always gain value. Most people let them gather dust
| for a while, then sell them for a tidy profit once the
| Ferrari quiet embargo on aftermarket sales goes away.
|
| This time they got really greedy and tried to insert a
| limited production mid-engine model into the middle, under
| the La Ferrari hypercar but above the 'base' mid engine car
| they have been making forever. The problem is that SF90 isn't
| special enough. It's the same basic technology as the much
| cheaper 296 (which is plenty fast and special) and no SF90
| has re-sold for above or even that close to MSRP. All the
| special customers have taken a bath on SF90 and I hear are
| pretty annoyed with Ferrari.
|
| They also tried to toss in the SP line of cars, further
| diluting the special, limited nature of the hypercars.
| jemmyw wrote:
| I don't really get it. I thought oh yeah I guess I buy expensive
| for my income so why not. But if I want a bag I research to try
| and find the best one for me, not for prestige. Same with every
| item. I guess people buy fancy watches and jewellery, and that's
| fine, but what I can't imagine is having all that money, meaning
| you have freedom to do pretty much whatever you like, and
| spending that freedom hanging around a posh clothes store
| frivolously buying shit in order to ingratiate yourself to buy a
| bag.
| AlotOfReading wrote:
| To put it in a way that might be more familiar to someone in
| tech, it's like buying an absurdly powerful computer to show
| off to friends. In all likelihood you don't actually need a 64
| core, 128gb monster with dual 4090s, but you might want to be
| the kind of person who does need it and use it for the kinds of
| activities you imagine such a person might do. For computers,
| that might be playing a game at 16k at 240hz. For a purse it
| might having something appropriate to a gala or looks good in
| Paris. That's why luxury brands sell lifestyles, not extol the
| product itself.
| jemmyw wrote:
| Yah but you can just buy that. You don't need to waste your
| time sucking up to the sales rep, and if you did you could go
| get another, just as powerful a system from someone else.
| achenet wrote:
| because in this case, there's only one company making that
| special computer, and it's either suck up to their sales
| reps or buy an 'inferior' product.
|
| I guess probably like periods when NVIDIA GPUs or Raspberry
| Pis get scarce, and people go on eBay to buy them.
| immibis wrote:
| The bags aren't special high-quality bags. They're just
| bags. Even if they were made of tougher material, Sam
| Vimes Boots Theory doesn't apply at this massive price
| difference.
|
| Their main purpose is showing off that you schmoozed the
| sales rep - nothing at all like how a computer works.
| "Check out this super rare thing I managed to get" does
| happen occasionally, like Intel Larrabee graphics cards -
| but only occasionally.
| rsynnott wrote:
| I mean, while I'm not in the market, I gather it was
| getting that way for high-end Nvidia cards during the
| crypto mining bubble if you wanted to get them at MSRP; I
| assume that is also difficult today with all the genAI
| stuff.
| gabruoy wrote:
| At this scale, things aren't being bought with money, but with
| other systems of value. Imagine if you had near-infinite
| disposable income, and also all of your friends do too. What
| could possibly be considered interesting or status-worthy at
| that point? Luxury status symbols that can only be bought with
| things like your own time spent with a brand, status, and
| personal connections are the only ways to distinguish yourself
| from others.
| add-sub-mul-div wrote:
| Living your life as if conspicuous consumption is bullshit is
| much more distinguishing.
| 082349872349872 wrote:
| Call me crazy, but I'd guess that retail products that (a)
| have a SKU, and (b) are submarine advertised on websites
| with >40mm monthly viewers, however much they may be
| positioned as being sold to those with near-infinite
| disposable income, are really being hawked to those with
| merely disposable income.
|
| see https://images.dowjones.com/wp-
| content/uploads/sites/183/201...
| criddell wrote:
| If you have more money than time, you just buy on the gray
| market for a big premium.
| mankypro wrote:
| A fool and his money are quickly separated.
| knorker wrote:
| The people who buy these bags cannot spend all they have, even
| in 10 lifetimes.
|
| Don't worry about them. They'll be fine.
| teruakohatu wrote:
| This is why scarcity works so well for this target market.
| Its something they cannot just walk out and buy. They must
| instead earn it (buy spending lots of money and becoming
| friends with the sales assistant).
| Ekaros wrote:
| The actual target market is probably the one that burns all
| the money they have during their lifetimes.
| AndrewKemendo wrote:
| The existence of absurdities like this, and everything there
| surrounds it is beyond obscene when there continues to exist
| poverty - in the same places where these are being carried
|
| Everyone involved at every level should be ashamed of themselves
| and should be significantly questioning whether or not their life
| is a net negative on the world
| arcticfox wrote:
| I think these things are stupid, but they cost about the same
| as the difference between a pretty good car and a mostly good
| car. It doesn't seem like the most insane hobby to me.
| surfingdino wrote:
| When Omega and Swatch did a collab and released a series of
| plastic watches it was the poor who stood in lines around the
| block to get them and immediately resell at an obscene profit.
| There is a benefit to the poor if the figure out how to play
| that game.
| achenet wrote:
| this is true.
|
| I suppose it still might be interesting for people
| considering spending 10,000 on a handbag to ask themselves if
| they might not overall be happier donating that money to help
| the homeless in their cities, however (because not having to
| step over homeless junkies on your way to the Hermes store is
| also kind of a luxury good?)
| Ekaros wrote:
| If 10k is all you have. Something durable like hand-bag
| allows you to visibly signal for weeks if not months...
| Same can't be said about donation... Can you even check
| such thing? So would anyone in peer group even believe?
| noitpmeder wrote:
| Sounds like we need some way for someone to display their
| charitable donation amounts that are public and
| verifiable. Then more people could use their donation
| amounts as status symbols.
| AndrewKemendo wrote:
| That is the purpose of the NPR tote bag
|
| In some cases it's a bumper sticker or in my case it's a
| magnet that sits on my fridge
| 082349872349872 wrote:
| I am domiciled in a country where I don't have to step
| over homeless* on my way to the Hermes store; am I using
| this comment as a status symbol?
|
| * they must exist here ( _et in Arcadia ego..._ ),
| because I see the occasional newspaper article about
| them, but they're certainly not visible, as in Paris, or
| ubiquitous to the point of literally having to step over
| them, as they were in the Old Country.
|
| [in my old city there was one individual who I thought
| might have been homeless ... but upon asking, my friends
| (a) immediately knew who I meant, and (b) told me, no, he
| _has_ an apartment, he just looks like he doesn 't]
| dfadsadsf wrote:
| Considering budgets that homeless-industrial complex spends
| on homeless in NYC/SF/other big cities with homeless, 10k
| will have absolutely zero impact on anything.
| surfingdino wrote:
| Some people are vain. It's pointless to appeal to their
| sense of compassion. The best way to deal with them is to
| charge them lots and tell them they have a sophisticated
| sense of style. Their money supports preservation of
| artisanal skills, which is a benefit to humanity as a
| whole.
| HeyLaughingBoy wrote:
| Maybe they're doing both.
| HeyLaughingBoy wrote:
| And songs with lines like
|
| The time was 6 o'clock on the Swatch watch
|
| Gotta date, can't be late
|
| ...
|
| Didn't hurt either. Can't believe I remember that, almost 30
| years later :-)
| hristov wrote:
| It is funny how there are so many articles purporting to explain
| the economics of a Birkin handbag, without actually explaining
| it. Here it is, I will actually and finally explain the economics
| of a Birkin handbag.
|
| It is all about convincing the buyer to consider a consumer good
| to be an investment. People treat consumer goods and investments
| very differently mentally and rightfully so. A consumer good is
| something you use for you own enjoyment or necessity. An
| investment is something that is supposed to pay you back more in
| the future. You do not get to use or enjoy the stocks and
| treasuries in your investment account. But you do hope that they
| will bring you more money in the future.
|
| So what if consumer good can also be an investment? It seems like
| a great deal. First of all you get to enjoy it. If you are woman
| (or a man that likes to wear handbags, I guess) you can walk
| around with your Birkin bag and show it off while it appreciates.
|
| Stocks and bonds are the often recommended investments, but you
| need a large and complex political system to ensure your stocks
| and bonds are worth the money. They are after all just pieces of
| paper (and nowadays you usually do not even get to hold the paper
| yourself), but to get these pieces of paper to convert to
| ownership rights of large enterprises you need, as I said a large
| and complex political and legal system.
|
| A Birkin bag on the other hand, is something you can keep close
| to you. In your closet.
|
| So the sales potential of something that is both a consumer good
| and an investment is great. Hermes saw this potential and decided
| to make the Birkin that thing.
|
| If the Birkin can be sold for more in the secondary market than
| what it sells for in store, it becomes an investment all of a
| sudden. And then you get all kinds of new demand. So Hermes made
| that happen by good marketing and (probably) by buying out
| Birkins in the secondary market.
|
| But that is also a very unstable situation. If you can just buy a
| Birkin in a store and then turn around and sell it immediately
| for a profit, everyone would do that and the secondary market
| price would collapse. And that is where the exclusivity comes in.
| The plan for Hermes is that they would only sell Birkins to rich
| people that do not need to resell their bags in the secondary
| market even if there is a profit. Thus, the ideal client is a
| woman that feels good that her Birkin investment is appreciating
| in value but has absolutely no desire to sell it because she does
| not need the money and she loves her bag. She just likes to
| consider how much money she is making in her mental profit and
| loss statement by keeping her bag, while continuing to wear and
| use it.
|
| So that is why sales of new Birkins are so restricted and are
| based on a personal relationship between a salesperson and a
| client. The salesperson judges the client on whether they are the
| type of client that will turn around and flip the bag. And
| meanwhile the company, Hermes, judges the salesperson on whether
| they can keep their clients in check.
|
| Of course some bags get flipped, and that is necessary to keep a
| resale market going, and thus to keep up the evidence of higher
| resale values. But it is important to keep the flips to a very
| small number.
|
| It is a very clever system, but it was not invented by Hermes. It
| has been tried before with art, fine wine and ferraris. And for
| those of you that might think that the Birkin madness is somehow
| related to women's lack of financial sense, keep in mind that
| Ferrari was doing the same thing with limited addition Ferraris
| marketed mostly to men long before Hermes hit upon their Birkin
| scam.
|
| The problem, from the point of view of the consumer, is that it
| is a very unstable system. It seems great and safe to have your
| investment in your closet, but keep in mind that the value of
| that investment is being kept alive by Hermes doing hard work and
| spending a lot of money to keep up the secondary market for
| Birkins. If Hermes changes strategy or some new CEO makes some
| mistake, then the value of your Birkin will disappear in a second
| and you will have no legal recourse. If the fashion changes, the
| value of your bag may plummet even if Hermes does their very best
| to do everything right. Etc.
|
| So my recommendation for someone considering a Birkin or another
| consumer good/investment combo is to stick to actual investments
| for investing and to actual consumer goods for consuming. An
| asset that produces value (such as stock in a good company) is a
| naturally appreciating investment (as it produces value) and it
| does not need to have some kind alternative reality created
| around it by a corporation in order to appreciate.
|
| Of course one has also to make sure he/she is a good citizen and
| exercises their responsibilities to keeping up their nation as a
| stable democracy with a stable well functioning legal system and
| well established property rights.
| CPLX wrote:
| Pretty sure you don't need all these words to explain it.
|
| It's just a way for people to signal that they're rich and high
| status.
|
| Those kinds of things are inherently fairly fragile so one that
| has endured like this one is notable.
| rsynnott wrote:
| I think there is slightly more to things like this (and
| Ferraris and Rolexes and so on). People often think of these
| as _investments_, not merely a way to show off, because they
| have very skilfully been marketed that way.
| dboreham wrote:
| See also: guitars. People were always willing to pay $$$ for
| 1950s Gibson Les Pauls, holding them as investments. So someone
| smart at Gibson realized they could make perfect reproductions
| of those guitars, and persuade people they should also be held
| as investments.
| woah wrote:
| Houses
| iamsomewalrus wrote:
| off the original topic, but on topic for this -
|
| Yes! Gibson recognized they were getting cut out of the
| vintage market and started making not only the reissues
| (RIs), but also the limited edition copy-of-famous-
| person's-guitar. What gets me is that Reissues these days are
| priced so close to vintage instruments. It's so hard to
| justify the purchase.
| virtualritz wrote:
| If you're interested in the craft/quality that goes into these
| products (or frequently doesn't), "Tanner Leatherstein"'s YT
| channel is a suggested watch.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/@tanner.leatherstein
|
| He dissects luxury leather products.
|
| Tanner has two recent videos on Hermes that seem related enough
| to mention here:
|
| What does Hermes actually sell? A closer look into astronomical
| price tags of the luxury legend.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_f0jFs22Ts
|
| Discover the real value of Hermes: Unraveling the mystery behind
| luxury prices.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6fkzpyHJ77g
| yobbo wrote:
| The reason behind value is similar to the value of a
| military/exclusive medal. It's a "legitimate" way for the owner
| to signal prestige.
| jsty wrote:
| In economics terms - a Veblen good
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veblen_good
| virtualritz wrote:
| True but not entirely.
|
| There are big quality differences and often luxury brands do
| use material and labor that makes a bag cost hundreds of
| dollars or euros to produce.
|
| But not all do and sometimes they flounder or cheat on
| certain products.
|
| The margin between that production cost (Tanner always gives
| an estimate) and the actual price is definitely a function
| mainly of the prestige associated with the brand.
|
| I.e. other factors such as shipping, display (think flagship
| stores), advertising & sales labor costs play much less of a
| role in the luxury segment.
| rvba wrote:
| There are a lot of people who will pay a lot of money to show
| that they are better than others.
|
| Still the best shop was the one who sold stuff only to fit
| people - didnt have big sizes (I always wondered if they
| didnt sell big sizes at a premium).
| lupire wrote:
| No, because they don't want fat people tarnishing their
| brand.
| kjellsbells wrote:
| I can understand why a bag that has been hand sewn by skilled
| artisans in some tiny town in Italy (say) might be expensive.
| Skills take time to learn, and the labor is costly. (The
| leather itself seems to be a negligible fraction of the cost of
| production.)
|
| What I dont get is what stops Chinese manufacturers from
| recruiting equally skilled local artisans in Asia to create
| their own luxury brands, and what stops Hermes from outsourcing
| their own bag manufacturing to those artisans in China instead
| or France or Italy.
|
| Its not like China doesnt have a rich craft tradition. Do those
| domestic luxury brands exist? If so, why arent they sold for
| export?
| ceejayoz wrote:
| > What I dont get is what stops Chinese manufacturers from
| recruiting equally skilled local artisans in Asia to create
| their own luxury brands, and what stops Hermes from
| outsourcing their own bag manufacturing to those artisans in
| China instead or France or Italy.
|
| A bag of this sort gets dramatically _less_ valuable to the
| clientele if you cut the price by half. They don 't want a
| cheaper version. If anything, they want it _more_ expensive.
| caycep wrote:
| the French are good at finding answers to these questions,
| often to the benefit of themselves...see
| https://atelierwen.com
| newsclues wrote:
| Yeah, luxury bags aren't about buying a bag but owning an
| object that signals status.
|
| Making it cheaper or local or available to more people is
| not the goal.
| roncesvalles wrote:
| Beyond a certain price, all goods become jewelry.
| jotux wrote:
| >A bag of this sort gets dramatically less valuable to the
| clientele if you cut the price by half. They don't want a
| cheaper version. If anything, they want it more expensive.
|
| There's a name for this:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veblen_good
| moandcompany wrote:
| On a past trip to Paris and Florence, I wondered why there
| were so many non-tourist Chinese living in the region. It
| turns out... Many of those "Made in Italy" luxury goods are
| made by skilled Chinese artisans (in Italy).
|
| The value of those "brands" are based on perception and the
| existing brands have put a lot of work into cultivating their
| brands historically.
|
| https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/04/16/the-chinese-
| wo...
|
| https://forum.purseblog.com/threads/inexpensive-immigrant-
| la...
|
| On a side note, this also applies to some "Made in America"
| brands too. Some of my favorite American brands used to host
| factory tours for their customers -- they tended to have a
| majority if not all southeast/east Asian workers making their
| garments and bags.
| throwadobe wrote:
| Also interestingly Italy was basically the 2nd country hit
| with a massive spike in Covid cases right when the pandemic
| hit, as there had been some leather/fabric trade show with
| participants flying to and fro (I don't recall the
| specifics)
| burningChrome wrote:
| I remember reading it was "undocumented" Chinese
| nationals who were traveling back and forth between China
| and Italy. One of Italy's largest textile factories is
| literally within miles of the Wuhan lab and many
| speculated that many of the workers were moving back and
| forth and brought the virus from the factory to Italy.
|
| But you are correct in the fact there is no denying Italy
| was hit very early on, well before many realized what was
| going on. I remember seeing an article were Italian
| doctors were concerned they had five deaths in a single
| weekend from new strain of influenza they hadn't seen
| before.
| lupire wrote:
| Are you saying that people living in America who (or whose
| parents) were born in China wouldn't be American?
| moandcompany wrote:
| The description of "non-tourist" Chinese is intended to
| describe persons that are of Chinese ancestry, and in
| these contexts, more likely than not, immigrants from
| China now living-in, and/or working-in a different
| nation, for example, France, Italy, or the United States;
| their (primary) purpose for physically being there is not
| tourism/leisure/recreation.
|
| No, a person living in America who was born in China, or
| whose parents were born in China, could self-identify or
| be identified as Chinese, American, both (e.g. "Chinese-
| American"), neither, or something else entirely.
| xmprt wrote:
| I think the implication is that these are people who
| trained in their home countries and were brought to Italy
| so the luxury brands could continue claiming a "rich
| history of Italian craftsmanship." In a way it's true but
| it's also lying by omission.
| moandcompany wrote:
| Yes. There's also an interesting tangential topic of so-
| called "counterfeit" or "replica" luxury goods where they
| can sometimes be unofficial items produced from the exact
| same factory, in-country, or abroad as "extra-runs", as
| well as items produced by those "skilled artisans" that
| previously worked at the official factories recreating
| the same items, using the same methods and materials,
| unofficially elsewhere.
| paganel wrote:
| Prato, just outside Florence, "is home to the largest
| Chinese community in Italy and one of the largest in Europe
| (...) the medieval Tuscan town of 195,000 counts around 12%
| of its residents as Chinese--though undocumented residents
| are suspected to bump the percentage up much higher" (to
| quote the first result I found on google search)
| nineplay wrote:
| It's seemed to me that there's a specific fast/good/cheap
| rule for consumer products.
|
| 1. High quality
|
| 2. Pays lower-level employees fairly
|
| 3. Low cost
|
| Pick 2.
|
| Consumers will complain that they can't get all three and
| frequently blame assorted factors such as price-gouging and
| CEO pay but I suspect that those rarely make as much of a
| difference as consumers hope.
| nemothekid wrote:
| > _Do those domestic luxury brands exist? If so, why arent
| they sold for export?_
|
| The value of a luxury brand is in the history, reputation and
| social proof. I bet there will be Chinese luxury brands
| eventually, only after decades of cultural export. You can
| argue that South Korea "suffers" from the same problem as
| well, with SK being relatively new on the global stage.
| However Japan has luxury brands (like Commes Des Garcons,
| Issey Miyaki) that were established 50-60 years ago.
| bobthepanda wrote:
| it also depends on which luxuries market you're targeting.
|
| South Korea is making a big splash in cosmetics, for
| example, but has never been a particularly large textile
| hub.
| jsmith99 wrote:
| It's very hard to compete on quality in leather bags without
| a reputation and a good bricks and mortar network because
| online customers have no way to tell the quality and even in
| person customers probably lack the knowledge - so from the
| producers perspective why bother spending more?
| brandall10 wrote:
| This does happen to an extent with smaller upstart brands.
|
| For instance, in men's shoes, Grant Stone made a name for
| themself offering a very similar, albeit even better built,
| product to Alden for roughly half the price.
|
| In guitars we see companies like Eastman doing a similar
| labor arbitrage producing products similar to Martin and
| Gibson.
|
| The key though are price savings. These could be argued to be
| 'luxury' to an extent in that they're notably quality
| products, but the attraction is the savings from labor passed
| onto the customer.
|
| The type of luxury we're dealing with for the Birkin's of the
| world is based on brand cache more than anything else. Price
| is simply not a factor, so it doesn't make any sense to take
| measures to reduce it. Worse, the moment a brand gives a hint
| that they're doing anything remotely cost cutting is going to
| be catastrophic as it goes against their 'spare no expense'
| mantra.
| quickthrowman wrote:
| > What I dont get is what stops Chinese manufacturers from
| recruiting equally skilled local artisans in Asia to create
| their own luxury brands,
|
| Luxury brands are selling a story, and that story is
| generally 'European, old (100+ years)'. Companies like Rolex
| and Hermes have perfected this, upstart luxury brands from
| China would need a good 20+ years or genius marketing to
| start building the type of brand that can sell a story.
| bobthepanda wrote:
| It's certainly not impossible though, we now have luxury
| Japanese brands.
|
| I think a bigger struggle for any Chinese brand would
| probably be rampant counterfeiting; for luxury goods to
| prosper, customers need to have a way to ensure they're
| getting the real deal. And China currently accounts for 75%
| of counterfeit goods by value seized at US ports.
| WoahNoun wrote:
| I've bought many leather wallets in the US even from
| seemingly upscale places like Nordstrom's. They all kinda
| fell apart after a few years. I bought a leather wallet in
| Italy near the Trevi Fountain for roughly the same price
| almost decade ago and it's by far the best wallet I've ever
| owned. It's even aged in a nice way.
|
| https://lasellaroma.it/product/wallet-cod-5026/
| golergka wrote:
| This may not be the case for Hermes, but designer brands
| sometime also mean great and new design. Personally, I spend
| extra for Rick Owens and Balenciaga just because of the ideas
| they put into the looks.
| michael_vo wrote:
| I went to a buy.
|
| Hermes gives you 24 hours to go into the store and buy the item.
| Otherwise the bag goes to the next buyer on the rolodex.
|
| Buyers call their friends and make it into an event. They're
| literally giddy and excited to go. It's like winning the lottery.
|
| You're ushered into a private room with nice couches, mirrors, a
| phone. You choose a scarf and wrap the scarf around the strap.
|
| Buyers text their sales rep almost daily.
|
| In a way it's like a drop in the NFT space.
| GaryNumanVevo wrote:
| Comparing a Hermes appointment to clicking "buy" on an NFT is
| hilarious. Nonetheless, I've gotten three appointments, have
| spent around 150k EUR on bags. So far I've made $30k after VAT
| and US duty. No idea why Paris original Hermes bags go for so
| much more in the states. If I have an appointment, I'll fly
| round trip to Paris, buy the bags, and hold them until I go to
| the states. Great experience, very high class!
| GaryNumanVevo wrote:
| First appointment they have a limit, IIRC it's like 2 bags,
| but subsequent appointments you can buy a lot more
| 1oooqooq wrote:
| so you're their sales rep?
| GaryNumanVevo wrote:
| No? It's a fun luxury item to flip, that can make some
| decent money. Rolex's used to be good to flip if you had a
| good rep with an AD, but now the resale market is down.
| morsch wrote:
| Humans of late capitalism
| oblio wrote:
| Agreed, this all seems so bizarre and frankly... decadent.
| kylehotchkiss wrote:
| How much value do these bags lose if you so little as touch
| them with an ungloved hand?
| gen220 wrote:
| Do you know if Hermes is OK with people purchasing with
| intent to immediately resell?
|
| I think I remember reading that people have "gotten in
| trouble" (i.e. block-listed from future sales) for being
| suspected of this, but I might be confusing it with some
| other company.
| michael_vo wrote:
| Hermes monitors the resale websites. If they can find out
| the identifier then you will be banned.
| GaryNumanVevo wrote:
| Personally, I haven't heard of it happening. Most of the
| market is off resale websites anyways. Now if you started
| a boutique trying to resell Hermes bags, then you might
| have an issue.
| 1-more wrote:
| You've spent half of your highest salary on bags? Feels like
| a lot but I'm just some guy. What was the biggest bag balance
| you've had on the books? Or are you buying and flipping at
| most one or two at any time? When you make these trips, do
| you have a US buyer lined up beforehand or do you find them
| once you're in the US?
| nine_k wrote:
| With 20% ROI collected in a few months, after all duties,
| it's a good deal, even if you pay with a credit card. (You
| can certainly get a cheaper loan if you're the kind of
| person to be invited to a bag-dispensing event.)
| GaryNumanVevo wrote:
| 1) My wife loves Paris
|
| 2) Credit card points + Travel miles
| xhkkffbf wrote:
| Loan? I certainly hope no one is taking out a loan to do
| this.
|
| Well, I guess if the resell is pretty certain, then a
| loan is a smart business move. But really no one should
| be going into debt for an item like this.
| nine_k wrote:
| Certainly, a loan was mentioned only for reselling, as a
| typical business loan to finance a surefire-looking deal.
| GaryNumanVevo wrote:
| I think the biggest balance I had was ~$65k at one time.
| I'm buying one, maybe two per trip depending on what kinds
| of bags collectors are looking for in the US. I don't have
| a buyer setup before hand, but I'm in a couple of private
| facebook groups that I can usually find one a few weeks
| before I fly to the US.
| 1-more wrote:
| > a couple of private facebook groups
|
| There's the secret sauce: you need a high trust trade
| network. Well this is pretty cool. I love to learn about
| weird informal economies, thanks!
| GaryNumanVevo wrote:
| Yep! It's very similar - albeit much smaller - market to
| watches, collectable vinyl records, trading cards, etc.
| Just easier to rely on trust and word of mouth sometimes.
| dboreham wrote:
| Not as bad as buying a Ferrari: where you have to already own a
| Ferrari to be allowed to buy one.
| moomin wrote:
| A friend of mine is a true petrolhead. Loves cars. When he
| was in his early twenties he bought a second hand Ferrari.
| Drove it around for years. He sold it, for the exact same
| price he bought it, back the person who'd sold it him in the
| first place.
|
| I wouldn't call a Ferrari an investment, but if you love them
| they hold their value pretty well.
| kurthr wrote:
| Yes, but maintenance costs are very high. You can expect
| >$5k and typically another few $k for tires. That is true
| even if nothing breaks and milage is low (eg <5k mi/yr).
| Costs quickly go up once cars are past 20 years old due to
| the lack of parts. You definitely need $10-15k in an
| emergency fund if anything significant goes wrong (or you
| got sold a lemon).
|
| So that $40-50k car price is about half of 5 years of
| ownership.
| elorant wrote:
| One reason they hold their value well is because they have
| low mileage. They're not practical cars to use on a daily
| basis, not to mention maintenance costs which are quite
| high if you use the car often.
| jazzyjackson wrote:
| meanwhile a '93 Honda NSX recently sold for 60k showing
| 234,300 miles on the odo
|
| https://carsandbids.com/auctions/3OnRAn0v/1993-acura-nsx
| dexwiz wrote:
| Yeah but aren't these cars big with people who do after
| market mods? Ferraris have to be serviced by licensed
| mechanics.
| sandworm101 wrote:
| Not that car. A '93 NSX today will be bought by a new-
| money millionaire in his 40s as a nostalgia piece, his
| dream car from when he was a teenager in the 90s. It will
| be kept as stock as reasonable. Even the photographs are
| designed for such a buyer. An NSX on a crisp Chicago day
| is the definition of 90s cool.
| neuralRiot wrote:
| > Ferraris have to be serviced by licensed mechanics.
|
| If you're talking about special ones like La Ferrari or
| some others, i can tell you that there are lots of 458
| italia and California and Cali T that have been in no-
| name shops and still being sold without any problem.
| huehehue wrote:
| I learned how to drive stick on an NSX.
|
| I also wedged my skateboard in the back window when it
| was open, causing it to completely shatter when the owner
| tried to close it. Didn't appreciate what a bone-headed
| move that was at the time, but you've enlightened me.
| burningChrome wrote:
| >> not to mention maintenance costs which are quite high.
|
| I remember watching Gas Monkey Garage where they bought a
| smashed Ferrari F40 for $400K. One of the funniest scenes
| was Richard Rawlings on the phone with the Ferrari parts
| dealer telling him how expensive the parts were he needed
| to rebuild the car with. The funniest was the
| juxtaposition of Richard, a guy who's used to haggling
| with people to get a good price on everything, and here
| he was being reminded that these were OEM Ferrari parts
| with the quip, "How much for a quarter panel? Yeah, I
| KNOW its a real Ferrari quarter panel!" with the standard
| eye roll that the cost of this was killing him.
|
| The whole show gave a glimpse into owning one of these
| cars. IF something does happen to it, in order for it to
| be "certified" as a legit Ferrari, you have use all OEM
| parts and have a person from Ferrari oversee the repairs.
| The whole show was a lesson in the amount of time and
| money needed to own one of these - even if you don't
| drive it very much.
|
| Here's an article that detailed the whole process:
| https://www.hotcars.com/what-happened-to-
| ferrari-f40-from-fa...
| elorant wrote:
| There's a very popular video from a dissatisfied owner
| who talks about all the maintenance nightmare of owning a
| Ferrari.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-JgeU3X-2AM
| xmprt wrote:
| The cost of a Ferrari isn't in the car. It's in the
| insurance, maintenance, and stress of anything happening to
| the car. I for one would hate to have a luxury vehicle even
| if I could afford it and even if you guaranteed to buy it
| back from me for the same amount I'd get investing in the
| stock market.
| Scoundreller wrote:
| Yeah, I feel like I could (should?) get around town
| faster in a beat up Corolla, and getting around faster on
| a highway in a supercar would require taking a lot of
| physical + legal risk.
| brandall10 wrote:
| It's interesting that Jay Leno refuses to buy a Ferrari for
| this fact.
| pie420 wrote:
| it is the same model. in order to buy a birkin you need to
| buy tens of thousands of dollars of less desireable Hermes
| product.
| m463 wrote:
| there are also severe restrictions on your ownership of the
| ferrari.
|
| You are required to maintain and insure it. by ferrari.
|
| You can't loan it out for performance testing.
|
| You can't street race it.
|
| You can't sully the brand.
|
| and plenty more.
|
| makes me wonder, do the new ones have telemetry to check this
| stuff?
| michael_vo wrote:
| Actually the whole sneaker market is like this too now. They
| have weekly drops where inventory is restricted to create hype.
| wlesieutre wrote:
| Not the _whole_ sneaker market, a weird premium collectable
| subset of the sneaker market is like this. You can buy
| sneakers at Costco (as long as you like the one option they
| stock).
| silverpepsi wrote:
| Not the whole market at the high end either, I have very
| little trouble getting any pair of Balmain, Versace, and
| Rick Owens sneaker I want - I have several dozen pairs of
| all three brands
|
| Strategy at the high end is to price correctly but
| astronomically so almost no one can afford them, then offer
| seasonal sales to sell the less popular colorways or styles
| off to the aspirational upper poor.
|
| Nike/Adidas is like the polar opposite, intentionally
| underprice so demand is frantic and there is a lot of
| action for middle men, then over the years try to steal
| back as much of the middle men profit as possible
|
| All very interesting imo
| michael_vo wrote:
| There's a whole ecosystem for used nike shoes.
| https://www.youtube.com/@Ramitheicon gets over 500k each
| video and he's got a physical storefront where he trades
| cash to kids for their used nike shoes. There's so much
| hype for these shoes from NBA players, tik tok,
| instagram, and youtube.
| oblio wrote:
| > I have several dozen pairs of all three brands
|
| I guess different colors? I've always wondered, what do
| people with 50+ pairs of shoes do? Surely most of them
| just gather dust.
|
| > price correctly but astronomically
|
| Based on materials or cost of labor, I doubt it's correct
| pricing. It's all artificial scarcity due to branding,
| I'm fairly sure.
| axlee wrote:
| We're far from the 2018-2021 levels of ridiculousness though,
| the hypebeat market has taken a big hit. Grey market watches
| as well.
|
| Birkins haven't.
| oblio wrote:
| I'd argue it's the opposite. This is a long running model
| copied for NFT.
| tempsy wrote:
| Uh not really.
|
| The unique part here is that in order to even have the chance
| to buy a bag you need to develop a relationship with a sales
| rep and buy a bunch of other stuff. The more other stuff you
| buy the higher on whatever list they'll put you and when they
| get a bag in stock they'll give the chance to buy to whoever
| they have a positive relationship with and who has spent a lot
| of money.
| pfannkuchen wrote:
| Sounds a lot like getting a mechanic in the USSR.
| oblio wrote:
| 7 years from now. But will the mechanic come in the morning
| or in the afternoon?
| taude wrote:
| i heard this is how it's working for a Rolex now, too, unless
| you go to secondary market and pay a big premium.
| Raidion wrote:
| This is always how Rolex has worked. Supply is limited, and
| prices are fixed, so they have to pick and choose who gets
| the rarer and more desirable watches, and who better to
| offer them to than the people who are your best customers
| (or have enough clout to be free advertising?).
|
| Ferrari works the same way.
| gadders wrote:
| RIP "Rep Ladies" on Reddit, where there was a whole community
| talking about buying "replicas" (very high quality fakes) from
| China.
|
| Bag purchasing aside, the whole community had a very specific and
| enjoyable vibe to it. It was like every poster was Charlotte from
| Sex and the City.
|
| The Reddit was killed by this article:
| https://www.thecut.com/2022/04/repladies-fake-luxury-bags.ht...
| coldfoundry wrote:
| And TikTok too. I used to frequent RepLadies just for the
| incredible review quality some years back that users were
| writing. Incredible pictures, auth vs replica comparisons, and
| total detailing of every step of the order/shipping process
| with a dated timeline.
|
| Ironically it felt like the "Hermes" of the replica community
| because of its level of quality - such a shame it's no longer,
| and the child subreddits that popped up to "replace it" just
| aren't the same.
| gadders wrote:
| Yes, the moderators there did a great job of enforcing a
| culture and a standard of review of the products. They also
| had loads of FAQs for all the steps in the process.
|
| I hope that it lives on on a secret discord server or
| something somewhere. Would be a shame to lose it all.
| GaryNumanVevo wrote:
| Replicas are great! I own a couple of Birkin bags, and I pretty
| much only wear replicas when I'm out and about. The resale on a
| vintage Birkin bag is insane, so it's better off sitting in my
| closet
| et-al wrote:
| That was a great article and would probably appeal to some of
| the posters here:
|
| > "My friends that spend a lot on authentics have either never
| worked a day in their life or they've married rich guys," she
| says. "But if you're working hard for your money, you don't
| want to spend it on stupid stuff. In New York especially,
| wealthy people just have more interesting things to do with
| their money. They invest in crypto. They reinvest in their
| businesses. They invest in their children."
|
| > Still, most of Lisa's rich friends ignore her suggestions to
| buy reps. "It's just a snobbery thing," she says. "They've
| literally told me, 'I'm too good to buy reps.'" Instead,
| "they're out here buying authentic Hermes, and they are
| stressing out every single day. 'Will I get the bag?' 'What if
| it runs out?' I'm just like, _You literally don't need this
| stress in your life; you can just be happy._ "
| lupire wrote:
| "invest in their children" is just polishing up their
| children like a Birken bag.
| lupire wrote:
| How did the article kill it? Eternal September?
| graycat wrote:
| > The economics of the Birkin handbag
|
| He's very rich and she is VERY pretty!
| 082349872349872 wrote:
| I'll grant you the VERY pretty for Jane, but was Serge
| Gainsbourg ever very rich?
| jamesralph8555 wrote:
| This model is not unique to Hermes. Watch and car brands work the
| same way. Early on in these markets, you can get one of the
| desirable items without spending too much on undesirable items.
|
| Some examples:
|
| Rolex - stainless steel models are desirable and appreciate, gold
| models go for below msrp
|
| Porche - Bucking the trend a bit, Porche gives you the option of
| paying an additional dealer markup rather than making you buy a
| Macan to get a GT3 RS.
|
| Over time, this arbitrage goes to equilibrium and resellers can't
| make money. It is relatively easy to get into this market so
| naturally it gets flooded. Profit goes to 0. Resellers also carry
| a risk that the item loses market value while they hold it. The
| only real winner here is the brand.
| mamonster wrote:
| In the watch market, a lot of the resellers who got in during
| COVID are still underwater.
|
| Know a guy from the alternatives space who bought an 8 figure
| portfolio of Richard Milles, Pateks and some smaller brands and
| is still sitting on it. Bidders are coming at 15-20% below his
| ask at least.
| htrp wrote:
| Not a loss til you sell??
| meowster wrote:
| Yep! I know a ton of people who never lost money on Beanie
| Babies because they haven't sold yet and are waiting for
| the market to rebound! /s
| BeFlatXIII wrote:
| What's the conversion rate from Beanie Babies to $GME?
| pc86 wrote:
| At some point you have to think you'd be better off selling
| at a loss and reallocating the funds, especially if there are
| tax implications of being able to show a loss in business
| inventory (which you may not be able to if it's just some guy
| buying a box of watches and not an actual business venture).
| blantonl wrote:
| On the watch side, there is some nuance here.
|
| Rolex stainless steel models are highly desirable, but they
| really don't appreciate in value. They simply sell on the
| secondary market for a >50% markup because they are still less
| expensive than a lot of the precious metal versions. So a rolex
| authorized dealer will typically have a huge ratio of buyers to
| watches available for steel watches. Precious metal rolexes -
| it's a big "depends." Any of the platinum watches are highly
| desirable as well as the meteorite dial watches - they sell
| well above msrp on the secondary market. Note that rolex
| authorized dealers are not allowed to mark up new watches at
| all. The price is the price set by the brand. Most authorized
| distributors are also jewelers so they allocate steel sport
| watches to people who buy a lot of jewelry.
|
| Pateks are a different beast. The sport watches are highly
| desirable, and generally not available to the average buyer
| under any circumstances unless they have > $100K Patek spend,
| which means you're going to have to buy what is typically more
| of an art piece type watch (complication, calatrava, etc)
| before you'll get a shot at a $20K Patek sport watch. This
| means you can very easily get a beautiful brand new Patek dress
| watch for 20% off on the secondary market, since buyers will
| simply purchase that watch to get the spend history,
| immediately dump it on the secondary market at a big discount,
| just so they can get the opportunity to purchase a $20K watch
| and sell it for a >100% markup. There's no shame for some of
| these people.
| rayiner wrote:
| > There's no shame for some of these people.
|
| It sounds like the market just fixing a stupid sales model.
| samatman wrote:
| Doesn't look too stupid for Patek Philippe. These
| shenanigans are why they can charge $20k for a stainless
| steel automatic watch with a simple date complication,
| which is only slightly better (at best) than a $300 Seiko.
| OnACoffeeBreak wrote:
| When I think of "sport" I think of "fitness" watches from
| Garmin and Apple Watch. Patek sport watch is definitely not
| that. What is meant by "sport" in case of the Patek sport
| watch?
| criddell wrote:
| _Sports_ is really just the traditional name of the
| category.
|
| They are more casual watches. They will have a seconds hand
| and glow in the dark hands and markers. They will be able
| to tolerate getting wet (ie no leather).
| vundercind wrote:
| It's like how Oxford cloth button down shirts or cotton
| knit polos are sportswear, or a sport coat (it's in the
| name!) or how jodhpur boots are "equestrian", et c.
|
| They started that way, but not so much now. Still, that's
| the _lineage_ they fall under in certain contexts.
| quickthrowman wrote:
| Nautilus and Aquanaut are what I think of as Patek 'sport'
| watches.
| havefunbesafe wrote:
| I like that Walmart "sells" them
| https://www.walmart.com/ip/Patek-Philippe-Patek-Philippe-
| Nau...
| eadmund wrote:
| A sport watch is not a dress watch, not a dive watch and
| not a field watch. It's typically water-resistant, but not
| _hugely_ water-resistant (swimming, rather than diving). It
| typically has a metal bracelet or a tropical rubber strap.
|
| A dress watch is thin, almost always with polished rather
| than brushed surfaces, rarely with a date complication,
| rarely with lume, sometimes without a second hand, with a
| leather strap. It's meant to slide underneath a shirt cuff
| and be both elegant & discrete. It is probably not water-
| resistant. It may not have a minute track.
|
| A dive watch is meant for scuba diving. It will have one-
| way bezel marked with minutes for tracking dive time. It
| will be heavily lumed. It will typically have a metal
| bracelet.
|
| A field watch is based off of a WWI officer's watch. It
| should be reasonably water-resistant (weirdly, many are
| not!). It will always have three hands, and must be hacking
| (means that the second hand will stop when you set the
| time, so that it can be set to the exact second). It
| probably has 13-24 in an inner circle. It definitely has a
| minute track.
|
| A Garmin or Apple Watch is ... not really a watch, but is a
| wearable computer.
| nradov wrote:
| Note that hardly anyone has actually used those "dive"
| watches for diving in decades. A wealthy, fashion-
| conscious diver might wear a dive watch while traveling
| to the dive site, but for actual diving they'll take it
| off (don't want it lost or scratched!) and bring a
| cheaper modern digital dive computer (which might come in
| wristwatch format for certain models, thus further
| confusing the terminology). In diving circles, if you
| mention "dive watch" then most people will assume you're
| talking about a Shearwater or Garmin rather than some
| Swiss toy.
| eadmund wrote:
| > Note that hardly anyone has actually used those "dive"
| watches for diving in decades.
|
| Yeah, the line about them is that they are 'desk divers'!
|
| I have the idea that plenty of folks do still use them
| for diving, but of course I could be wrong -- it's not a
| community I am much around.
| theluketaylor wrote:
| In the watch world sports watch means a tool watch,
| something designed for a specific purpose like supporting
| an occupation, military use, or while participating in a
| sport (mainly uppercrusty sports). Sports watches have
| taken over, and can really be thought of as everyday
| watches since people are wearing rolex submariners with
| tuxedos now.
|
| Sport watches started with things like the JLC Reverso,
| which was designed to meet a challenge of a watch that
| could survive a polo match. The case includes a swivel that
| lets the dial flip around to keep it protected while
| playing.
|
| Quartz watches upended watch makers across every price
| point, totally destroying the bottom of the market. The
| survivors moved towards mechanical watches as luxury items,
| and even the holy trinity of Audemars Piguet, Patek
| Philippe, and Vacheron Constantin had to respond. Audemars
| Piguet revealed the luxury sport watch Royal Oak in 1972
| and there wasn't any going back. PP designed Nautilus in
| 1976 and Vacheron brought out the Overseas in 77. These 3
| lines make up a huge chunk of the holy trintiy business
| now.
| roncesvalles wrote:
| Ah, the games people play when they have too much money.
| NoLinkToMe wrote:
| Really interesting, answered some of the questions I had on
| watch market economics and seller and buyer incentives. Is
| there a place where I can learn more (e.g. a youtube channel
| that explains how all of this works, the roles and incentives
| for the various parties in the watch market)?
|
| Thanks
| tempsy wrote:
| I think you're missing a key point here and that is you have no
| chance of buying a Hermes bag unless you have a relationship
| with a specific sales associate and buy a lot of other stuff
| there. Very few other categories of goods can get away with
| something like this.
|
| In some ways Rolex is like this but Rolex is relatively high
| production volume and there are many situations where you can
| get lucky and buy one relatively easily, especially now that
| the hype has died down a bit from 2021-2022.
| knallfrosch wrote:
| See also:
|
| Inside the Delirious Rise of 'Superfake' Handbags
|
| Can you tell the difference between a $10,000 Chanel bag and a
| $200 knockoff? Almost nobody can, and it's turning luxury fashion
| upside down. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/04/magazine/celine-
| chanel-gu...
|
| An economist's guide to the luxury-handbag market It is plagued
| by counterfeits--and information asymmetries
| https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2024/03/07/a...
| aragonite wrote:
| Also, a classic:
|
| https://www.styleforum.net/threads/mafoofan-struggles-to-buy...
| lelandfe wrote:
| Wow, that was an aggravating read. I don't think I would have
| been able to keep my composure. Is/was that user notable on
| that forum?
| aragonite wrote:
| Yes, he's an accomplished lawyer and quite famous on the
| style blogs!
| lelandfe wrote:
| That helps explain how they were able to stay calm as the
| assistant stretched the limits of professionalism, hah
| vitorsr wrote:
| Related:
|
| The secret economics of the Birkin bag (2016)
| (https://www.economist.com/1843/2016/07/28/the-secret-economi...)
| ianpurton wrote:
| The economics of purchasing new are fairly simple, you walk out
| of the store with something worth more than you paid for it.
|
| The people in the secondary market take all the risk by paying an
| inflated price that may go down and the risk of fakes.
|
| It reminds me of the Rolex market.
| eadmund wrote:
| Has Hermes trademarked the design? I would love to get my wife an
| homage Birkin, but every time I google for such a thing I don't
| really find anything. The only thing that makes sense is that
| they aggressively shut down every competing maker -- or just that
| my google-fu is lacking.
|
| There's no way that she would be happy with tens of thousands for
| a purse, but if I could find one with the look and utility for a
| few hundred then I think she'd be delighted.
| humansareok1 wrote:
| Go to like any large city and people sell knockoffs for cheap
| on the sidewalk.
| dboreham wrote:
| Not necessarily complying with all relevant IP laws of
| course.
| melling wrote:
| "homage Birkin"
|
| A knockoff? Is that what people are calling knockoffs these
| days?
| eadmund wrote:
| A fake looks like an original, and is something which
| wrongfully and illegally misuses the original's logo or other
| marks: it lies about what it is.
|
| A homage is something which looks like an original, but does
| not use the original's logo or other marks. I have no problem
| with an homage.
|
| 'Knockoff' could refer to either of those. What I would like
| is a well-constructed reproduction of a Birkin bag, which
| does _not_ misappropriate Hermes's trademarks.
| tkz1312 wrote:
| The original NFT
| osks wrote:
| I really enjoyed the Aquired episode on Hermes. Not my type of
| brand, but interesting.
|
| https://www.acquired.fm/episodes/hermes
| tylervigen wrote:
| I did too. Actually I was introduced to the Acquired podcast by
| the WSJ last month[1] and Hermes was the first episode I
| listened to. I wonder if this was just another WSJ reporter
| falling down that same rabbit hole.
|
| [1] Via https://www.wsj.com/business/media/acquired-podcast-
| tech-bus...
| farceSpherule wrote:
| The Birkin bag is nothing but overpriced hype. De Beers operates
| in the same manner, creating fake demand and spending tremendous
| sums on marketing to make you think that diamonds are "rare" when
| in fact they are not.
|
| These bags are made by Chinese immigrants, not by Parisian or
| Italian "artisans." How do you think the Chinese counterfeiters
| are able to reproduce exact replicas that are indistinguishable
| to the naked eye?
|
| Hermes and De Beers get the last laugh because they know that
| women are so desperate to appear wealthy that these products sell
| themselves to these low self-esteem trollops.
| auc wrote:
| I would recommend listening to the Acquired podcast episode on
| Hermes. While the bag is very "overpriced", they are genuinely
| the highest quality bags on the market in basically every
| important dimension.
| goalonetwo wrote:
| anyone spending 20k$ on a handbag lost all touch with reality.
| nojvek wrote:
| With the rise of US economy and further wealth disparity,
| signaling "wealth" is a real thing.
|
| We humans aren't that different from other animals that "peacock"
| to advertise their social status.
|
| Interesting how certain brands are able to capitalize on the
| exclusivity of high end of fashion over the innate need to
| signal.
|
| The problems of ultra rich are very different yet so similar to
| the poor. Humans gonna human.
| fsckboy wrote:
| no matter where you are on the political spectrum, you might
| enjoy "splitting" the animated gif
| https://images.wsj.net/im-972116/?width=1278&size=1 into its
| component still-images.
|
| The credited artist, Eric Helgas, is quoted as saying "My work
| focuses a lot on iconic imagery and challenges the viewer's
| perception of the objects I choose to photograph."
| https://lvl3official.com/artist-of-the-week-eric-helgas/
|
| Well Eric, I don't feel challenged by this work. I guess you
| thought that I thought that stevedores, people with dirty
| fingernails, thick black hair on their arms, a preponderance of
| upper body fat characteristic of males, etc. would not carry
| Birkins. HA! jokes on you! Any body can carry a Birkin, and we
| might expect anybody who is afraid their femininity might be
| questioned to make sure to carry such an iconic handbag, so I'm
| sure all you've done is take a random sample. Where's the
| challenge?
| deanCommie wrote:
| I don't really understand your last paragraph.
|
| It is in no way expected that Art that "challenges" is going to
| challenge every viewer. Of course some wouldn't be, in this
| case you. That's not a bug. I wouldn't even necessarily say
| that the quality of art is measured by the % of audience it is
| able to successfully "challenge", that also incentivises shock
| for shock's sake.
|
| But I also don't really understand the specifics of what you're
| saying - There are no fingernails shown in the gif, and I
| suppose maybe one person with upper-arm fat?
|
| To be clear, I'm not advocating for the art or the artist. It
| does nothing for me either. I'm curious about your seeming
| vitriol to it tho. (Could be a misread of what you wrote)
| fallinditch wrote:
| Status symbol - a weird concept to me. Exhibiting status symbols
| has various social, psychological, cultural and economic uses and
| meanings, but it seems to me that they often reflect the
| existence of a kind of deficiency.
| patchtopic wrote:
| I prefer me a excellent condition pre-loved Crumpler bag from
| ebay :-)
|
| almost zero prestige so reasonable prices
| maxglute wrote:
| Bliss Foster, fashion youtuber has a great video on Hermes
|
| @11 minutes about why Hermes is peak of luxury even compared to
| other houses
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3F7Exfsto6Y
|
| But entire video is a fun watch.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2024-06-24 23:00 UTC)