Yeah, this is another one where I never recall it being high end. For as long as I can recall, Macy*s (note the star) has been somewhere between JC Penney and Nordstrom.
When the “Vacuum Cleaner Crossing” Far Side comic* first ran in the paper, my mom clipped it out and wrote “Hope it was a Hoover” underneath it. They’ve sucked for over twenty years. According to her, anyway.
*For those of you who haven’t seen it, it features an vacuum cleaner run over flat in the middle of a road next to a diamond sign with a silhouette of an upright vacuum cleaner. Far Side cartoons don’t exist online.
i do miss bass shoes. thankfully i still have weejuns, maine weejuns, because they last. when i took them to a shoeguy to get resoled he nearly drooled on them. he kept saying, “good shoe” “good shoe”.
Elizabeth Arden perfumes. They produced middle-brow classics over the years (Green Tea, Blue Grass, Fifth Avenue) but the moment they started pushing BRITNEY SPEARS stink juice, they fell so far off the pedestal they will never get up. No. Class. Same with some other perfumers, like Dior. I do understand they need to change with the times and appeal to the younger customers, though. So I guess it’s just me who thinks they have cheapened their brands.
Have you smelled any of the Britney Spears perfumes? Some are so-so, but there are a few (can’t remember the exact ones) that my friends who prefer high-end perfumes adore. They’re embarrassed about the Spears name, but hey, they’re in it for the scent and quality, not the branding.
The 3 you mention produce products that lend themselves to brand loyalty- cars and foods; people tend to be very brand and/or taste conscious.
From what I can tell, the companies being brought up in this thread tend to be either fashion/clothing/accessories or consumer electronics. Fashion stuff tends to be very fickle, from what I can tell, when there’s not a performance component. What’s hot one year, or for a while, won’t be, eventually. So those companies really have X choices - 1. Continue making the same stuff that’s now unfashionable, selling it at the same premium price, and hoping people continue to buy it (not a good strategy), 2. Continuing to try and stay relevant by making what’s currently fashionable and trying to catch the next wave, or 3. Take advantage of their current reputation, and selling the same unfashionable stuff to people who don’t know any better at a discount /discount store. #3 is pretty much the easiest path to continuing profitability, and that’s why fashion names tend to have a downward trajectory, and end up at K-Mart or Wal-Mart.
Technology popularity tends to be heavily dependent on innovation and/or being lowest cost. Brands like Panasonic are still at the top of their game because they roll out new improved stuff every year, but if you’re not innovating and producing, then you’re in a race to the bottom for the lowest cost, and it’s frequently profitable to throw a respected older brand name on a cheap Chinese product than to sell it as some brand no one’s heard of.
Porter Cable used to make really nice, heavy-duty power tools. Now they’re Lowe’s answer to Ryobi (Home Depot’s cheap stuff). A bit better than Ryobi, but not much. At least the drill chucks are steel rather than plastic.
Breyer’s Ice Cream.
All natural and delicious when I was a kid. Now is it just cheap chemicals.
“Prior to 2006,[2] Breyers was known for producing ice cream with a small number of all-natural ingredients. In recent years, as part of cost-cutting measures since their move from Green Bay, Wisconsin to Unilever’s U.S. headquarters in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey,[3] Breyers has reformulated many of its flavors with nontraditional, additive ingredients, significantly changing the taste and texture of their desserts as a direct result of these additions.[2] Following similar practices by several of their competitors, and to the consternation of many former customers,[2] Breyers’ list of ingredients has expanded to include natural food additives such as Tara gum[4] and Carob Bean gum,[5] artificial additives such as maltodextrin and propylene glycol,[6] and common artificially separated and extracted ingredients such as corn syrup, whey, and many others.”
I agree. I haven’t eaten in an Au Bon Pain in ages. Although I’m not a big fan of Panera, I’d choose them over ABP.
From a business standpoint, it’s understandable why they’d go into the sandwich direction: You’ve got to make an uber-ton of bread to make a modicum of money. Ergo, it’s more profitable for them to expand the menu.
Abc, nbc, cbs.
I’m not sure about the quality of their goods, but Banana Republic was a lot less interesting after they were acquired by Gap.
I feel like PBR wasn’t quite as white trash when I was a kid as it is now. I love it, still.
I love Swiss Army cologne. It used to be something that I had to hunt down at boutique perfume shops. Now it’s at Walmart. Ergo, not cool anymore.
I brought this up talking with a group of friends last night. Each of us still has ancient, functional Coleman products. And everyone expressed disappointment at the way the companies product have gone downhill.
Doc Martens since 2003 have been made in Thailand or China (with a select few editions still made in the UK) and I have noticed a slight drop in quality if not prices.
Others swear they’re much worse, and I can’t agree–other than some shoddy stitching issues which are mostly cosmetic–they’re still the most comfortable shoes I own.
Not gonna lie. She has/had this one perfume whose name I can’t remember that I loved. I discovered it by accident when my brother bought it for me as a present, and was very presently surprised by how much I liked it. So much so that I may or may not have purchased more of it my own when it was gone. It does not smell like pork rinds and failure, as one might expect, and actually has a very pleasant, subtly sweet scent. I was never embarrassed by the name because nobody asked me, but had they, I’d have said what it was. I have no shame.
St. Marys used to be a well-respected brand of woolen blankets. But the name was bought by Fieldcrest, the woolen mill in St. Marys was shut down, and the name began to be used for sheets and towels. I don’t know if the name is even used any more.
Oh, I don’t know. I have gear from North Face and Mountain Hardwear and Arcteryx, and while it’s pretty clear that the latter two brands are of higher quality than North Face, they’re quite a bit more expensive as well. My North Face sleeping bag (a -7C Cat’s Meow, if you’re curious) has served me well for six or seven seasons now, and I’m a cold sleeper.
But when it has had its day I’m going to look at Mountain Hardwear. I am absolutely thrilled with both the quality and service I get from them.
LV is a very expensive brand, as I’m sure anyone who has been sent in there to buy a bag for their significant other can attest to. The classic LV or “monogram” is the only stuff my wife likes, and thank goodness, because some of their newer, Brighter stuff is just crap, IMO. But, people buy it, and the younger generation get sucked into the brand, so if they can make enough money as theynage to become brans loyal, LV’s marketing dept. Has done it’s job.
I will say this, though. The quality of their leather goods is outstanding. I am rough on wallets, and would go through a leather one once everynyeae or two. The cheap $10 leather wallet would last long enough to get me through the year. Then, I got married.
My wife bought me a man’s LV wallet. It does not have the momogram so many people know, but something much more subtle for a man. That wallet looks as good now as the day I got it as a gift. I know she paid a nice chunk of change for it, but the sticking hasn’t frayed, no rips or tears in the leather, its quite amazing. I was pissed to find out how much she paid for it, but over the years, it has cost less and less to own.
I wonder if this is true. It certainly is an interesting idea. I’ll add Philips electronics to your list of tech. Brands. What was once a quality product name has turned into garbage. Never buy a Phillips product.
Sharper image sucks. They still owe me money for an extended warranty that they stole from me right before the company went belly up. Their owner, that smug prick Richard Thalheimer was in every magazine, telling is what great innovative products he had. Then, he filed for bankruptcy, took the money and ran, and one is back with the new Sharper Image (at least I believe it’s him running the new sharper image. I hope he rota in he’ll with all his shortly, Chinese made products.
I’ll throw a couple of brands out there. Jos. A. Bank used to be a very expensive clothing store for men. Now, they can’t give their stuff away.
Craftsman is still the brand of tools I buy, but they no longer have their lifetime warranty. That says a lot about their manufacturing techniques. I think to be guaranteed a great tool, snap-on, MAC, is where you have to spend your money.
Agree with what folks have said about Coleman.
Also, any brand that has sold their sole to the big box stores, like a lowes or home depot, will kill brand rep. For market share, a while back, Snapper lawn equip,met, which were very highly regarded machines for the home user, were losing out to companies that went to the big box stores, so they tries it themselves. Their loyal customers brought them back out. Their product reputation took such a hit that no one was buying the snapper machines still made by the company. So they pulled out all together and now make the same great machines they made before going to Lowes (I think it was). Many companies have two different products, just like it was mentioned for the discount stores. The problem with snapper was that lowes wasn’t looked at as an outlet, so the consumer lumped all,snappers onto the same barrel, which almost killed the company
Goodyear tires are shit.
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Joe Boxer Brought to you exclusively by K-Mart… :rolleyes:
In video gaming, Happ arcade parts for joysticks used to be considered good, but their quality in recent years is atrocious and has really helped most gamers migrate to more Japanese style parts. Most of the P360 joysticks made within the last 5 years are considered defective out of the box by hardcore gamers, and there is a market for the good older ones even used.