There are waiting lists for some items, but it doesn’t show that the items are underpriced. Rather the waiting lists exist because Hermes knows that to saturate the market with their product would ultimately force them to lower the price when the resulting handbags lost some of their exclusive status. The waiting lists exist to enforce the higher price not because the price is so high.
If you saw a Hermes scarf for $500 that you really liked, and right next to it was a JC Penney scarf for $25 that looked and felt exactly the same (even down to the stitching), which would you buy and why? If you’d prefer to buy the Hermes one, it’s because you want the status. Or maybe because the cash is making your purse too heavy to carry around and you have to drop it, fast. People don’t spend more money than some people make in a week on scarves casually, or because they’re better quality, or because their neck is cold. It is by nature a conspicuous purchase.
The WoW mention is a strawman because it’s not a luxury item that can ever be displayed to passersby to assert a higher social status by virtue of spending money more frivolously.
That’s a point completely unrelated to the point I made regarding conspicuous consumption. Yet you brought it up like we were talking about the same thing in lesser degrees. Playing computer games in the privacy of one’s home is not in any way construable as a conspicuous purchase. Buying a Hermes scarf is not in any construable as a non-conspicuous purchase.
You can and should do what you want. But it doesn’t mean you won’t be judged. Affluent folks will judge you more favorably, or people like me might judge you less favorably. In the end it shouldn’t affect you much either way, since this isn’t a topic people are likely to discuss outside of a message board.
Personally, I wouldn’t buy either because I never wear scarves. For me, even $25 would be too much because it’s a waste. To get back to your question, though, I doubt that would ever happen. Have you ever seen an Hermes scarf? It’s of a quality that you’re not going to find in a department store.
So what makes an Hermes scarf copious consumption? Is it that it’s $500? Is a $500 pair of boots (which I do have–a gift/cast off) also copious consumption? Because at some point, it is a matter of degrees. A $25 scarf isn’t copious consumption and a $500 is. So somewhere between the two prices, we’ve gotten to what seems to be in your opinion decadence.
Basically, you seem to be assuming that the only reason people buy these scarves is to show off and make yourself look good. For a lot of people, $500 isn’t a lot of money to blow on a luxury item. And for some people, the amount of money you spend on things you deem important may seem frivolous. And I’m sure there are people who think makeup/cosmetics are silly and think that I’m crazy for spending $20 to $30 on a Lancome eye pencil when I could get a $5 one at Sephora. I’m saying that it’s relative based on what you, the consumer, think is worthwhile to you. There’s nothing magical about the Hermes scarf that makes it stand for luxury or over consumption.
I do think it’s better to get one quality scarf that you love and will keep forever than to get twenty scarves that will sit in the back of your closet until you throw them out.
That said, I’m pretty sure most luxury brands make most of their money off (somewhat) affordable gee-gaws. For every $500 scarf, they sell 20 $100 key chains. It’s a business of tee-shirts, coin purses and money clips, with the expensive stuff serving as much as advertisement as product of it’s own.
There’s no way you’re ever going to find an Hermes scarf that’s identical to a scarf at JC Penney, so your hypothetical is flawed. Also people don’t buy expensive things for the sole purpose of “flaunting” them. As Freudian Slit said above, to some people, $500 isn’t a huge amount of money. They buy Hermes scarfs without a thought to the price, simply because they like them.
Also, unless you have the Hermes scarf spread out and pinned to your back, wearing it isn’t immediately going to scream “Hermes” (the way a LV or Gucci bag is instantly recognizable).
Oh come on. Sure you can. People really can truly just like something and buy it because of that, not because of the name on it or to show it off.
What about wedding/engagement rings, or other jewelry? Many of those cost WAY more than $500 and are much more common than high-end scarves. Does it also make you vaguely sick to see someone wearing a nice necklace or diamond ring?
I’m with you guys here. Every time I see a woman carrying one, I feel that it ages her 10 years and acts as deadweight. Not my style at all.
If they raised the price on those items, there’d be no waiting list, but there’d be a small enough number of people buying them that market saturation wouldn’t be a problem. Therefore, the items are underpriced.
It’s like the joke where a woman is selling a rose for a hundred thousand dollars and someone asks who would buy such a thing. The woman says “I only have to sell one”.
Same thing applies here. Just because it’s not a hundred thousand dollars doesn’t mean it’s not overpriced. That just means there’s a fundamental flaw in your line of thinking. “Hm. Won’t pay $100,000? What about $15,000 for a purse? It’s a bargain! Look at the craftsmanship!”
Also, yeah, it does seem like older lady stuff, however, I’m notoriously unable to picture womens’ clothing and accessories on a woman unless I actually see it on a woman.
Of course Hermes is “tacky.” They manufactured fine saddles & tack–& still do. Hence the equestrian themes. But the horseless carriage encouraged the company to diversify.
I don’t have a Hermes budget but I’ve lusted after the scarves designed by Texas artist Kermit Oliver. Here’s a favorite; that’s a painting–far more expensive than one of his scarves. Here’s one of them.
Yes, many of the ladies who can afford the scarves are older than you. Should they wear all black in mourning for their lost youth?
Well, yes. Of course.
Actually, that is part of the issue. As I’ve gotten older and better off, my level of what Rachellogram would consider “conspicuous consumption” has increased. (She shouldn’t worry, so have my charitable contributions- including four figures a year at affordable housing for those single moms she is so concerned about.) But my tastes are getting more and more mature as well. I like trendy, but at this point in my life, I’m way better off with classic - it looks better with my greying hair and middle age looks - it doesn’t look like I’m trying to hard to look younger than my age.
But classic also holds up better at this point. Twenty years ago, the things I bought lasted a season, maybe two. Now I wear the same classic cut little black dress for ten years - if I spend three times as much on it, its still a bargain over a slate of new dresses every year. A scarf that I’m going to wear with that black dress for the next ten years - I’ll spend less on a Hermes scarf than I would on ten years worth of costume jewelry to accessorize the previous outfits. And that is where the “value” in a Hermes scarf comes in - no one is going to look at you and say “that’s last years scarf.” They are collectors items - you can pull them out of your drawer next year or twenty years from now and its still going to be a Hermes scarf.
Excuse me now while I go put on my black crepe and orthopedic loafers.
No. I don’t really care if they choose to wear gaudy eye-bleeding scarves either. From my eyes, that last scarf you linked to looks like something my great-grandma bought at a DC gift shop in 1973.
Hey, I also think Paris is ugly. Taste is taste.
I’m not sure anyone can argue that this $240 keychain is some kind of classic investment in quality though. Nor is the $135 coloring book really going to be justified on the "but it’s fine workmanship that will last a lifetime!’ grounds.
Humans get off on spending money, and spending money on brands we imagine belong to a higher social class is fun and exciting. Luxury brands work very hard to position themselves to fulfill this desire.
I’ll translate. “Overpriced” is normalfolk speak for “priced higher than items of comparable quality and style.”
Nope. I’m particularly aghast at the $200 baby bibs myself. But I tend to buy those sorts of things at Target and probably would with limitless money.
On the other hand, those sorts of items do move money around. It does the economy more good for someone to spend $240 on a keychain than to spend $4 on a keychain at Target and put $236 under their mattress.
You’re putting totally arbitrary values on these things, though. None of it is “necessary,” so what difference does it make why someone spends the money they don’t need to spend? If a Hermes scarf makes someone feel good, then it’s worth it to them. If you enjoy playing WoW, then it’s worth it to you.
Dangerosa is so right, too…classic things that don’t go out of style are often worth the money even in objective terms. If I buy a quality product that I will literally wear the rest of my life, then $500 is an investment, and amortized over years, not that expensive at all.
“As seen on TV” items move money around as well, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to have much respect for the people that buy them, even if they are people who can easily afford rooms full of iRenew bracelets.
I do think it’s reasonable to judge people by how they steward their resources. And I do think a need to display an assumed class status is one of the lower forms of aspiration. We only have so much energy, and there are some more productive ways to use that. That said, I don’t think a Hermes scarf that you will bring you a lifetime of use and joy is a necessarily a bad use of your resources. I will, however, feel free to judge people who spend $240 on an ugly piece-of-leather keychain because it has a name on it.
I already said that none of the Hermes items fit my budget.
And thanks for reminding us, once again, that you’ve been to Paris. Even though you thought it was ugly.
Why? If you are spending money on consumer goods, what difference does it make what consumer goods you are buying? If a person decides not to buy that ugly keychain, is there some other acceptable thing to spend that money on?
Study the luxury goods market more. It doesn’t work the same as Sears and JCPenny. The bags with waiting list are 10,000 and up. For the people that buy them money isn’t a factor in making a purchase. Exclusivity, social clout, and in some cases tradition is.
Plus, a lot of the…uh, “older people stuff” is very nice. My grandmother buys a lot of clothes/accessories and as we are the same shoe size often gives me things like shoes or bags that she decides she doesn’t want. Some of my absolute best things have come from her.