I was in the new Winners in Leaside (Toronto) yesterday and they had small numbers of bags by......Burberry!, Fendi!, Rebecca Minkoff, Michael Kors, Coach, and Kate Spade.
If you aren't familiar with Winners - they sell mid-range designer clothing and bags from the previous season at big discounts. I don't know if they have them in the US but the TJ Maxx some of the ladies talk about sounds similar.
Most of the bags are brands like Tommy Hilfiger, Guess, Kathy van Zeeland, Liz Claibourne, etc. I've seen the odd Coach or Kate Spade before, but I've never seen a bag over $150 (discounted price) there until now.
I saw one lady with her 11-12 year old daughter and the daughter was looking at a cute little "speedy" shape bag with pink hearts all over it and burgundy leather where the vachetta would be on a Speedy. Her mother said it was cute and asked her how much, kind of like she would buy it for her - $449 (marked down from $625 (it was Burberry!)...so, uh, no, you can't have that one! I also saw a Fendi for $1,100 (retail $1,600), and probably 15-20 of these mid/high range bags in total.
My guess is they've decided to bring in a small number of higher end bags so people like me will keep coming back to see what's new. Costco does that, but I've never seen anything higher than Coach there. If nothing else it's interesting to be able to see them up close and compare the quality - you don't usually get to paw over a Fendi or Burberry without an SA glaring at you!
If you aren't familiar with Winners - they sell mid-range designer clothing and bags from the previous season at big discounts. I don't know if they have them in the US but the TJ Maxx some of the ladies talk about sounds similar.
Most of the bags are brands like Tommy Hilfiger, Guess, Kathy van Zeeland, Liz Claibourne, etc. I've seen the odd Coach or Kate Spade before, but I've never seen a bag over $150 (discounted price) there until now.
I saw one lady with her 11-12 year old daughter and the daughter was looking at a cute little "speedy" shape bag with pink hearts all over it and burgundy leather where the vachetta would be on a Speedy. Her mother said it was cute and asked her how much, kind of like she would buy it for her - $449 (marked down from $625 (it was Burberry!)...so, uh, no, you can't have that one! I also saw a Fendi for $1,100 (retail $1,600), and probably 15-20 of these mid/high range bags in total.
My guess is they've decided to bring in a small number of higher end bags so people like me will keep coming back to see what's new. Costco does that, but I've never seen anything higher than Coach there. If nothing else it's interesting to be able to see them up close and compare the quality - you don't usually get to paw over a Fendi or Burberry without an SA glaring at you!
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