Authenticate This COACH - **see first post for format**

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IMPORTANT READ-ME

Please post authenticity questions related to COACH in this thread. No PMs please.
For further information, please refer to the first post on page 1 of this thread.

Please follow the following requests:
  • Before you submit a request for authentication, please search this thread to make sure that the item has not previously been authenticated by searching the seller ID and/or item number. This is not a thread to ask general questions about COACH, please refer to our main Coach forum for such information.
  • Note that authenticators have the right to refuse any requests. This is a free service, but it is imperative that you help our authenticators by using the following format:
  • FOR ITEMS LISTED ONLINE:
    Item:
    Listing number:
    Seller and site where listed
    Link:
    Comments:

  • FOR ITEMS NOT LISTED ONLINE:
    Item:
    Where purchased or how obtained
    Comments:
BASIC PICTURES REQUIRED (but more may be requested): If necessary pictures are in the listing, it's not necessary to upload and duplicate them.
  • Front of item
  • Back of item
  • Full clear and legible creed text and serial number
  • Made in tags (when available)
  • Measurements
  • For bags with turnlock closures, show pictures of back of female side of turnlock
  • For bags with magnetic snaps, show pictures of the male part of the snap so that the numbers and letters on it can be read
  • If applicable, search interior of bag and/or pockets for small white tag with production information and include a picture of that.
Thank you and be safe!
 
No it doesn't. That's not the style number. Please read and save the six Salearea Coacxh Guides posted at Ebay especially the ones explaining Creeds and Serial Numbers.
http://www.ebay.com/gsr/i.html?uid="salearea"&rmvSB=true

The Station Bag is genuine, from the late 1980s.
I have read them, it's just a lot to remember and process as you look at each bag. But yes, I read this blog and the ebay site for HOURS before I ever posted the first post.
 
Mentioned earlier it is Soho Belted Pouch no. 4156. I have already purchased it and would just like to know if it is authentic. Thank you again.
Too funny - I bought the same bag (and same creed) - received it today. The leather feels funny - nothing like my bags from the 90s. The leather feels almost sticky (?) or rubbery (?) I don't know, it's hard to describe, but I think it is leather because it seems to be on the inside. How does yours feel?

I came here to read (again) some of the "FAQS" (quoted because of the lack of hard & fast rules) and discussions. Mine was item #152551143602 - made seller an offer of $16.99 and they accepted it.
 
No it doesn't. That's not the style number. Please read and save the six Salearea Coacxh Guides posted at Ebay especially the ones explaining Creeds and Serial Numbers.
http://www.ebay.com/gsr/i.html?uid="salearea"&rmvSB=true

The Station Bag is genuine, from the late 1980s.
I'm sorry - I thought it said the much earlier bags did not have the model number. So I expected this one was "new" enough to have it. argh.
 
Well, it's not the kind of bag that most women would carry every day, is it? Don't be too concerned or think a bag is questionable because it doesn't show much wear. Unlike today when everything is disposable, or in the case of designer handbags is out of style and something no self-anointed Fashionista would be caught dead carrying once the style disappeared from all the fashion blogs, twenty or thirty years ago a Coach bag was often considered an investment or a special occasion bag since you didn't see them dangling from the arms or shoulders of half the women in the mall - or worse yet, Walmart. That Madison Sutton Satchel that originally cost $324 back in 1996 would retail based just on inflation for over $500 today, and you can probably almost double that if you factor in the cost of materials ( almost the same kind of caviar-type leather that Chanel uses) and the cost of making it in Italy by actual Italian craftspeople instead of in China. There aren't a lot of women today other than us purse-obsessed tPF members who would have been able to justify or even afford to be carrying a bag that had cost them at least $800 in real-time money as an everyday, go-grocery-shopping or wait-in-the-pouring-rain-for-the-bus handbag.

A surprising number of us here at tPF have been lucky enough to find "brand-new" classic and vintage Coaches with the original tags and paperwork and sometimes even the box, because some people who bought them or got them as gifts just tucked them away unused in a closet for that special occasion that never came. A barely-used classic pre-China Coach isn't so rare that someone should worry about it based JUST on its newness. Styles made after 2000 with original tags and paperwork are another story - those need to be looked at carefully. Almost all Chinese or third-world fakes of post-2000 styles came with fake paperwork, tags, dustbags, and even receipts, sometimes even more than the genuine ones. And not just for handbags either, but for shoes, scarves, wallets, keychains, clothing, and anything else they could fake.
hee hee - I will carry it every day to work! I did buy it. RE: disposability, I probably have every bag I have ever purchased since 1990. Yes, bins and bins of them! I started out with Coach, Dooney Burke, and Cole Haan, then some cheaper kinds like Franco Sarto, but for the last 15 years or so, I pretty much only buy ones made in Italy (new from department store), or only ones with very very soft leather if not made in Italy. I have a 1990s station bag that I used to carry every day - it's amazing how good it still looks. I've started carrying it sporadically again in fact. This blog has helped me SO MUCH when looking at bags on ebay.
 
No it doesn't. That's not the style number. Please read and save the six Salearea Coacxh Guides posted at Ebay especially the ones explaining Creeds and Serial Numbers.
http://www.ebay.com/gsr/i.html?uid="salearea"&rmvSB=true

The Station Bag is genuine, from the late 1980s.

I'm sorry - I thought it said the much earlier bags did not have the model number. So I expected this one was "new" enough to have it. argh.
The first serial numbers that contained the style were made in 1994. So any serial numbers prior to 1994 are random and unique numbers. (There are exceptions though. Many fakes have "random" looking serial numbers but they aren't unique; many fakes have the same number(s).)
 
Bought is wallet from a thrift store hoping it is real. Please help! Thank you!!

Item: Coach Checkbook Wallet

Bought: thrift store

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It's an Ashley leather checkbook wallet.
Would you please take a peek at these 2 from yesterday? Told you my luck was changing, hehe! Thank you [emoji846]

Item: Signature Lurex Mia
Seller: local Goodwill
Comments: that horse/carriage charm is new to me

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Authentic.
Second one... thanks!

Item: Legacy Signature Suede Hobo (am I close?)
Seller: local Goodwill
Comments: hoping U plant code moved to China!

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Authentic.
 
I'm curious about this "unique" listing.The creed has notches and the stamping doesn't match other E6B creeds (and on the off chance it's 1998, it's not a match to a J8B creed either.)

Item: Lexington tote
Seller - slidin
http://www.ebay.com/itm/COACH-Legac...-Hobo-Tote-Handbag-Shoulder-Bag-/152467968196
Item number - 152467968196

Opinions? Confirmation? TIA!

First picture is from the listing in question. Others are comps.
slidin coach ?Lexington? E6B-4181 creed.jpg
coach E6B creed 1.jpg coach E6B creed 2.jpg coach E6B creed 3.JPG

ETA: If the creed on the listing in question isn't large enough to read, here's a full size image:
slidin coach ?Lexington? E6B-4181 creed.jpg
 
The first serial numbers that contained the style were made in 1994. So any serial numbers prior to 1994 are random and unique numbers. (There are exceptions though. Many fakes have "random" looking serial numbers but they aren't unique; many fakes have the same number(s).)
I did not expect that the bag was prior to 1994, and that's why I thought it was weird that the last four digits weren't the model. How do you determine that it was made prior to 1994? I haven't come across that info yet. Or is it a matter of "I just know" because you've seen just about everything? I have a station bag that I bought in the 90s some time so I had no idea they had been making them for so long. I have to get mine out and see what its creed looks like. I would have purchased it new at somewhere like Macy's.
 
I'm curious about this "unique" listing.The creed has notches and the stamping doesn't match other E6B creeds (and on the off chance it's 1998, it's not a match to a J8B creed either.)

Item: Lexington tote
Seller - slidin
http://www.ebay.com/itm/COACH-Legac...-Hobo-Tote-Handbag-Shoulder-Bag-/152467968196
Item number - 152467968196

Opinions? Confirmation? TIA!

First picture is from the listing in question. Others are comps.
View attachment 3761816
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ETA: If the creed on the listing in question isn't large enough to read, here's a full size image:
View attachment 3761821

I don't think it's genuine either. The serial number fonts are wrong, compare the base of the number Ones to this genuine one, and the serifs at the ends of the letter N with the genuine one.. The Coach New York stamp on the front looks a little crooked, and the lining isn't right, the Lexingtons never used striped lining, they used the Coach LOGO lining. The lighter and darker stripes are different widths which they're NOT in the genuine Sonoma lining. Coach never used a striped lining like that wide-narrow pattern but I just saw it in another fake a few weeks ago.The uneven deep/shallow creed stamping is another problem.

I'm seeing an "8" year code. If it was a 6 it would be definitely fake, the Lexingtons weren't introduced until the early 1998 catalog although a few were already in production in very late 1997.

1998_B-plant-US-B8B-4156-lg-b.jpg 1998_B-plant-outlet-J8B-9053-a.jpg 1998_B-plant-prob FAKE_E8B-4181-a.jpg
 
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I did not expect that the bag was prior to 1994, and that's why I thought it was weird that the last four digits weren't the model. How do you determine that it was made prior to 1994? I haven't come across that info yet. Or is it a matter of "I just know" because you've seen just about everything? I have a station bag that I bought in the 90s some time so I had no idea they had been making them for so long. I have to get mine out and see what its creed looks like. I would have purchased it new at somewhere like Macy's.

All serial numbers in genuine bags made in 1994 through the present will have at least ONE LETTER OF THE ALPHABET IN THE FIRST HALF OF THE SERIAL NUMBER. The month code is always a letter ("official" letters for the month codes were A thru M except of the letter "i", but rarely an "i" or an "n" was mistakenly used by plants whose employees hadn't "read the memo").

The letter for the month code was usually the first digit but sometimes the digits in the first part of the serial would get scrambled up, but 1994 and newer numbers will ALWAYS include at least one letter in the serial prefix.
 
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