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I’ve been thinking - the bourbon world functions similarly to Hermes, albeit with a few less 0’s on prices (usually). DH is a bourbon guy and we had the following exchange at our local wine & spirits shop recently. For context, this shop is 2 blocks from our house and we buy regularly from them but don’t spend a whole lot - I mean like less than $1k / year (I like wine ok?!). The shop employees know us by sight, although not by name. We popped in to get a bottle of wine and DH was looking at the bourbons when one of the owners started chatting with him:
Owner: you looking for anything in particular today?
DH: no just browsing
Owner: we’ve got some [insert rare bourbon name here] in the back if you’re interested. We don’t put it out on the shelves otherwise it’d be gone in a second, but since you’re a regular, it’s available if you want it. We literally have people that follow the delivery trucks around and buy it up as it gets unloaded.
DH: really? How much?
Owner: $80 [DH says this is a $150 bottle on the secondary market]
DH: Great, I’ll take one.
These “rare” bourbons are produced in limited quantities, be it due to a longer aging process, special edition recipe, or what have you. Either through real or artificial scarcity, demand outpaces supply for these bottles. They can be difficult to find in store, maybe only released once a year, and typically go for a premium price on the secondary market (Sound familiar!?)
Back to my bottle shop experience recently, it was pretty clear that the bottle of bourbon was “tied” to our patronage/loyalty to the store aka “being a good customer”* rather than tied to explicitly buying x or y product, again sounds exactly like my personal experience with H.
I only recently, this last visit, brought up “quota” bags with my SA, more specifically that I’d like to add a new bag with a strap as my next bag and the convo naturally gravitated to the Kelly & Constance (among others). I only (“only” in H world lol) spend a few thousand $ per year (<$5k), mostly on shoes and leather goods. My SA and I had an open convo about leather types of each bag, likely availability of what, etc and she said “it just comes down to when we get x or y in!” I totally get that means depends on when they get x or y relative to who else wants it 😁but not once has she ever mentioned “building a profile” in different categories, suggested I try out different maisons, or tried to hint at me buying more. In fact she talks me out of things! Clearly I’ve not gotten the bag we discussed yet, so who knows how it’ll work out, but I’ve been working with her for 5 years and would hope at this point she’s not just blowing smoke up my a**. I very much left with the impression that if she has something that matches what I’m after, it would be available to me.
I can only speak from my personal experience, and in no way want to diminish or dismiss those who have had different encounters of SA’s being more explicit on buy x to get y.
*I would consider spend/$$ just 1 aspect of being a “good customer” along with consistency, ease of doing business with, among other qualitative factors.
Totally OT, but DH tells me that in his convos with bourbon store owners, it seems their stock of rare bourbons is very much tied to the purchase of x number of cases of less desirable liquor from their distributors. Literally as explicit as “well I’ve got a case of [rare bourbon] and I’ll sell it to you if you buy 10 cases of fireball too. So the tying is more from distributor to store front, rather than store to consumer. Interesting to think what if each of our boutiques’ stock of bags was tied to their sale of other goods!?
If you’ve made it this far, thank you for sticking with my ramblings. All in all, this seems to be a very shades-of-grey issue for H, certainly not black and white and I’ll be interested to see how it plays out.
Yes, other brands do this, too. LV is a great example. It’s why LV CAs are always pushing leather bags over canvas - the commission is higher.
I think that is the intent of H and you’re the type of customer they want and are marketing to. They truly want their clients to love and appreciate the brand. Not those who have been influenced by social media for 1-2 items.
Again, I think any SA would know that you're someone who will buy with them (and make them commissions) for the long term and not just to get a Birkin, and that makes a big difference.
@MonsoonBirkin , thanks for the link. In accordance with your second sentence re monopoly, the article seems to posit that both cases are dead in the water bc the plaintiffs cannot show that Hermes kills off its competitors, defined as those businesses that sell the belts, scarves, RTW, accessories, teacups etc. I thought it was interesting that the courts are reluctant to define a market with a single brand. So the market would not be simply the Hermes Birkin but leather bags. The article specifically stated that the antitrust issue is not whether it is hard for the prospective client to get a QB ( the same argument as an art collector who is not on the galleries preferred list. ETA: summarizing it bc the first time I opened the link, I saw the article; the second time I got a paywall
Yeah, it's a tough climb. I went back to the initial complaint to figure out how the Plaintiffs were going about the monopoly component. That was (and still is) a big mystery to me because I wasn't sure how they intend to play that--are they claiming market power over handbags, monopoly power over the Birkin, or...? I read and re-read the filing and still can't make heads or tails of what they're going for.
