Yes. I was considering purchasing the Tiffany Swing bracelet for several years, but couldn't get past the ridiculously high price tag, typical of Tiffany. The bracelet is platinum with 1.6 carats of very tiny diamonds. It's worth about 1/3 of the $7100 price tag. Recently the bracelet showed up on bluenile for $2400 - same diamond quality and carat weight, but in 18kt white gold. I haven't bought it yet, but wouldn't think twice about the ethics of it, because its' a fair price.
I only buy in to that 'paying for design' BS to a certain extent. If there are only a few hundred of a designer item/design manufactured, then there's legitimate merit to the value of the design, and I expect to pay more for the item. But when places like Tiffany come up with a design and start stamping them out by the gazillions, the value of the design decreases dramatically with every unit made and sold. When places like Tiffany start to get real with their pricing, I'll pay a little more for their 'original' designs, but not the assinine premium they try to pawn off on customers. In the meantime, if someone comes up with a high quality look-alike that meets my needs, I'm right on board.
But as long as people buy in to the notion that they should be paying ridiculous prices for the design of designer goods, the designers are perfectly willing to inflate the prices to help further the notion that the buyer is paying extra for 'luxury'.
I work at a company with many divisions. In the division I work in, we design items that there'll be only 1-6 of the widgets made, ever. Other divisions design household type items that'll be made by the millions. The cost of the design of the household items is spread out over the millions that are sold. The cost of the design of the 1-6 items that'll be made is very, very steep for the buyer. Fashion designers try to create an image of exclusivity to help justify the prices. But when there are drawers full of an item being sold at shops in all major (and some smaller) cities around the world, the item is not exclusive, no matter how you cut it. And the cost of the design should be watered down by the mass production of these items.