Your recent purchases

[iSuck]

Re: Your recent acquisition

[quote user="Faust"][quote user="iSuck"][quote user="firstlove"][quote user="Faust"][quote user="iSuck"]


[quote user="CHRIS"] how much? and how much were the raf sandals too by the way?[/quote]

$495. $995.

[/quote]

lol, wow, that's really ridiculous.

[/quote]

holy shit.. it REALLY is ridiculous!!.. [72]

[/quote]

I'd say no less ridiculous than any other designer markup from brands discussed/purchased here.

Nice boots, you can tell people they're made from an Elephant.

[/quote]

Ahh, no. They are fucking sandals - that is a sole and a couple of straps, not even leather ones. It is preposterous of them to charge that. I can somehow very remotely understand the $2200 gloves last season, because they are a pretty complicated piece of work (although the price is still bonkers), but I really can't understand this...

[/quote]

Some may argue that you're paying a premium when it comes to "design"-- be it ablended cotton/poly/silk whateverasymetrical back seam tshirt or some patent leather, rubber and nylon to put on your feet. Added incentive in some cases if the item is "rare".

[laika]

Re: Your recent acquisition

I too was amazed at the price of the sandals when I saw them. The boots must cost an absolute fortune! [79]

[philip nod]

Re: Your recent acquisition

i swear to god that the foul sandals i saw at seven were 1295, boots 1895~~

[Faust]

Re: Your recent acquisition

[quote user="iSuck"][quote user="Faust"][quote user="iSuck"][quote user="firstlove"][quote user="Faust"][quote user="iSuck"]


[quote user="CHRIS"] how much? and how much were the raf sandals too by the way?[/quote]

$495. $995.

[/quote]

lol, wow, that's really ridiculous.

[/quote]

holy shit.. it REALLY is ridiculous!!.. [72]

[/quote]

I'd say no less ridiculous than any other designer markup from brands discussed/purchased here.

Nice boots, you can tell people they're made from an Elephant.

[/quote]

Ahh, no. They are fucking sandals - that is a sole and a couple of straps, not even leather ones. It is preposterous of them to charge that. I can somehow very remotely understand the $2200 gloves last season, because they are a pretty complicated piece of work (although the price is still bonkers), but I really can't understand this...

[/quote]

Some may argue that you're paying a premium when it comes to "design"-- be it ablended cotton/poly/silk whateverasymetrical back seam tshirt or some patent leather, rubber and nylon to put on your feet. Added incentive in some cases if the item is "rare".

[/quote]

That's a given - but this is an extreme premium, way too extreme. Actually, it's downright stupid. I'm sorry, your money is yours to spend, but let me just say that designers will charge whatever the market will bear and you are helping them and pricing consumers like me out of the market.

[philip nod]

Re: Your recent acquisition

you should be happy in this case

[Faust]

Re: Your recent acquisition



[quote user="philip nod"]you should be happy in this case
[/quote]

why?

[iSuck]

Re: Your recent acquisition

I don't think one pair of sandals or boots from a desiger is indicative of people being priced out of the market when there is plenty of stuff on the rack that is still rather "reasonable" for designer goods.

[Faust]

Re: Your recent acquisition



[quote user="iSuck"]I don't think one pair of sandals or boots from a desiger is indicative of people being priced out of the market when there is plenty of stuff on the rack that is still rather "reasonable" for designer goods.[/quote]

[86] well, i am not saying that you are single handedly buoying the overpriced market, but you are part of a collective.

[philip nod]

Re: Your recent acquisition

[quote user="Faust"]

[quote user="philip nod"]you should be happy in this case
[/quote]

why?

[/quote]

that you're priced out of the raf sandals market

[Faust]

Re: Your recent acquisition

[quote user="philip nod"][quote user="Faust"]

[quote user="philip nod"]you should be happy in this case
[/quote]

why?

[/quote]

that you're priced out of the raf sandals market

[/quote]

[86] look, the things is, both good and bad, is that the consumer supports the designer. funnily enough, the american male consumer supported neither Ann nor Raf at the HEIGHT of their creative careers - therefore the dept. stores dropped them. And now we get this Raf mediocrity at outrageous prices snapped up, which will probably result in more mediocrity. Call me paranoid.

[philip nod]

Re: Your recent acquisition

i think jil sander has contributed more to raf mediocrity than anything. he's got the mainstream hetero wrapped up w jil, so he can go avant garde flame in his own line.

[deuxmille]

Re: Your recent acquisition



We also don't know how much the store is making on them. I think they pride themselves as being the only store in the us that ordered them or something like that, so perhaps their markup is also higher than usual.

Still ridiculously expensive for a leather sole.

[ddohnggo]

Re: Your recent acquisition

it'd be dope if you could build legos around the sandal top to cover your foot.

[Who?]

Re: Your recent acquisition



[quote user="ddohnggo"]it'd be dope if you could build legos around the sandal top to cover your foot.
[/quote]

[74]

[bakla]

Re: Your recent acquisition

re: Raf's unpopular sandals, if CCP made something that looked less Lego and more 'Atelier-esque', would people complain less about the price? I think the main complaints stem from a disagreement that this style, which some find so vehemently unattractive, is deserving of such a high price tag. But there're more factors than that. But the process of designing and selling something as fashion is pretty much the same. It will be long, but I'll try and explain what I know.

[quote user="deuxmille"]

We also don't know how much the store is making on them. I think they pride themselves as being the only store in the us that ordered them or something like that, so perhaps their markup is also higher than usual.

Still ridiculously expensive for a leather sole.

[/quote]

This is key information. I don't know if anyone else aside on SZ aside from Zamb is aware of the process of fashion & accessories creation and retail, so let me try to explain it as I know it:

Fashion is created a year in advance and shown about 6 - 8 months in advance, depending on the companies. Big names like Raf will show at the shows, while others like accessory designers (like Rafe New York, who I used to work for) have to design and show ahead of the major houses and hope that their instincts are either right on trend with designers or will actually create trends that the big designer names won't.

Development begins always a year in advance, with material sourcing, multiple samples made, approvals and adjustments, and then showings to the buyers. Along the way, some styles get canceled if the samples /factories just don't work out right, or if materials get canceled or are suddenly unavailable, or deliveries from vendors come in wrong, etc. This happens ALL the time. Then there's a second slew of cancellations, from the items that do not sell/appeal enough to the buyers at the shows (this is why there are Sample Sales, for the samples that designers create to show to the buyers, in an effort to recoup some development costs).

Cancellations happen a lot to the more forward designs, because buyers, especially in the US, tend to buy the more conservative styles. More conservative means more people will 'get it' and they can maximize their sales. Both designers and buyers MAY make exceptions and order more avant garde styles for press purposes, especially if the press loves a certain style that they intend to cover a lot (Press get shown the collections before buyers, buyers will see things at the shows and back at the showroom after). For example, the Raf gloves from last Fall? ALL OVER THE PLACE, probably the same exact pair of gloves were lent left and right for fashion shoots and magazines, but how many stores in the US ordered them? Two. Seven, which got one pair, and Barneys, which got two, one for NYC and one for Beverly Hills (which I bought, on sale). In the entire US. Barneys probably bought them so that when magazines in the US would feature them, they could get the credit, which is free advertising. And of those three gloves, only ONE pair sold at full price, everything else sold only on sale. This is key for pricing - prices are often marked up a certain degree especially on rarified items, to make up for the fact that because you can't get volume discounts on making so few pieces to begin with, and you might not make even your costs if these end up only selling at a substantial discount. It all becomes a very complicated juggling act, not necessarily to make a huge profit but sometimes, just to stay in business.

So why make interesting styles if they tend to be a hard sell? Because designers want to design, and will often take a chance on something that's bound to bomb because they want their point of view out there, literally regardless of the cost. And frankly, consumers like us here on SZ will complain that boring plain styles are being perpetuated all the time to sell, but really, how many of us buy entire collections at full price? The bulk of our purchasing happens at sale time it seems, because as much as we admire the crazier things, there's still not THAT huge a customer base for specialty items. Seven is the sort of store that likes to have the wild, crazy stuff that no one else will get because they like unusual things, which is one reason to order form them - they keep that Editorial purchase possible at the store level, beyond the samples item on the page.

Anyhow aside from all product development feeding into a designers' cost, the numbers they end up ordering affect how those items that weren't ordered in large quantities will cost as well. Shoes, for example, especially such unusual sandals as the ones iSuck purchased, require so many parts and different materials that all need to be ordered in minimum quantities in advance based on hopeful sales predictions (which, to make cost effective, require that you sell a certain amount). If the mills tell the designer that they need to order a minimum of X number of hides and X number of yards of webbing in various colors, then to even just break even on the sandals, they may need to foresee selling certain quantities of them, especially since they're very 'editorial' i.e. a hard sell. If Seven is the only store that ordered them in the US, you can bet Raf really didn't make too many of these sandals...which, because they're footwear require you make and order in a minimum number of size runs. You can't just order a size 41 and a 42, you need to order a minimum range to accommodate potential customers. So to do that, designers need to predict a year in advance how much material they will order to create a run of something that might not even sell... and either eat the cost (which affects their bottom line and how they stay in business) or charge high for them.

Just some of the factors that go into the price of an item like iSuck's Raf sandals. It may not justify the cost to a customer, but I can see why it may have cost so much. This could easily have been canceled before it reached the stores, unless Raf committed to producing them no matter what.