We are kicking off a day of gift ideas in honor of Black Friday, the official start of the holiday season. First off, let's check out the latest offering from one of the big department stores. Nordstrom has jumped on the extravagant gift bandwagon with their
Ultimate Gift Collection. The four one-of-a kind gift packages include a family portrait session with celebrity photographer Sam Jones which costs $50,000; a custom couch designed by Tory Burch in a silk Ikat print fabric hand-picked by Tory Burch and manufactured by Century Furniture in Hickory, N.C. for $15,000; a dream armoire designed and stocked by Juicy Couture (Two armoires are available at $15,000 each0; and custom artwork by artist Ruben Toledo, a larger-than-life, (12'x 20'), personalized painting. The package includes a pre-consultation at your home, a completed painting and professional installation of the finished work for $200,000.
More bad news for Saks Fifth Avenue. As our sister blog Daily Finance reported, Saks has released its second quarter results beating analysts' expectations by posting a loss of $54.5 million, or 39 cents per share on sales of $561.7 million. Same store sales were down 15.5 percent. None of this is too surprising, luxury shopping has been taking a huge hit in this economy. But what is compelling is that Saks saving grace may end up being its discount outlets. An AP story said that the less-expensive Off 5th stores are doing better than Saks' full-price stores. This news comes as Nordstrom, which has also been having a rough time in this market has announced that is expanding its discount chain, Nordstrom Rack. The question I have is with the boom of outlet stores and the success of discount stores like Marshalls and TJ Maxx, who will be left to buy the items at their original prices? The discount market relies on the fact that department stores exist and that some buyers are willing to pay the premium to have their choice of designer goods. If the luxury brand buyers switch to buying the brands only at discounted rates it remains to be seen how the structure of shopping will change. I suppose the good news in this for luxury retailers is that the shopping impulse is alive and well in U.S. consumers, they just aren't willing to spend the big bucks currently.
Nordstrom
After sending out correspondents to 12 stores of 5 different luxury department store chains in 6 cities across the country, the 
