luxury trends

Spending Returns to the Luxury Market or Please Pass the Ferragamos

Wearing the same pair of Manolo's may have been fine for 2009, but frugality and self-denial has simply grown tiresome for the wealthiest Americans and the nouveau riche Chinese. Global sales of luxury items are beating expectations, according to the results of a new study.

People, this is seriously good news! While the fact that people were shopping at the 99-Cent Store did little to kick the recession to the sidelines, economists have been saying right along that what was needed was a return of consumer confidence and for consumption to begin in earnest. While we're holding our collective breathes for jobs to be created so we can actually start spending again, relief came from an unsuspected corner: The rich, it seems, have grown bored with their wardrobes. Being seen twice in the same dress was just so 2009!

The study by Bain & Co. has forecast that sales of designer clothes, leather goods, watches, jewelry and other indulgences would surge 10 percent in 2010, recovering from a sit-on-your-Dolce-&-Gabbana-wallet 8 percent decline in 2009. The study was commissioned by Italy's Fondazione Altagamma association of high-end producers.

Sales in the U.S. market grew up 12 percent. Asia saw a 22 percent growth in high-end spending and European shoppers spent 6 percent more. Leather goods, which held steady despite the 2009 dramatic decline, is predicted to grow by 16 percent in 2010.

Of course the holiday season will be the litmus test. And even Bain is hedging its bets a bit, saying growth could range from 9 percent to about 11 percent, depending on shopper turnout.

The real story though may be coming from Asia, where the Chinese are powering luxury sales to the point where they grew a whopping 30 percent. Chinese tourists have begun traveling the world and spending as they go.

Some other encouraging factoids: larger brands are faring better than smaller ones -- perhaps because they had the resources to weather the recession. And menswear is growing faster than womenswear -- for which there is simply no explanation known to (wo)mankind.

Tags: luxury shopping, luxury spending, luxury trends

Luxury Trends for 2011: The Latest From The Luxury Institute

by Susan Kime (RSS feed) —

The Luxury Institute conducts independent research with wealthy consumers about their behaviors and attitudes on customer experience best practices. Their white papers on luxury trends and consumer attitude change emerge consistently throughout the year. The most recent was published on October 10, 2011, on emerging luxury trends for 2011..

The Institute states, " As the luxury industry enters the last quarter of 2010 and prepares for 2011, executives are grateful for what could have been a worse year considering the state of the world's economy. The truly global top-tier luxury brands are surging in China, while holding their own in the US, Japan, and Europe. Leading public companies have done much better than privately-owned brands by using their heritage, innovation, and resources to gain market share. Many family-owned European brands, rich with history but lacking innovation, have suffered and are desperately looking for capital. Overall, the industry has seen tepid growth; this trend is likely to continue for the next three years unless some unforeseen, and highly unlikely, positive event occurs and saves the global economy."

Tags: IPad, ipads, Jean-Noel Kapferer, luxury brand management, luxury brands and e-commerce, Luxury Institute, Luxury Institute 2011 Trends, Luxury Institute LCRMA Association, luxury trends, trends, trendspotting, Zappos

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From Conspicuous to Conscious Consumption: Redesigning the Meaning of Luxury

by Susan Kime (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Wealth, By Design

Looking for the green shoots of optimism is not easy -- especially after two winters of discontent. Yet, there appears to be a resurgence of optimism, a new energy that may have the power to redesign as it redefines new ways of perceiving the idea and the reality of luxury.

On the plus side is the Wall Street Journal. In the 03/08/2010 article entitled The Ten Best Places For Second Homes, Steven M. Sears declared, "At long last, the market for luxury real estate is coming back to life. Prices for primary residences, which plunged at least 20% from the peak in 2007, appear to have bottomed. In some of the snappiest locations, scattered bidding wars are breaking out and prices are turning upward. In Greenwich, Conn., realty brokers say, the final months of 2009 were almost record-setters for sales volume, as two years of pent-up demand was unleashed."

Also pertinent are data in the newest Wealth Report (3/15/10), with inferences that seem promising: "Retail chains post a 3.7% increase in February comps, with luxury outperforming the overall group. Consumers are again indulging in luxury purchases."

Could this mean that the 2009 severe recession earthquake is behind us? Well, hopefully. But it's necessary to remember the concept of false positives. In medicine, economics, statistics, pregnancy tests and LIFE, they are results that look good but, after the dust settles, may not yield the results originally expected. Consistently valid results take time. So with the shoots of hope within the numbers above, there is still room/time for questioning. We receive clearer pictures as time goes on, understanding that hope should be tempered by the economic history of the recent past.

Maybe the consensus of philosophers and economists were right – that it takes trauma to change minds and actions, and because of this unexpected economic jolt, what has also changed over the past 18 or more months is an unexpected evolution in the definitions and dimensions of luxury.

Tags: Abercrombie Kent Residence Club, changes in luxury buying, consequences of recession, CRM, Exclusive Resorts, Exquisite Safaris, luxury buying, luxury trends, second home buying

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