Luxury brands make bad moves to garner sales
Does the recession we’re entering (or have been in for a long time now, depending upon whom you ask) spell the end of luxury spending? Of course not, but it has forced both luxury good makers and retailers to change their strategies, often for the worse.
Some luxury retailers, like Bergdorf Goodman, are reaching out, cold calling potential customers to personally invite them to the store. And some luxury good makers are reducing the quality of their products rather than raising their prices. Bulgari has stopped polishing the underside of a $10,000 watch and is using less expensive packaging.
I don’t think this is a sensible course of action. In my opinion, it’s more harmful to a brand to lower its quality than to raise its prices. There will always be price insensitive customers, it just becomes a little more difficult to find them during a recession. The marketing has to be better. Tarnishing the brand will make it more difficult for the brand to recover when business returns to “normal.”
I wholeheartedly agree with you Isaac. When you’re dealing with luxury clientèle, under no circumstance should quality be jeopardized. There will always be consumers with minimal price sensitivity. It is why luxury brands exist and continue to exist. It’s upsetting to think that a company as powerful as Bulgari wouldn’t take this deal breaking factor into consideration. Thanks for the insight.