Are consumers full of inflation thoughts?

Bag inflation means the consumer now has to spend around £800+ for a decent luxury handbag compared to £500 just a couple of years ago. The value of any selection is also made worthless by the fickle nature of fashion. This development means a designer handbag may last just a season, if poorly selected, a bag can become outré in the space of a few months.

Bag inflation is working at every level, from low to high cost bags. The everyday customer, who a couple of years ago spent £49 on a chain store leather bag, thinking they were buying the most expensive [URL="http://www.ecsoso.com/products/LV-handbag-s668_p1.html"]LV handbags [/URL], [URL="http://www.ecsoso.com/products/Burberry-Bag-s552_p1.html"]Burberry handbags [/URL], or [URL="http://www.ecsoso.com/products/Coach-Handbag-s556_p1.html"]Coach handbags [/URL]
on the shop floor, may now be buying one at £89. They now consider that spending £89 on a chain store leather bag, is quite reasonable, and they tout it as great value for a leather bag.

The behaviour of handbag fashion is very odd when you consider how inexpensive other fashion items have become.

Whether the bag spend is £90 or £900, the customer sees the bag as a passing fashion, in just the same way as she once regarded last years clothing. The modern consumer sees the bag as the part of her wardrobe that can be added to, used, set aside, but also revived at some future date.

It is forecast that by 2010 handbag spending will be worth a billion dollars. Accessory designers are now as driven as fashion designers to produce lots of new styles that hit the seasonal mark.

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