China Fashionistas Get Best Deals on Gucci, Hermes Bling: Retail – Bloomberg
Lets say your name is Laura Buccellati and your dream has always been to design and sell your own luxury purses and handbags. You are a descendant of the famous, Milan-based jewelry company, Buccellati, which makes high-end jewelry and silver products and sells them worldwide. (In fact, earlier this year, Buccellati released the most expensive bejeweled iPad and iPhone covers ever offered, which list for $485,000 and $208,000, respectively). You have been frustrated with the conduct of the familys business, and you feel unfulfilled in your role there, so you sell your interest and start a new handbag company in Florida called Laura Buccellati LLC. You are not concerned with name brand confusion because there are many similarities in the fashion industry Calvin Klein and Anne Klein and Lloyd Klein, Mark Jacobs and Adam Jacobs, Diane Von Furstenberg and Egon Von Furstenberg. People really seem to like your handbags and you start to make money.
Guests were invited by mail to the four-hour sale, at a hotel in the citys West Lake district, and barred from taking pictures, according to a story posted on the website of the Peoples Daily, the official newspaper of Chinas Communist Party. Price Difference One aim is to keep Chinese shoppers such as Ann Hu from taking gorden coklat their wallets to Europe. On a trip to Milan in July, the 27-year-old marketing executive from Shanghai picked up a Loewe leather handbag for 8,000 yuan , about half what she would have forked over in China. The price difference between Europe and the mainland can pay for a round-trip ticket for me to Paris or Milan, explains Hu, whos collected luxury bags since she was 23. If I could do that and holiday for a few days there, why wouldnt I? China imposes duties as high as 25percent on imported products such as leather handbags, dresses, shoes, and watches, depending on their value, according to data from the World Trade Organization . The country also levies consumption taxes of 20 percent on high-end watches and 30percent for cosmetics. The effect of taxes and a price markup means luxury branded items end up costing 50percent more in China than in Europe, said Sanford C.
Why COACH, Michael Kors, Apple, GM and New Balance are Succeeding in China – Forbes
I provide companies with go to market, expansion, consumer engagement, and supply chain strategies and implementation in China. Key areas of concentration are consumer products, retail, luxury, healthcare and automotive. I have completed projects and campaigns for more than 200 multinational as well as small and medium sized enterprises in China. I was previously managing director of China BrightStar, a china-focused consulting firm, and VP at Beijing Gongmei, a Chinese manufacturing conglomerate. I regularly appear in the media and am a frequent speaker at conferences, universities and special events providing insight on Chinese business, politics and culture. I am currently co-authoring a book on Chinas consumers to be published by J. Wiley and Sons in 2014.
China Fashionistas Get Best Deals on Gucci, Hermes Bling – Yahoo Finance
More from Bloomberg.com: Retooled Hamas Bloodies Israel With Help From Hezbollah Likewise, at a downtown Shanghai outlet of Kering SA (KER)’s Gucci, a light pink Soho leather shoulder bag was discounted 30 percent to slightly more than 12,000 yuan, about the same price as a similar bag in the U.S., Bloomberg Businessweek reports in its Sept. 1 issue. Several forces are fueling the price slides. Sales in China of goods from Europe’s most prestigious fashion houses have been damped by the government’s anti-graft campaign, which has curbed gift-giving. And steep import and consumption taxes on luxury goods bought in China have led an increasing number of wealthy locals to shop more while overseas. More from Bloomberg.com: Hook-Up Culture at Harvard, Stanford Wanes Amid Assault Alarm Left with stacks of unsold merchandise in their mainland stores, high-end brands are resorting to something they rarely had to do earlier: price-cutting. “Even during the financial crisis, I don’t think we saw this amount of discounting,” said Franklin Yao, managing partner of Shanghai-based SmithStreet, which advises companies on their China strategies. “Inventory has become an issue for brands across the board, and this is a big problem.” More from Bloomberg.com: India to Unveil First Warship to Deter Chinese Submarines Slower Spending Consultancy Bain estimates that Chinese purchased a third of all luxury goods sold globally in 2013, but growth in luxury spending in mainland China will slow to 2 percent this year after rising 30 percent in 2011, it forecasts.