Can someone explain the appeal of expensive Hermès bags to me

[KellyK2026]

I don’t know how, but I recently got sucked into watching a bunch of Love Luxury videos on YouTube which features rich people buying expensive Hermes bags. Can someone please explain the obsession with Hermes bags? To me, they look very basic or just plain ugly. I cannot fathom why someone would pay £20,000-200k on a bag which costs a fraction of that price to produce and was mostly made in China. I’d rather get a good quality bag which has been handcrafted locally for £200 or less. Someone please explain it to me?!

Acquiring luxury branded goods are a symbol of social status.

So Hermes is an example of a company that sells ethically controversial products alongside non-ethically controversial products.

Are you also condemning people that buy some products and not others from equally chequered companies? Nestle and Unilever for palm oil products? Apple for devices with mining supply chains? Nike for their criticised supply chains and environmentally damaging synthetic materials? Toyota for their excessive petrol vehicles? McDonalds, Burger King and KFC for intensive meat production?

Are you condemned for buying the McDonalds apple pies or McFlurries if you steer clear of the battery chickens and the gassed pigs for their pork? Are you condemned for getting the Toyota EV as long as you don't buy a gas guzzler?

Are you OK to buy a jar of palm-oil free Nescafe from Nestle, but condemned if you buy a palm-oil containing KitKat from them?

Or is that OK because a KitKat costs the consumer £1? Despite KitKat's making nestle £2.8 billion a year from retail when Hermes Birkins only make £200 million?

I do condemn Apple and other companies but, again, a lot of the brands you listed are absolutely unavoidable in the modern world. Nestle, for example, owns a significant amount of the food industry. You can not avoid it. People need to eat. They need to use a phone. They need to drive a car because our infrastructure is set up for motor vehicles and not other modes of travel. But most people in the world have avoided buying a Hermes handbag. That is totally avoidable. You don’t just walk into a shop and accidentally come out with a 10k bag. It’s a very intentional act. Hermes does not have a monopoly on fashion or handbags and there are plenty of ethical alternatives. Your argument is totally invalid.

God the OP is boring me with her preaching now. Anyone up for a frivolous handbag thread?

Then don’t be here?

I'm equating a life with a life.

And that’s a very simplistic way of viewing it.

One of dh’s clients ( a multi millionaire btw) gave me a birkin for Christmas.
I took it to the Love Luxury place to value it only to find out that it was a fake
I was so embarrassed . I am sure that they thought that I was attempting to pull a fast one

Oh my god that would be embarrassing! I think it happens a lot though. To be fair a lot of the fake ones are very convincing nowadays.

@Ruthietuthie They sounds great quality. If I had the money I would probably want a bag of that quality...probably not a reptilian one though! Do you think you pay a lot extra for the brand name?

You absolutely do not need to eat a KitKat or own a Toyota EV. You absolutely can avoid Nestle – it's very easy, they do not have a monopoly on the market.

By your own standards – don't align with brands that you don't ethically align with and then you won't accidentally walk out of Tesco with a KitKat.

You have simply chosen Hermes because they are particularly expensive, and for some reason high price point brands seem to be on the chopping block when low-cost items aren't – regardless of them being a necessity.

A Toyota EV will set you back £40k – another high-ticket item that you won't accidentally walk out the showroom with. Toyota certainly don't have a monopoly on the market either – why not choose a Volvo/Polestar who are among the top-rated for ethical standards and transparency?

Or is it just bags?

I thought you said you had watched some videos and had only just become aware of these 20 - 200k bags. Who exactly are these people you know who have sold theirs because they were scared to take them out?

@Bobbieiris, I am sure there is a lot of extra for the brand-name, yes. I imagine the mark-up is comparable to other luxury brands, but maybe less than some lower-tier luxury brands (a Christian Dior book tote is often given as an example of something that is priced ridiculously higher than the cost to make, whereas with Hermes you can see the quality and value in the leather, stitching, and in the commitment to service).
The fact that they a) aren't AS expensive if you buy direct from Hermes, and b) hold their value really well, does make a difference too, to how I perceive their value.
I also didn't buy things I didn't want as "Birkin bait," as you sometimes see people on-line do. My SA is my husband's mother's SA. I buy a couple of the silk scarves whenever I like the pattern, some ready-to-wear (mainly coats and jackets), sometimes china, and that's it. I don't buy things I don't like (say, the costume jewelry, which I view as a waste of money) or think are over-done (the blankets or the Oran sandals).
Actually, I mostly enjoy collecting the scarves second-hand. It's a hobby of mine. I have certain designs I look for on auction sites and really enjoy tracking them down. My favorite design of all time is the Kermit Oliver design, Kachinas, which I have in lots of colors, in silk, and in cashmere. At the moment, I am looking online for the "Please check-in, woof woof!" silk scarf. It's whimsical and makes me laugh. This one is on an auction site at the moment, but I wouldn't pay that much, so I'll just keep looking until I find it cheaper.
abigail-goodman.com/products/hermes-please-check-in-woof-woof-application-91

I don't think it's the cost of the bag that makes people feel unsafe - as you say, it can be insured.

I think what makes people feel unsafe is the knowledge that a bag as expensive as that is the kind of item that you might get beaten, stabbed or shot for.

I personally wouldn't actually be worried about that, but I can see why people are.

I couldn't get excited enough about a Hermes bag to spend that sort of money on one, even if I had that kind of money to spend. But as with all things, each to their own. If that's the kind of money people have and that's what they want to spend it on, that's fine. I don't have to understand it to accept that different people like different things.

I also don't think killing animals to make expensive things is any worse than killing animals to make cheap things. My guess is that the crocodiles Hermes uses for bags are raised to much higher welfare standards than most of the beef and dairy cattle whose skins end up making cheaper bags, shoes, jackets, belts and furniture. I'm not saying I approve of raising crocodiles for leather - I don't. But I do think it's a bit more complicated than 'crocodile leather bad, cow leather good'. Although (most, not all) cow and sheep leather comes from the meat industry, it's not really a by-product of it. It's more accurate to say that it gets produced and sold alongside the meat, I think.

Agree, and I think the purpose of this thread is getting excessively vague. What started off as just 'I don't understand why anyone would spend that much money on a bag', quickly and rather chaotically turned into a thread about the ethics of crocodile farming – which seemed to be the point and then not the point depending on which post the OP was answering.

Put the magnifying glass on most consumer products and you will find a dubiously ethical practice – no point in singling out Hermes. It just gets too vague.

What do you mean who exactly are these people? Like giving you their names would make a difference?

No, I think she's referring to you describing your Hermes awareness as a recent and passing interest to the sudden claim to have in depth knowledge on an apparently deep-seated Hermes consumer issue.

You really don’t get it, do you? You don’t need an expensive bag. You do need a car in the majority of places. This conversation is going around in circles because you don’t seem to be able to grasp basic points. You know Hermes has an extensive exotic range. Everyone does. It’s something they are proud of. You can’t compare it to someone going into a supermarket and buying a bloody Kitkat. I’m sure if printed next to the Kitkat it said something along the lines of ‘look at all the horrors nestle commits’ then, yes, it would make people think twice about buying it. Most people won’t even know about Nestle and what that company has done. You know when you go in a Hermes store that they farm exotic animals because it. Is. In. Your. Face. And people like it.

Well instead of you speaking for others, how about you let her answer it?

Surely for the people who own these bags the price is a non issue. If you’re fabulously wealthy a 200k Hermes bag is like me buying a 50p carrier from Tesco, it just doesn’t register.

So whether such a bag is ‘worth the money’ is not a question. It’s just something the very wealthy have access to which shows off their financial status, but they don’t ‘value’ it as most of us think we would, its just a bag, and one of many they own once approved by Hermes as a customer.

I agree with this. It’s bizarre to me that people place so much value on a bag but, yeah, I don’t think ‘is it worth it’ even enters peoples head. And, yeah, it definitely seems to be more symbolic than anything.

@Didimum was correct, stop being so nasty because you’ve been caught out.

So, to rephrase - how do you ‘know’ people who have owned these bags but been scared to do so if you have only just seen them on a youtube video?

I never said I’ve just become aware of them. Please point out in the thread where I said that? I’ve known about Hermes for years but never paid a lot of attention to it. Yes, I’ve known people sell their Hermes bags because they didn’t feel comfortable wearing them outside. I never cared enough to ask the price of the bags but I totally understand now after seeing the prices.

It it totally unfathomable to you that some people might not feel safe wearing one?

And instead of telling other people what they should spend their own money on, why not just not buy an Hermés bag if you don't want them or disapprove of the way they operate? Why the urge to sneer at strangers about their choices which have no effect on you whatsoever?

As for what something is 'worth', it is worth whatever someone is prepared to pay for it, and this applies to everything from a banana to a penthouse. We call it supply and demand, and just because something may be worth a lot to you or me doesn't mean it will have the same value for someone else.

If I am happy to pay £10 for a banana, or £20K for a bag then that is what that banana/bag is worth.

People can buy what they want. When did I say that they can’t? I said it’s not worth it and I haven’t found anyone to convince me otherwise, but knock yourself out and buy a Hermes bag.