Comparison of Eastern and Western Consumption of Luxury Diseases

There is a joke: If someone picks up a valuable handbag, if it is in Europe and the United States, the owner will be found among women over 30 years old. If it is in Asia, the owner will be found among women under 30 years old. Find the owner. Indeed, luxury goods are more popular in Asia than in their native Europe and the United States, especially among young people. Comparing the two, you will find that China and Asia are significantly different from Europe and the United States in terms of consumption concepts and cultural cognition of famous brands.

The east wind prevails over the west wind

BURBERRY, famous for its plaid pattern, is a fashion brand from the UK. Its flagship store in London was previously located on Regent Street, a fashionable shopping street where many old British brand-name stores gathered. Now it has moved to Bond Street, which is relatively quiet but has a better reputation not far away. This street stretches for hundreds of meters and is lined with stores of the world's top brands. The BURBERRY store is like other stores on the street. Most customers speak Japanese, Cantonese, Taiwanese Mandarin and increasingly Mandarin, so much so that the store has to hire Japanese and Chinese clerks.

If we say that these Asian customers are just buying souvenirs from their European travels, we are only half right. In the slum area of ??Hackney, BURBERRY's London factory is located here. There is a large factory store in the factory that sells all BURBERRY products from socks to windbreakers, from umbrellas to bags. Since it is a factory store, the price of the goods is far lower than the market price, but the packaging is crude, the display is chaotic, and they are piled up there in a disgraceful manner. From a distance, they look like street stall goods. Customers carried plastic baskets and made purchases as if they were visiting a supermarket, with smiles on their faces as they were satisfied with getting a big deal.

What’s interesting is that the customers of this store, which only locals know, are still mainly young Asian women who have lived in London for a long time, and there are very few British locals.

In fact, in areas where fashion brands are concentrated in France, Italy, the United Kingdom, and the United States, Asians are the main force.

LV is a brand that is wildly popular in Asia. There is a LV flagship store next to the Champs Elysées in Paris. 90% of the customers are Asians, especially young women from East Asia. There are so many customers that a dedicated receptionist is responsible for calling the number. The store even requires customers to show their passports and limits the number of purchases per person. Japanese and Chinese customers often buy small leather goods such as handbags and wallets, while the wives of oil tycoons from the Middle East buy large suitcases. Suitcases worth tens of thousands of francs each can be bought from large to small, three or four or more. The purchase restriction policy seems to be ineffective for them.

Although the shop assistants are extremely polite, behind the scenes is often the French’s crazy disdain for Asian luxury goods.

The reporter once had dinner with several friends from Hong Kong and the UK. Because it was made in AA format, everyone took out their wallets after the meal. When the three Hong Kong people took out their LV wallets at the same time, all the British people at the table screamed. They never imagined that every Hong Kong woman wears such expensive things like uniforms. Are they sick?

It’s all caused by vanity

Westerners generally have higher incomes. The middle class earns between three and five thousand US dollars and pounds and marks per month. They spend hundreds of yuan and one thousand yuan on luxury items. It is not difficult to taste. But in China, people's income is low, and product prices are much more expensive than in Europe and the United States due to tariffs and other reasons. Ten thousand yuan is definitely a high income, and people in this income class are the most sensitive to fashion, but ten thousand yuan is not enough to buy a Hermès handbag without eating or drinking. For many Westerners, as long as they are willing, they can buy themselves a famous brand every month. However, for most Chinese famous brand fans, if they want to buy a famous brand, it will take several months to realize their dream. .

DTC Diamond Consulting Center is an international organization responsible for promoting diamonds. The manager, Ms. Chen Xuemei, has been promoting diamond jewelry in China for many years. When she explained that Asians are keen on luxury goods consumption, she said frankly: "It's more or less due to A little vanity. People in China have become more economically powerful and can afford to spend money, so it’s not a bad idea to satisfy their vanity. In addition, some luxury goods, like diamonds, have a value-preserving effect. This is also the consumption psychology of Asians. It is indeed stronger than Europeans and Americans. ”

Relatively speaking, Westerners are older, have higher status, and have more varieties, while Easterners are younger, have lower status, and have fewer varieties. .

In the West, those who own many top-quality luxury goods are mostly over 30 years old, have successful careers, abundant income, are well-informed, and their external image tends to be mature, confident, and elegant. Personal temperament complements the gorgeous appearance of luxury goods. Lisa is the director of a museum in London and an enthusiastic fan of FENDI. She insists that luxurious brands like FENDI can only be worn by people over 30 years old. In addition to buying fashionable clothes, she also likes all kinds of famous brand porcelain, such as WEDGEWOOD and RORALDOULTON. Lisa once proudly said that although she owned many designer clothes, it was only a small part compared to her collection of famous brand household items such as porcelain and tablecloths. Those household items are her real passion. She likes to touch these exquisite things while drinking afternoon tea. Linda is a Chinese painter who married a British businessman a few years ago. Her husband was very generous. He bought a Porsche sports car for himself and a Mercedes-Benz sports car for her, but he did not let her buy top brand clothes. Her husband taught her earnestly: "In the UK, to see if a person has money, you first ask him where he lives, then what kind of car he drives, and never what he wears." It turns out that Europeans and Americans are not without vanity. Just see where it is used. In her husband's opinion, it would be too frivolous for a person without a house or a car to show off in famous brands.

It is often young girls who enjoy the top brands in China. Many people save money for a month or two and spend thousands of yuan to buy a brand-name bag or wear brand-name sunglasses. If you really don’t have enough money, just buy a fake to make yourself happy. Ms. Z, the Beijing office representative of a Fortune 500 American company, was surprised to find that although her salary was equal to the total salary of everyone in the office, after a girl bought a designer bag, those Almost all young girls carry a designer handbag. That brand is also very rare in the United States, but she herself uses an ordinary bag. Fortunately, her executive suit was of the highest quality, allowing her to maintain a sense of authority. "Those girls' clothes are relatively cheap, at most domestic famous brands, but those bags really add a lot of beauty to them." But Ms. Z had no intention of buying such a bag. She felt it was too worthless.

It is precisely because of vanity that it explains why brands like LV are so popular in Asia. Currently, "aid dating" is popular among Japanese girls, in which girls have sex with adult men, and the men buy luxury goods for them in return. Liangzi, who had received this kind of "assistance", commented on LV: It comes from a famous family and is the favorite of Empress Napoleon. It is the world's top brand in the luggage category, unrivaled. It's never discounted like most luxury goods. What's more, it is printed with a LOGO (logo), which is easily identifiable at a glance. Vanity has grown to distressing proportions. Fuguixiang inside and outside the walls

At least that’s how China’s famous brand stores are: concentrated in a five-star hotel or the city’s most exclusive department store. There are Wangfu Hotel and Guomao Mall in Beijing, Meimei Department Store and Jinjiang Dickson Mall in Shanghai, Minshan Hotel in Chengdu, and Seibu Department Store in Shenzhen. This form of building shops within shops in luxury buildings, with strict walls making these boutiques more distinguished due to their heavy fortification, seems to be insufficient to show the status of famous brands.

Beijing’s Wangfu Hotel *** has more than 50 top brands, occupying three floors above and below ground. It is currently one of the hotels with the largest number of domestic luxury brands. The brands that occupy a prominent position in the lobby on the first floor include Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Armani, Cartier, Hermès and other well-known brands, and some have guards at the door (it is said to be an international practice), which is very strict. Moreover, the business hours of the Wangfu Hotel store are open later and close earlier than other shopping malls, making it appear reserved.

Luxury consumption in the West is not as upright as in China, just like high-end communities and universities abroad have no walls. Large fashion capitals, such as New York, London, Paris, Milan, etc., have dedicated boutique streets. For example, London has Bond Street, New York has Fifth Avenue, and Paris has Place Vend?me. These streets are hundreds of meters long and lined with famous brand stores. The stores have become larger because they have broken away from the constraints of shopping malls and hotels. They are usually two or three-story buildings, so that the placement of goods and the decoration of the store can achieve the best effect, and there is enough area for display windows to enhance the brand image. The most direct and concise expression. In particular, these streets often have a long history of hundreds of years and are traditional consumption areas for the rich, so they have a deep historical and cultural accumulation.

Although this kind of boutique store does not follow the trend of luxury hotels, it still has its own aura of Guanhong.

In addition to specialized boutique streets, there are also many high-end department stores where brands gather. Taking London as an example, there are three large department stores, namely SELFRIDGE, HARVEYNICOLES and Harrods. Although these shopping malls are large in size and beautifully decorated, there are too many products, making it impossible to build a shop within a shop. No matter how famous the brands are, they are all crowded together side by side. Especially those famous brand clothes, such as Ermenegildo Zegna and Armani, have always dominated a palace in China, but in foreign department stores, they can only be hung in a string on clothes poles, allowing customers to pick and choose. . It's just like the popular products we choose in domestic shopping malls, which don't have any sense of elegance.

Shopping in a high-end department store is a completely different feeling than shopping in a specialty store. In a specialty store, it seems that there are more salespeople than customers. The clerks are polite and considerate, waiting around you like a prince or princess. They want you to try on all the clothes upstairs and downstairs. Their purpose is nothing more than to make you buy something. But no matter what, I feel very happy to be treated with such courtesy in a pleasant environment. The key to the problem is that when you step into the store, you must have good psychological endurance and be able to tolerate the slight contempt shown by the clerk when he learns that you don't want or can't afford those things.

It is different in a department store. There are not so many salespersons surrounding the constant flow of customers, and you can be free to try things without getting addicted. And it is very refreshing to see the clothes that are suffocating customers' wallets being piled hastily. This is why people are happy to go to department stores to buy things. It's a pity that there is no such shopping environment in China. Why is the brand’s moon round?

People who are well versed in famous brands transcend the stage of judging things by things. They will look at the relationship between celebrities and famous brands through famous brands, look at the economic background, the good and evil of human nature, look at the different manifestations of lifestyles, and identify with famous brands. The cultural connotation contained in it.

At present, most luxury goods in the world are rooted in the cultural soil of Europe and the United States. Due to their unique historical and cultural background, Europeans and Americans often have a deeper understanding of famous brands than Easterners. They have a clear understanding of the origin of the brand, the spiritual essence it represents and the style it expresses. It is difficult for people in China to understand the details of Western culture, and due to historical and cultural reasons, even if many people understand it, it is difficult to empathize with it, and they cannot understand why the moon of luxury goods is so round.

For example, Chanel has a famous skirt suit. When US President Kennedy was assassinated, he fell into the arms of his wife Jacqueline. Jacqueline was wearing a pink Chanel skirt suit. The profound impact of the assassination of John F. Kennedy on American society and Jacqueline's appeal in the European and American fashion circles are relatively unfamiliar to the Chinese. These are not conducive to domestic fashion fans' deep understanding of Chanel.

For another example, CD's NEWLOOK series often uses dozens of meters of high-grade fabrics and retro styles, striving to create an elegant, gorgeous, noble and sexy female image. This may be understandable in other times, but it was born in 1947, a time of extreme material poverty after World War II. At that time, France had no food, no coal for heating, no clothing, and rationed supplies of cloth. What was even worse was that there was no hope in people's hearts. Dior, the designer of NEWLOOK, wants to ignite people's hope through a beautiful image. The sleeping dreams in people's hearts were awakened. They took off their dull, rough and shabby clothes during the war and bought the cheapest fabrics to imitate NEWLOOK. The gorgeous clothes on the streets drove away the dark clouds in their hearts and ushered in the spring scenery. The government at that time was helpless in the face of the depressed French people who were going on strike all over the country. However, CD made the French regain their old dreams and hold their heads high. Domestic brand-name fans seem to be more interested in talking about how the style of CD has changed from a lady to a lady due to the joining of designer Galliano, but they know very little about why CD has a ladylike style formed by NEWLOOK.

It is precisely because of the lack of basic understanding of famous brands that some ridiculous things happened. A big-name handbag brand famous for its concept of famous ladies commissioned a survey on the brand's consumers in China. The results showed that most of the consumers are "young ladies." Rolex watches have also become a symbol of luxury in China. In fact, they are favored by many foreign artists.

In addition to natural cultural interoperability, people abroad have far more practical experience than at home. Even department stores located in slum areas have special counters selling various accessories.

In the UK alone, there are several large chain stores specializing in accessories such as CLAIRE, ACCESSORY, and TIERACK. Their density is no less than that of McDonald's and KFC in Beijing. The accessories in them are suitable for children aged two or three to the elderly. No less. It is this exquisite and elegant lifestyle that enables Westerners to receive exquisite care in every aspect of their daily lives. This is not only a reflection of high economic level and cultural literacy, but also the soil for the production and development of luxury goods.

In China, the lifestyle is relatively rough, and it is easy for the "petty bourgeoisie" group to appear, and they are ridiculed and criticized by people. Fortunately, more and more people are beginning to pay attention to their quality of life and know how to wear different accessories for different occasions. Ms. Chen Xuemei said: "Every time I go to a party, I can't wear the same clothes or the same jewelry. I have to borrow it from the jeweler."

Celebrity style is also an important way of traditional brand culture. . There are a number of celebrity gossip magazines abroad, such as OK, HELLO, etc., which introduce the lifestyles of celebrities from all walks of life and have a great influence on citizens' lives. HELLO and OK introduced in detail the fashion star Victoria Victoria who bought thousands of pounds of clothing on Bond Street on a certain day in a certain year, what kind of gift package did she give to her baby son for his first birthday, and what kind of gift package did she give to her baby son in Hutt? The layout of a multi-million pound mansion in the Ford countryside and more. Once, because she said she liked the GUCCI brand, fashionable men and women from all over the UK rushed into the GUCCI store, almost causing a shortage. Hollywood stars Michael Douglas and Zeta Jones got married, and the groom ordered 100,000 pounds of caviar from SELFRIDGE. Once these magazines revealed it, sales of those extremely expensive items immediately picked up. Not long ago, there was a girl named Mei Feng in Taiwan. She wore a BURBERRY trench coat during a court hearing. Everyone went shopping after watching the TV broadcast. Celebrities inadvertently serve as brand ambassadors.

In comparison, China has not done enough in this regard. At the annual Golden Rooster and Hundred Flowers Awards Ceremony, the stars who go on stage to receive the awards are dressed so casually that they might as well be having a private party. Gong Li's recent appearance at an awards ceremony drew criticism for her too-casual attire. Moreover, some celebrities brag in the media about their ability to buy fake goods and match the real ones with the fake ones so that people can’t tell the difference. The domestic fashion circle has an obligation to disseminate brand culture to the public, and for the brand itself, this effect is often better than dry advertising.

Despite various gaps, the level of domestic luxury goods consumption has been getting higher and higher. A large number of fashion consumer media are doing enlightenment and literacy work. The most important thing is that people's lives are becoming more and more sophisticated as their economic strength increases, and their attitude towards luxury goods is becoming more and more "neither humble nor arrogant". For example, with diamonds, many people have shifted from emphasizing the size and grade of gemstones to emphasizing the overall beauty of jewelry. Luxury goods have begun to serve people rather than blindly follow them. This is the high level of luxury consumption.