Deluxe: How Luxury Lost Its Luster

An engrossing and entertaining book by Dana Thomas on the history of luxury, and how its definition and accessibility has changed over the years.

Find out, among other interesting discoveries, how the big fashion names started in the business, and how they're more concerned with making heaps of money by resorting to assembly-line production than individual handcraftsmanship like they used to do.

Excerpt:

Walk up to a luxury brand store and a dark-suited man with a listening device tucked in his ear will silently pull open the heavy glass door. Inside there is a hush as slim, demurely dressed sales assistants await you in a posh minimalist space in neutral tones with chrome accents. The first thing you'll encounter are shelves full of the brand's latest fashion handbags as well as its classic designs, displayed like sculptures, each lighted with its own tiny spotlight. Glass cases are filled with monogram-covered wallets, billfolds, and business card holders: the lower-priced, entry-level items aimed at aspirational middle-market customers. Chances are, the slim assistants will make the sale right there in the very first room. Through calculated marketing strategies and with the support of fashion magazines, luxury companies in the last ten years have created the phenomenon of the handbag season — the must-have around the world that will catapult sales and stock prices. Louis Vuitton's sales of Japanese artist Takashi Murakami-designed smiling cherry purses were almost single-handedly responsible for double-digit growth for Louis Vuitton in the first quarter of 2005. The average markup on a handbag is ten to twelve times production cost. And Vuitton prices are never marked down.

Get a copy. It's worth the money and time.