Luxury brand Chanel is raising prices, limiting sales. Here's why

Perhaps taking a page out of the petrol hike rule book, French luxury behemoth Chanel has raised prices of some of its most popular handbags yet again.

Although price adjustments are a common practice once a year, this is Chanel’s fourth or fifth price hike on certain products since the start of the pandemic.

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For instance, the price of Chanel’s small classic flap bag has increased by 60 per cent since November 2019, now costing $8,200 or around ₹6,18,000. The larger variant of the same bag costs $9,500 (₹7,15,000), up from $7,400 (₹5,57,000) in June 2021.

For some perspective, the infamously expensive Birkin by French luxury brand Hermès now costs about $115 (₹8,600), less than the medium-sized Chanel flap bag.

Why is Chanel going gaga with price hikes?

Chanel says the hikes are in response to unspecified exchange-rate fluctuations, changes in production costs and to ensure its handbags cost roughly the same around the world.

Industry experts say essentially Chanel wants to become more exclusive, as part of an effort to become as or even more iconic than the Birkin or Kelly bag by long-time rival Hermès.

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Luxury works overtime to ‘limit’ sales

In recent years, luxury brands like Chanel have even placed limits on the number of products a customer can purchase at a given time. Although the limits don’t seem to be in place for every city, reports say that at least in Paris, New York and Korea, you can only buy one Chanel bag in a month.

In an effort to gain some control on the burgeoning resale market, similar purchase ‘quotas’ are employed by other luxury players like Hermès, Rolex and Louis Vuitton on select products of high resale value.

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