2025 is quickly proving to be one of the toughest years for the luxury goods industry (2020 aside). Department stores, our favorite luxury brands, and consumers feel it, too, as the overall attitude towards luxury has dramatically shifted.
Forbes reported that the market faces a sharp decline of up to 5% this year. The industry hasn’t faced challenges of this significance since the 2008 financial crisis and, later, the COVID-19 pandemic of the early 2020s.
So what’s changed?
From Post-Pandemic Boom to Buyer Fatigue
For starters, luxury price increases seem never-ending, but this is nothing new. Following an increase in demand after the COVID slump, luxury brands began to capitalize on the demand, and prices soared. Later, they soared further as brands scrambled to renew a sense of exclusivity.
In 2025, US tariffs caused goods to reach astronomical prices. Couple that with an unstable economy, monumental designer shakeups in the luxury world, and a sense of declining quality, and it seems that many shoppers have major luxury fatigue.
As we look towards the fall, we aim to cover newer brands as well as contemporary brands, along with the brands we know and love, we want to know. Are you shopping for luxury more mindfully this season, less, or not at all?
I sold my luxury bags and am going back to coach. Sticking to contemporary.
Bought one this year (Dior backpack) and I have buyers remorse. Love the bag and can afford it but the price felt stupid. Definitely have fatigue and would rather spend money on travel and even jewellery which, despite the crazy price of gold, feels like better value. There are now way too many collections and celebrities pushing the new bags that everything feels like it’s dating super quickly. I have also sworn off stores like Chanel because I feel like there is a strategy of “let’s push the prices as far as we can to see what idiots are prepared to tolerate.”
Does shopping secondhand count? I have a wishlist of things that I would like to own most of which were around while I was raising my two children. Some have fallen off of my list because my preferences in bags has changed. The Chloe Paddington is one that has fallen off. But, I recently purchased a Louis Vuitton Wilshire PM which I am loving.
I still shop in department stores. I rarely go to free standing boutiques. I feel like I’m being followed. My husband and I are planning a trip to Japan in December to visit my son. So, this bag will probably be my last luxury purchase for a while. I’m in desperate need of a new suitcase.
This is the first year in the last 15 years or so that I haven’t bought a designer handbag. I definitely feel luxury fatigue and also a sense of diminished joy when out shopping. Even the SAs I meet don’t seem like they’re having any fun. However, I’m looking forward to more posts about contemporary or new brands!
I am, just fewer items than years past. I make a list of things I am interested in, I can purchase a couple of the items each season. I am speaking of designer items in general, no way I can buy two bags each season!
I am also feeling the weight of buyer’s fatigue. It’s as if we’re living through a quiet global recession, where even “luxury” no longer carries the same allure.
With brands like Chanel pushing to such astronomical price points, I’ve simply found myself disinclined to make a purchase.