Re-issues of archive accessories are leading to insane re-sale prices. Does fashion need a stricter approach to stop re-sellers taking it too far?
Buying luxury bags second-hand is like pulling teeth. If you’re not being ripped off, aired, conned, or verbally berated on re-sale sites on a regular basis, you’re not that into shopping second-hand fashion - that’s just facts. But the biggest enemy to second-hand buyers isn’t re-sellers: it’s re-issues.
Bringing back vintage silhouettes for the modern buyer, the likes of Louis Vuitton re-issuing its Murakami collaboration at the start of this year and Chloe reviving its iconic Paddington bag have been causing waves in the re-sale market, leading to spikes in demand for the OG models and driving up prices.
Thanks to a combination of things – fluctuation in the economy, an increase in demand, and the luxury industry hiking up its price tags overall – the cost of re-issues are often much more expensive than the originals. For example, the Louis Vuitton x Murakami Cherry Blossom Papillon MM saw a 303% increase in price between 2003 when it was first dropped and the 2025 re-issue.
This means an extremely limited selection of high luxury clients are able to afford the re-issues, which is driving traffic to resale sites where the prices of the original bags – now a couple decades old – where people expect to be able to pay less than the re-issue for a second hand bag.
But where there’s demand and limited supply means re-sellers can put their prices up too, and soon they’re almost on par with the re-issues. For brands, this isn’t a bad thing as even a desire for their vintage designs that doesn’t directly funnel cash into their pockets drives brand awareness. But for us, the consumer, it’s not ideal given how insanely high resale prices can get.
In the music industry, new laws are enforcing caps on the resale prices that use the frenzy of purchasing tickets to force fans into spending insane amounts to see their idols. Maybe reissues are a sign that the fashion world needs that too. At what point can we say it’s unreasonable to charge $500 for a second-hand bag on Vestiare that was $150 last week?
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