Himel website updated

[Dr H]

Ha, me neither. I don't have a car at all, and I live on the second cheapest square in the monopoly board!

Is that 'Go To Gaol/Jail' or Community Chest now...?

 

[Fanch]

Thank you for the psuedo-psychology. Why would you assume that, because I am an acknowledged addict, I therefore am motivated by hype and price rather than quality. My addiction is equally likely to be motivated by quality. .

Even before you posted your response, the first thing I thought of was that I perceive you and I both buy luxury goods we don't really need primarily for quality and pride of ownership, and that applies for leather jackets, watches, or any luxury item.

 

[Edward]

Is that 'Go To Gaol/Jail' or Community Chest now...?

Whitechapel!

 

[Big J]

@Justhandguns, yes, I think you're right about the pricing bracket and the reasons for it, but I'm not sure how sustainable that is as a business model? Will they be happy to sell one jacket for 100% mark-up when they could have sold 3 or 4 to the same customer over a period of years with 40% mark-up instead?
I think average salaries are still higher in Japan than back home. But I honestly believe that the case of 'stupid prices' is driven by seeing Japanese and non-Japanese jackets together at the same show, or on the same page of a fashion magazine, and potential customers are assuming that the Japanese jackets are the best 'because they are so much more expensive'. And to close that perception of quality gap= stupid prices.

@Edward, I thought owning a car if you lived in London was a sign of poverty?

 

[Camaro1967]

The inflated prices certainly seems to attract a certain amount of ego and conspicuous consumption. What irks me is not necessarily that the prices are high(er), though, especially if the salaries of the workers or the cost of materials went up, too. The cost of business does, within reason, go up and that's understandable.

Instead, however, there really seems to be a mad push for maximum greed. Fleecing the customers as much as humanly possible because there are those who will buy "quality" goods for seemingly any price because their ego, addiction, or the bought-in hype dictates it.

Maybe that's being too critical, though? People like what they like and if they can afford it, cool. But the jacket makers increasing their prices, almost arbitrarily at times, suggests they are doing so, not because their product is suddenly worth more, but because they are directly marketing to the vanity of a specific customer base. And perhaps to also create the perception that cost equates to quality or value.

I think this is where the likes of a Himel loses would-be customers such as myself. I love the guy's stuff. Amazing quality, no doubt. But $2,500 for a 2.5oz horsehide Canuck? There's just no way. Especially considering this is (or was originally intended as) a work jacket that will obviously never see a day of hard physical labor by most consumers.

 

[Guppy]

I can't really afford a $2500 jacket either. I mean, I could pay for one, but I'd be too afraid to wear it anywhere. Whether it got damaged somehow, or just stolen, or I got mugged. I''ve seen them go under $1k on ebay, never in my size, but I'd consider one at that kind of price point. If Himel can sell them for what they charge for them, I can't find fault with the fundamentals of their business model.

 

[Townes1974]

I am curious how many people here have sourced the materials and skilled labor that it takes to make the jackets David Himel makes. The talk of fleecing customers and arbitrary price increases should have some basis in fact. Provide the prices on the materials and labor then make the case for maximum greed. I doubt Himel or any of the Japanese brands that are taking so much heat for their pricing are getting rich off of making jackets.

 

[zebedee]

Wearing thick skins and having thin ones. Spend what you want and each to his own.

 

[JMax]

I don’t need to source anything, just look at the prices of the other top-notch brands available and that I own. Given the options, part of Himels job is to convince me to pay the extra $1,000+, not my job to convince myself to hand it over. His website is a solid effort at doing that. Though as much as I love the Chevalier, IMO there ain’t enough juice from the squeeze. To others there is. It’s all good.

 

[willyto]

I can't really afford a $2500 jacket either. I mean, I could pay for one, but I'd be too afraid to wear it anywhere. Whether it got damaged somehow, or just stolen, or I got mugged. I''ve seen them go under $1k on ebay, never in my size, but I'd consider one at that kind of price point. If Himel can sell them for what they charge for them, I can't find fault with the fundamentals of their business model.

What really surprises me is that used brands like Himel, The Real McCoys, Hellers, Cafe, Freewheelers, Buzz Rickson, Jelado, Cushman, etc don't command high prices on Ebay compared to their original prices. I think it must be due to their niche market and very few people knowing their existance but meanwhile Mister Freedom prices are out of this world for resale.

I've seen jackets lose like 1000$ value just over less than a year of ownership. That's just madness while other brands maintain their prices at a regular value over time and sometimes they get very low.

I've seen Himel Heron for sale in Europe for around 800-900€ which is a steal for any european customer, unfortunately it wasn't my size.

 

[Superfluous]

Interesting observations.

Are there people who assume that something that costs more is necessarily better made? Absolutely! I suspect this is very common.

Are better made products oftentimes more expensive to produce as compared to lessor quality alternatives. Again, absolutely.

Are better made products oftentimes priced higher than lessor quality alternatives. Again, absolutely.

In order to reconcile the foregoing realities, a savvy customer must look beyond the price and make an independent determination as to whether the more expensive product is, in fact, better quality. There are countless examples of more expensive products that are not any better than lessor priced alternatives, and sometimes the more expensive items are vastly inferior. Therefore, anyone who relies on price as a benchmark for quality is plainly naïve and misguided.

Notwithstanding the foregoing, there are countless instances where one can acquire genuinely better quality by spending more. An S-Class Mercedes is made better than a Kia. Whether the delta in price is worth the delta in quality is an entirely different issue. Rather, my point is simply that spending more can, and often does, result in better quality.

I guess my point is that sometimes there is a correlation between higher pricing and better quality, and sometimes there is no correlation. Therefore, I don’t think its fair to generalize that those who spend more have necessarily bought into a false notion that higher pricing universally equates to better quality. Rather, while some clearly embrace this faulty premise, others apply greater scrutiny and endeavor to obtain greater quality for the additional price.

Jacket manufacturers have no obligation whatsoever to make their products affordable, or to reasonably price their products, or to establish a legitimate correlation between price and quality. To the contrary, jacket manufacturers are free to price their products however they darn well please. They are businessmen and they are entitled to maximize their profits. Leather jackets are not a necessity, and manufacturers have no obligation to ensure that the general public can afford them.

With smaller manufacturers, price increases are oftentimes implemented to reduce demand to a more manageable level. If a particular manufacturer can only produce 100 jackets per year, and it has 300 people waiting to pay the current price, why not increase the price, reduce the wait list to 200, and still operate at full capacity well into the future, but at a higher profit margin? That’s just good business. We buyers may not like it, but it makes perfect sense. Our only recourse is to cease patronizing manufacturers that we deem too expensive, and to allocate our money to their competitors.

Separately, none of us know what the profit margins are for individual manufacturers. We may assume that higher priced manufacturers have higher profit margins, but there are many reasons to opine otherwise. For example, mid-sized manufacturers such as Aero and Vanson have the ability to spread out fixed costs over a greater number of jackets, and thereby achieve an economy of scale. The costs savings associated with this can be enormous. On the other hand, smaller manufacturers must recoup their fixed costs with many fewer jackets, and this increases their per unit costs. Additionally, different manufacturers use different leathers/materials, and thereby have materially different product costs. Labor costs also vary dramatically – I suspect that Japan, in particular, has materially higher labor costs as compared to other locales. The net net is that we have no idea what these jacket manufacturers are earning at the end of the day. I suspect that certain of the mid-larger volume manufacturers have higher profit margins and net profits as compared to the niche brands, even though their jackets may cost less.

Lastly, as an overlay to all of the foregoing, everything about quality and pricing is spectacularly subjective. There is no objective measurement of quality, nor fair pricing. Thus, all we have our individual opinions. Anyone who believes their opinions regarding quality and pricing are more authoritative than others is, IMHO, misguided. I will never tell anyone that they erred by purchasing a lessor priced jacket, nor ridicule them for doing so. I may choose a different path, but my path is no more or less righteous than their path.

 

[Camaro1967]

Sourced? Nah, it's not necessary from the standpoint of a consumer. People will pay whatever they deem the product is worth. So, if there are folks comfortable throwing big wads of cash at luxury goods, all the power to them. But the higher that price goes, the fewer that can reasonably--or would be willing to--pay those prices.

I wouldn't say Himel or the Japanese brands are really taking a lot of heat. They have a loyal (and growing) fan base. Where the criticism comes in, at least for my part, is that it's very clear these brands are not interested in appealing to a broader market by jacking up their prices. Their pricing precludes a big chunk of the market, especially from potential would-be customers like myself, that would otherwise happily buy from them if they didn't charge a king's ransom for their goods.

For example, when the price is north of $2,000 for a jacket, we can, within reason, say this is the upper 2% of the market who can and is willing to pay those prices. Hence, conspicuous consumption and the extreme end of the vanity market.

Don't get me wrong, Himel makes outstanding stuff. There will be people who will pay whatever he charges. And maybe one day I will be one of them. But I remember when I first took an interest in quality leather goods, I would read something on Lost World's website about them being a bargain and laughing. In retrospect, especially with so many makers upping their costs while LW remains fairly consistent, I'm in no position to provide the specifics on all the costs involved (but let's be honest, few on this forum really could give that kind of information), but it's clear the bottom line for some makers charging more than twice of others is not because their costs are more or the quality is significantly better; which leaves us (or at least me) to ask, if the motive for the increases isn't about greed, perhaps that prestige marketing argument (more money = better quality) holds more true.

 

[Superfluous]

Question: Could Himel sustain his business and make money selling the exact same jackets for $1,000? I personally have no idea, but I kinda doubt it. Do any of us really know the answer?

 

[Superfluous]

Another question: For those of you who believe certain manufacturers are just plain "greedy," what do you believe is a fair and reasonable profit margin? $500 per jacket? 30% of the MSRP? At what point do profit goals move from reasonable to greedy?

A Bugatti Chiron priced at $1 million would be an insanely priced car -- exponentially higher than countless other outstanding cars -- utterly ridiculous. However, at that price, Bugatti loses money. My point is that one cannot determine profits and greed simply by looking at pricing. There is so much more to the equation.

 

[Big J]

I think the market is currently distorted, hence the high prices.
It started when hipsters started paying crazy money on eBay for vintage jackets a few years back. The 'true' hipsters have all moved on, but the hipster thing has gone mainstream since then, and jacket manufacturers are just cashing in on people's willingness to hand over wads of cash for jackets as part of a broader trend in the fashion industry maybe.
It won't last. It's just a matter of time until paper books, leather jackets and gasoline engines become about as acceptable as clubbing baby seals due to ecological factors (that and the fact that the middle classes will soon be negligible in size and spending power).
Things are only worth what people are prepared to pay, hence the bargain basement prices of Japanese jackets on the used market in Japan.
If people didn't do the marketing work of manufacturers themselves by justifying and rationalizing crazy prices, but instead said 'No, it's a $1000 jacket', the market would correct itself and prices would come down.
This increase in prices isn't driven by some imaginary increase in quality or workmanship hither to unknown in human history of saddlery until the last few years, nor by a sudden increase in vintage enthusiasts increasing demand, but instead by an increase in middle class customers with disposable incomes getting caught up in the end of the mainstreaming of hipster style IMHO.
What are the cool-hunters paying over the odds for used on eBay now? In five years there will be high quality repros of that selling for double reasonable high prices.
Popcorn please, I'm waiting for the bottom to fall out of the market and (as another poster says above) some good bargains.

 

[ton312]

My problem with Himel and the prices they demand is, having tried them on in a retail store...feeling positively underwhelmed. The hide, the cut, just everything... Left so much to be desired.
The jackets frankly didn't hold up. Stitching wasn't mind blowing (in fact a bit shoddy TBH), leather felt cheap, and the cut wasn't for me at all (all off the rack jackets). I will say the custom jackets shown here don't look to be at all of the same caliber. I wouldn't even think them the same maker TBH. But that's not really the point.

It's too far a leap for me. Not b/c of the price per say, but more b/c I don't see the value. I just don't believe it's actually there. The new site reads a bit like propaganda to me and I've always loathed the slogan, "one good thing" as it attempts to justify, in my opinion, an ego driven price point.
The Himel jackets I tried on at Mildblend were not sewn together all that well, the leather had a plastic hand and I laughed with the owner of the store about the price point.
Super, Carlos, dude, and speed have phenomenal Himel jackets. No doubt about it. Easily the best examples of his work. There's no argument there.

It's really a mute point and silly argument as there are fans of a brand and those who aren't. My problem is that Himel has self declared the jackets as the finest in the world and has assigned a price point that seems to fuel the assumption that more expensive somehow equates to higher quality. I just don't believe that to be true. Spoken strictly from my handling of off the rack Himel jackets. Perhaps I could be persuaded with a custom...but my patterns don't play out, realistically losing 2/3rd on resale.

 

[ton312]

I think the market is currently distorted, hence the high prices.
It started when hipsters started paying crazy money on eBay for vintage jackets a few years back. The 'true' hipsters have all moved on, but the hipster thing has gone mainstream since then, and jacket manufacturers are just cashing in on people's willingness to hand over wads of cash for jackets as part of a broader trend in the fashion industry maybe.
It won't last. It's just a matter of time until paper books, leather jackets and gasoline engines become about as acceptable as clubbing baby seals due to ecological factors (that and the fact that the middle classes will soon be negligible in size and spending power).
Things are only worth what people are prepared to pay, hence the bargain basement prices of Japanese jackets on the used market in Japan.
If people didn't do the marketing work of manufacturers themselves by justifying and rationalizing crazy prices, but instead said 'No, it's a $1000 jacket', the market would correct itself and prices would come down.
This increase in prices isn't driven by some imaginary increase in quality or workmanship hither to unknown in human history of saddlery until the last few years, nor by a sudden increase in vintage enthusiasts increasing demand, but instead by an increase in middle class customers with disposable incomes getting caught up in the end of the mainstreaming of hipster style IMHO.
What are the cool-hunters paying over the odds for used on eBay now? In five years there will be high quality repros of that selling for double reasonable high prices.
Popcorn please, I'm waiting for the bottom to fall out of the market and (as another poster says above) some good bargains.

Absolutely. In 2001 I bought a mint condition Bates, two flag highwayman for $75. That same jacket would've sold for $600 in 2012 and probably $450-500 now at best and likely $250 in reality. So hopefully the suede, Sherpa lined trucker made by JC Penny that I just bought for $50 will be worth $500 in a couple years. But probably not. LOL.

 

[Superfluous]

Ton, I genuinely respect your above-posted opinion. Why? Because it is based on real world experience, as opposed to hypothetical, theoretical, generalizations. I also appreciate the fact that, when sharing your opinion, you do not label, (mis)characterize or disparage those who view the issues differently. Instead, you respect and embrace our differences. Well done.

 

[jonesy86]

I think the pertinent concept is one of Perceived Value, I had to look it up.
I like my Himel.
Peace,

 

[BlueWallpaper]

I’m really surprised how much vitriol there is for Himel (for context, I own an Aero and have bought and traded a second hand jacket). So much ridiculously charged language here. Buyers of Himels are labeled ‘vain’ but asking for opinions on the Aero that you feverishly researched on forums, had fit jackets for, obsessed over the small details of and then paid the equivalent of a month’s rent of an average family for isn’t also ‘at the extreme end of the vanity market’ (guilty along with the rest of you by the way)? Time to fess up, we’re all pretty vain followers of fashion and are willing to put large amounts of disposal income behind that. Split hairs over what fashion means if you want. Flaunt your post code poverty. Pretend that you don’t belong a here because you can only afford a GW and 43 Aeros. Really what is so offensive about a Himel though?

I’ve read many times here, largely uncontested, that Shinki HH is the best in the world. I have no clue if that’s accurate but I recall reading that it takes a year for them to tan it. The only other data point I have is Chromexcel at one month. ‘Best’? Maybe. Most expensive? I believe that.

I also see ‘custom’ thrown around a lot for makers that are willing only to add length. I need a 41” chest for the best fit, how many makers are willing to accommodate that? Then, of course there’s plenty of Japanese brands that wouldn’t allow for even the adding of length at the price of a Himel.

A custom sized and detailed leather jacket handmade using arguably the best materials in the world for half the cost of an off the rack Gucci leather jacket? Outrageously expensive or a bargain? Is it really that clear cut?

(On the popular GW comparison. John just needs to increase his prices. If you have a 2-4 year waiting list then you’re probably not pricing your product correctly.)