Purchasing expensive goods online or queueing in front of a store isn’t the picture of luxury, at least, not for Chanel. The French fashion house just announced its plans to open a string of private boutiques across the globe that caters exclusively to its top-spending clientele. The first round of Chanel’s new stores will be developed in properties across Asia in early 2023.
Not only will these luxury clients be able to access private stores, but they will also avoid the arduous lines that stretch around the block at Chanel’s existing storefronts. This deluge of people waiting in line is due to the company’s aversion to providing e-commerce services for its fashion items and leather goods. The company’s reluctance to serve a digital client comes as no surprise, given Chanel has been slow to integrate online; the brand was one of the last luxury fashion houses to launch its social media presence in 2014. However, not having an easy way to access Chanel’s clothing and accessories means that customers and window shoppers alike must travel to one of Chanel’s 250 existing brick-and-mortars to try on its clothing and leather goods. By creating these private boutiques, Chanel has effectively reinvented its luxury shopping experience.
The development of new Chanel stores comes off the heels of a 50% increase in company sales to $15 billion (roughly Dhs57 billion) in 2021. Accruing these pre-pandemic figures suggests a strong consumer desire for Chanel, so making it harder to buy seems illogical sales-wise. However, the company’s CEO Philippe Bondiaux is confident in this move toward building up Chanel’s exclusivity. In the press release for the company’s private expansion, Bondiaux noted that Chanel’s “biggest preoccupation is to protect our customers and in particular our pre-existing customers” who are already spending top dollar on the brand’s products. Bondiaux added that Chanel is “going to invest in very protected boutiques to service clients in a very exclusive way.” This approach to sales is in line with Chanel’s current mode of operation, given the brand has continually raised the price of its bags–just three times since the pandemic. Its ongoing success proves, once again, that exclusivity drives desirability. So will other brands follow suit? We’ll have to wait and see.
