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Salivating For The EPI Life

Feb 17, 2016
by Caroline Miller
conspicuous consumption, couture gowns, D'Lish slippers, Dana Thomas, is that all there is?, Lauren Santo Domingo, luxury logos, luxury retailers, Modi Operations, what the super rich folks want
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Like the Marsh Hare from Alice In Wonderland, Extremely Important People (EPI) are wringing their hands and fretting.  “There’s nothing to buy.  There’s nothing to buy.”  That’s because large scale luxury providers have “sanded down” their merchandise and shifted their attention away from 1 per centers to focus on the  Middle Market: “a socio economic graphic that spends when flush and tightens purse strings when times get tough.”  Think well-heeled techies. (Conspicuous Consumption, Is that all There Is?” by Dana Thomas, TownandCountry, March 2016 pg. 132.) 

Having branded their products as luxury items, complete with logos, these large companies aim for a mass market, making their money on high mark-ups for accessible items like lipstick. (Ibid pg. 132.)

True, even the 1% have grown conservative when it comes to spending money.  Couture is on the decline as the super rich display a preference for buying ten $80,000 dresses rather than one designer gown with a $200,000 price tag  (Ibid pg. 195).  And besides, da-h-h-ling, look at the time one saves avoiding fittings.  Still, a person with billions and billions likes to splurge a little.

According to Lauren Santo Domingo, co-founder of Modi Operations, an on-line luxury retailer, what the super-rich want is to have  “things other people can’t have.” (Ibid, pg. 195)  What might that be?  Shoes with high tops made from an famous artist’s drop cloth would be one example. French lingerie measured and hand stitched for the individual would be another.  Of course, for those with money to burn, jewelry designed for the customer is catnip.  Whatever the item, nothing purchased should ever look like a duplicate of anything else or, heaven forbid, look like something worn on the red carpet.

Okay, I get it and I’m not envious.  Let the super rich have their D’Lish bunny slippers made from recycled mink coats. I salivate for the service money can buy. Having a private jet beats going through security lines at the airport.  Ditto with having a private physician, or best seats at a restaurant or theater. How about being able to afford a company that not only packs my suitcases when I travel but sees that they reach each destination on my itinerary on time, clean and pressed?   Oh yeah.  For that I could drool an ocean.  

private jet red carpet

 

 

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Contact Caroline at

carolinemiller11@yahoo.com

Portland, Oregon author Caroline Miller had distinguished careers as an educator, union president, elected official and artist/advocate.

Her play, Woman on the Scarlet Beast, was performed at the Post5 Theatre, Portland, OR, January/February 2015

Caroline published a serialized novelette, Marie Eau-Claire, on the website, The Colored Lens.  She also published the story Gustav Pavel,  a parable about ordinary lives, choice and alternate potential, on the website Fixional.co.

Caroline has published five novels

  • Getting Lost To Find Home
  • Ballet Noir
  • Trompe l’Oeil
  • Gothic Spring
  • Heart Land

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