Friday, September 19, 2008

Sarah Palin's Glasses

I’ve been having a standing argument with my kids for the good part of 25 years about the value or lack of, with name-brand merchandise. My argument has always been that you pay $10 a letter more for name-brand shoes, purses, jeans, etc. when a knock-off or lesser brand is just as good, often made in the same factory, and lasts just as long.

“Not true,” I’m told by my son. “Nike shoes last longer than Addidas Shoes.” Funny, since I tell him that they’re both made at the same plant in East Asia. He doesn’t believe that. He thinks Nike’s are made in Beaverton Oregon. Nike isn’t even incorporated in Oregon, they’re incorporated in Washington State.

I’ve still got a pair of Converse that I’ve worn almost every day, for four years, and they’re still as good as any Nike’s I’ve owned. I paid $19.95 for them. I just learned that they were bought out by Nike in 2003 for $305 Million, so now Converse is really Nike anyway.


When I was growing up, there were only two kinds of “tennis” shoes, Converse and Keds. We wanted Keds because we could jump higher and run faster, and not just because we saw that on TV.

Right now I’m wearing a pair of LA Gear. My theory would tell you that they cost $10 X 6 or $60.00 more than a no-name pair of running shoes, but that argument started in the 1990s so using a cost adjustment it would now be $16.34 X 6 = $98.04 more than a no-namer. However, I got them at a “buy one get one at the same or lesser value free” sale at a Big 5. All Nike, Addidas, LA Gear, and other assorted name brands, which tells you, if they can give them away free, that my mark-up theory might just be close.


Someone tell me who in the hell is Dooney and how did he meet Bourke, and why does every woman in America want their handbags? I found out that Peter Dooney and Federic Bourke launched their company in 1975 in South Norwalk CT. They started out making belts and suspenders. Then they came up with their All Weather Leather bags made from, yes, cow stomachs. Dooney and Bourke are very expensive designer bags, which is why knock-offs of D&B are so popular. When was the last time you asked a woman if her hand bag, emblazoned with those initials, was really a $195 Dooney and Bourke? Funny how that works out to almost exactly $16.34 x 12 = $196.08. Next time you see some woman shouldering a D&B ask her if she knows that they make them out of cow stomachs.


Coach is another auspicious entry into the purse business. Coach Leather was established in 1941 though. One of my co-workers has a “Coach” but it’s really not, it was made in Korea and is a knock-off. I asked her if anyone has ever noticed that she had the fake, and she said that most everyone says “Look at you girl, a Coach.” I couldn’t tell a Coach from a WalMart.

Coach has a hallmark clasp, a silver toggle, that Bonnie Cashin came up with from the latch on her convertible sports car roof. Let’s see what these go for…..Anywhere from $348 to $1,000 on their website, and frankly the purses all look the same to me except they’re different colors. I still ain’t paying $1,000 for a purse. I hope my wife doesn’t either.

One of my favorite stories about the designer label culture, is when my son bought himself a Rolex from a “rich” guy at the golf course where he worked. He paid $50 for this Rolex and he was ecstatic about his purchase. He had, what I termed, a “watch fetish” at the time. He spent any money he earned on Gucci watches. If anything stands out though, it’s a Rolex. Fifty bucks seemed like a good deal even to me, or a very “hot” to the touch item. So I asked to see it. He reluctantly let me touch it.

“Nice watch,” I said, “You got a real deal here too, because it has an extra ‘l’.”


His Rollex probably got more ah’s and oh’s than questions about the extra “l” anyway. I still have the watch and I chuckle every time I see it. How I got the watch is a whole ‘nother story.

Now we have a fashion crazed public wanting a pair of the Kawasaki’s on Sarah Palin’s nose. I heard that the company has sold more of the frames in the last month than they did in all of last year. “Frames” is kind of a misnomer because they are “frameless” glasses. You would think, logically, that would make them cheaper, but no, they retail upwards of $700.

Kawasaki, who also had a hand in designing an artificial heart (don’t see the connection), hopes that we Americans vote for Palin for her accomplishments and qualifications and not her fashion sense. He’s not the motorcycle guy, by the way, but he might be related.

I want you to know I’ve been wearing a pair of designer “frameless” glasses for the past four years. Made by Marchon, they are the Airlock2 model. The most expensive frames in the Optometrist’s office, I was told, which figured. But they’re FRAMELESS so how can they cost more than frames that actually are made of something, like titanium? And how do you design a frame that really isn’t there?

I’m just proud that I was on the leading edge of current fashion. I still wish I was the one who thought up the pet rock though.


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