Louis Vuitton has quietly raised prices on its U.S. website, with some bags jumping by as much as 7%, as the luxury house navigates the immediate fallout from new tariffs imposed by the Trump Administration. Analysts say the timing aligns with Vuitton’s usual price adjustment schedule, but the latest hikes – averaging around 3.6% – are also seen as a strategic response to a 10% import duty on European goods. While certain Louis Vuitton styles like the NeoNoe handbag saw notable bumps, the prices of others – including the CarryAll, Biker, All In and Graceful bags – remained untouched. This suggests that these bags are being made in the brand’s U.S. workshops in Texas and California, per analysts.
Experts suggest that despite the tariffs, Vuitton’s pricing power remains strong, reinforcing its status as a brand largely immune to the first wave of economic pressure.
Luca Solca, the lead luxury goods analyst at Bernstein, says that Louis Vuitton’s average price increase of 3.6 percent “seems more than enough to cover even the worst-case scenario of 20 percent tariffs on EU exports from the U.S.” These price increases provide a case in point, he says, that “the first level impact of tariffs will be negligible,” and that mega-brands like Vuitton in particular “remain highly desirable and command clear pricing power.”
Hermès shed light on its strategy this week, confirming that it will raise U.S. prices of Hermès’ bags, scarves, and other goods beginning on May 1 in order to “fully offset” the impact of the universal 10% tariff imposed by the Trump Administration last month.
“The price increase that we’re going to implement will be just for the U.S. since it’s aimed at offsetting the tariffs that only apply to the American market, so there won’t be price increases in the other regions,” Eric du Halgouët, Hermès’ executive vice president for finance, said during an analyst call on Thursday.
Stay tuned: We have a deep dive into this coming next week.
Over the past decade, countless brands traded character for clarity, swapping heritage for hyper-legibility in a rush to appear modern and “digital-first.” In furtherance of a larger “blanding” trend, serif logos gave way to generic sans-serifs, and color palettes were largely wiped clean. In the tech space, in particular, distinct identities blurred into one another in a sea of lowercase wordmarks and minimalist design. The goal was accessibility, digital scalability, etc. – but the result was often visual uniformity.
Now, it seems the scales are tipping back. Companies that once stripped their branding of depth and heritage are starting to reverse course, undoing their own subdued rebrands … or re-blands. They’re rediscovering the power of specificity: layered typography, richer palettes, and design languages rooted in tradition and craft.
“Could formality – tradition, cultural specificity and maturity make a comeback in design?,” Mother Design’s design director Alec Mezzetti asked recently. “The early signs of this counter-revolution can be seen across the world of branding and advertising, where friendly colors, hyper-legible text and digital optimization are starting to make way for richer tones, serifs and a de-prioritization of digital scalability.”
It seems that brands across industries, including fashion/luxury, are waking up to the fact that abandoning their own established aesthetics in order to look like everyone else is no longer a competitive advantage (or better yet, maybe never was).
Vestiaire Collective has released a new resale value report for S/S2025, analyzing 400 brands based on the average price per model listed on its platform. The report compares Q4 2024 to Q3 2024 and highlights shifting consumer habits amid increasing price-consciousness. Among some of the key takeaways …
Top Luxury Brands – Chanel, Louis Vuitton, and Hermès lead the luxury category for their strong resale value, desirability, and long-term worth. Chanel also ranked highest in product views per person.
Rising Stars in Resale –The Row saw the most rapid value increase among designer labels, with a 27% jump in its five-year resale value, linked to the “quiet luxury” trend. Meanwhile, Gucci, which is tanking in the retail market (and bringing Kering’s sales and share price down with it), ranked #4 among luxury brands despite underperformance in primary retail, thanks to high demand for its handbags.
Fastest-Growing Cult Brands: Based on compound annual growth rate (CAGR), The Row, Maison Margiela, and Miu Miu emerged as standout brands.
Vintage Market Boom: Vintage listings on the platform surged 220% in the past five years, driven by growing consumer appreciation for craftsmanship and natural fibers amid rising use of synthetics.
>> “This report highlights how resale is no longer a secondary option and is leading the way in how consumers experience and access luxury & designer fashion today. Vestiaire Collective is at the forefront of that shift, offering not just sustainability, but smarter, more conscious and more affordable ways to engage with style,” says Sophie Hersan, Co-Founder and Fashion Director of Vestiaire.