classicalthunde
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- Apr 11, 2016
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I don't get the grumbling about prices, tbh.
Say a Fox Shetland is $250/ meter (roughly the conversion for 190 GBP). And you need 2 meters for a sport coat. That's $500.
Another supplier might be $100/ meter. That's $200 for a sport coat.
If you're paying $3,500 for a sport coat (upwards of $6,000 at some tailoring houses), is $300 really going to make that much of a difference to you?
I'm more in the $1-2K range, so a $500 mark up for my preferred fabric has a significant impact on the overall cost of the garment.
I see this argument made a lot and its just kind of silly. It isnt the cloth side propping up anything. You are buying a product, who's cost to produce is X. A margin of Y is added and thats the price you pay. In any other product you wouldn't try and nickel and dime the producer by claiming they shouldnt include some of their costs as part of the costs that are marked up. That some tailors dont add a margin to the cloth is actually the surprising part of all of this.
You are a tourist. You want to occasionally buy a length of cloth from Fox. The next year its Cacciopoli. Maybe you buy a piece from Scabal every 5 years. So what? You basically want all the benefits of being in the trade, without having to do any of the work. The chef in your scenario might only buy 12 slices, but they do it every week or month or year. And even if they dont, they are still contributing to the larger eco-system. I honestly dont understand why you dont understand this concept.
I understand the symbiotic nature of merchants/mills and tailors, also fully acknowledge that I am a "tourist" and purchasing for my own needs as opposed to a re-occurring business order, and that I'm trying to maximize my own wardrobe personal budget
my issue is that preferred pricing at this point seems to be based upon title and trade as opposed to the amount/frequency ordered...If i started my own MTM account with a Chinese factory and ordered a couple of lengths of Fox every year for clients, what is the fundamental difference from Fox's perspective than if I ordered a couple of lengths every year for my own personal CMT use? If Person A wants to buy X meters of fabric per year, and Person B wants to also buy X meters of fabric per year, I just dont see the rationale behind charging Person A a price of Y for X meters, and charging Person B a price of 4Y for X meters, when the alternative is that person B purchases 0 meters. I would have thought it to be more of a capitalist sentiment than a marxist one, but I just dont see why merchants/mills should give a **** if i haven't "put in the work."
Also, I'm curious (maybe @dieworkwear can shed some light here) but how many sport coats do we think a firm like Steed makes in a year, and how many of them are with Fox fabric? are we talking 50 SCs and a wild guess that 10% Fox Bros (so 5 cut lengths)?
There are reasons for CMT. My tailor will get me cut lengths for reasonable prices (he is mostly using Holland & Sherry, Standeven and Fox), even if I do not have immediate plans to use them with him.
is this common? I would have imagined that this would be an awkward convo ("I want you to get this for me, but I dont want you to make it for me") or even against the terms of having a trade account (I can't imagine they would allow you undercut their retail prices)
EDIT: also, for the record, not trying to be combative here...