Chinese affluence shifted luxury consumption toward signaling success

Evidence

By the twenty-first century, Japanese enthusiasm for luxury goods had waned, but the template was easily adapted to China. By 2009, China had surpassed the United States to become the second-largest market for luxury goods. Chinese consumers accounted for one fifth of global luxury sales, a figure Bain consultants predicted would rise to 40 percent by 2030. As Indonesian Chinese designer Gracia Ventus explained, having grown up in prosperity, the younger generation in China were less inclined to save for the future, while also being taught to signal success through conspicuous consumption. This shift elevated tastes: “The super rich are trading their run-of-the-mill Mercedes for a Maybach, their BAPE for Rick Owens.” Domestic tariffs on luxury goods encouraged affluent Chinese shoppers to travel abroad, purchasing handbags, jewelry, and watches in Hong Kong, Japan, and Europe. — W. David Marx, Blank Space, 759

Categorization

• ADDENDUM: The shift from mass-market BAPE to high-end Rick Owens parallels consumption-signaling dynamics, relevant to the reader’s omnivore-monoculture thesis.
• XREF: connects to: When lower tiers afford higher-status goods, everyone’s baseline consumption norms rise. — W. David Marx, Status and Culture: How Our Desire for…, 161; New Money universally signals status through conspicuous consumption across eras and cultures — W. David Marx, Status and Culture: How Our Desire for…, 309