Telfar Clemens broke the internet this summer when he took a stand against internet resellers. If you don't know about internet resellers, think about those guys that camp out for sneakers just to buy multiple pairs and resell them for triple the price for profit. Typically this has been exclusive to the sneaker industry, however straight men, in true hetero fashion, decided to try their hand at the the coveted Telfar Shopping Bags by buying up a large chunk of Telfar shopping bags making them completely inaccessible to the people that actually want them.
Telfar Clemens, the Liberian- American fashion Designer and Founder of Telfar, a BLACK owned luxury fashion brand, made it a point to create a brand that was unisex, but also priced to be accessible to everyone while still providing a luxury product. His brand quickly garnered an immense amount of support from the black community, especially from black women, making his Telfar shopping bags this summer’s must have fashion piece.
Naturally black woman and the queer black community took to the internet outraged, and rightfully so. After hearing the outcry, Clemens put his website on pause to find the root of the issue and identify the bots that bought up products for the sole purpose of reselling for egregious prices like $5,000 ?!?!? To address the high demand for his product, on August 19, 2020 Clemens launched the Telfar Bag Security Program. This program made every bag size and color available for unlimited pre order for 24 hours only, promising to have all orders fulfilled by January 15th.
Although this was a win for many black women, this still begs the question… Why is it that heterosexual resellers decided to leech off of a black owned, non-gendered fashion project that provided affordable, luxury shopping bags ? Especially in the current climate where the black community has made it a point to support black owned business. You can get luxury bags like Coach, Michael Kors, Kate Spade, Vera Bradley, etc at department stores in the same price range, but it was not until a product that was black owned, and fully backed by black women hit the market that resellers decided to shift gears and exploit a small black owned business that prides itself on being for everyone.
Everyone wants to advertise how quickly their product “sold out” and make their supporters wait for restocks when they can easily make a conscious effort to provide unlimited stock and also put an end to this pesky resell business, which frankly is tacky as hell. More brands should do a better job of making their product accessible, instead of feeding into the capitalistic greed that continues to be predatory towards low-income populations that deserve luxury products too, especially when it's coming from their own people. For Us, By Us.
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