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It's signaling. Wearing prominent logos sends yourself and others a message that you have the disposable income to pay twice as much for a version of the thing

It's signaling. Wearing prominent logos sends yourself and others a message that you have the disposable income to pay twice as much for a version of the thing that has a special picture on it.

rendall 3y ago
Yes, agreed. It still does not explain the practice in a way that makes sense to me. There are so many and much better ways to signal disposable wealth. To me it immediately signals "more money than sense".
- distcs 3y ago
  Honest question. Where you buy your clothes from? As much as I would like to buy clothes without logos, they are not easy to find where I live.
  - rendall 3y ago
    I live in Finland. My favorite place to get sportswear and just daily wear is H&M. No logos. My favorite design house is Makia. Really amazing stuff. https://makia.com/ https://makia.com/ but if it has a big-assed Makia logo I don't buy it. When I lived in New York there were so many options it was hard to choose, but I'd check out used clothing boutiques for fun things.
    - FrankoDelMar 3y ago
      You may be interested -- Karhu is from Finland and makes minimally branded sneakers
      - rendall 3y ago
        Thanks for the tip!
    - dpkirchner 3y ago
      FWIW, in the US, H&M is known for fast-fashion, garbage-tier clothing. I've heard the brand is better outside the US, though.
      - fshbbdssbbgdd 3y ago
        I keep hearing people say this, but the few things I bought there lasted many years.
      - rendall 3y ago
        If I lived in the US in a place that didn't have many good stores around I'd buy from retailers online and try out different things. I've had luck with https://www.uniqlo.com https://www.uniqlo.com
      - rendall 3y ago
        Hmm. You may be right. Here is the men's pants section on the Finnish site https://www2.hm.com/fi_fi/miesten/osta-tuotteen-mukaan/housut.html https://www2.hm.com/fi_fi/miesten/osta-tuotteen-mukaan/housu... Equivalent items do generally look better, to me at least, compared to the US https://www2.hm.com/en_us/men/products/pants.html https://www2.hm.com/en_us/men/products/pants.html Equivalent prices, too. For example, compare the "cargo joggers" Finland https://www2.hm.com/fi_fi/productpage.1002227020.html https://www2.hm.com/fi_fi/productpage.1002227020.html to the equivalent item from the US store https://www2.hm.com/en_us/productpage.1002227011.html https://www2.hm.com/en_us/productpage.1002227011.html To me the one available from the Finnish store has a better cut and seems to be made of a thicker material.
- FrankoDelMar 3y ago
  I think there are multiple sides to this. Some people legitimately do not care whether or not they wear branding or at least prefer to be assured of reliability of the clothing fit and quality. This approach isn't necessarily more expensive either. Something from Nike, Adias, UnderArmor sold at a discount, say at Nordstrom Rack, is superior in quality to the destined-for-landfill clothing of H&M and Primark. I don't like branding either. For normal cotton wear, it's largely Uniqlo peppered with more unique pieces from minimally branded designers. For sportswear I tend to purchase from Lululemon because it's high quality and minimally branded. However, I understand it would be much cheaper to buy a bunch of discount Nike, Adias, or New Balance clothing. So I don't necessarily associate overt branding with disposable wealth per-se and I would say it depends on the brand and the context the clothing is being worn (but maybe that's only because of my understanding of brand differences). I would assume someone wearing all Lululemon to be more wealthy than someone wearing all Adidas even though it's less branding. That said, certain designer brands serve only to be a status symbol like Gucci, LV, Supreme, Kenzo, Bathing Ape, Off-White, Balenziaga..the list goes on. Hell, at least if someone is driving a Mercedes or BMW they're getting a well built car, there's almost no excuse to pay more than $50 for a T-shirt just because it's from Fendi or Maison Kitsune. As we pointed out in other comments, sneakers are an exception and it's almost impossible to find decent sneakers without branding and this probably has to do with the economies of scale.
- lisper 3y ago
  > There are so many and much better ways to signal disposable wealth. These are not mutually-exclusive options.
  - rendall 3y ago
    I mean, for clothing it is. I do not associate logos with wealth. I've seen plenty of people who have very little money wearing logos, but none wearing Loro Piana.
    - lisper 3y ago
      That's because Loro Piana T-shirts don't have the logo on them. They do, however, cost many hundreds of dollars [1] so if your eye is discerning enough to spot one you can be sure the person wearing it comes from serious money. It's similar for other high-end lines like Hermes. To spot them you have to be in the know. Indeed, the ability to spot these well-disguised high-end products is itself social signalling among the extreme high end of wealth. (The same phenomenon exists in other Veblen goods, like wine.) Louis Vuitton, on the other hand, famously has its logo all over its products [2]. But even there you kind of have to know what you're looking for. It doesn't jump out at you the way a Nike logo does. --- [1] https://us.loropiana.com/en/p/man/polo-and-t-shirts/soft-t-shirt-FAF6128 https://us.loropiana.com/en/p/man/polo-and-t-shirts/soft-t-s... [2] https://us.louisvuitton.com/eng-us/products/monogram-gradient-cotton-t-shirt-nvprod2550079v/1A8HKK https://us.louisvuitton.com/eng-us/products/monogram-gradien...
      - rendall 3y ago
        I think we're talking past / agreeing with each other? Anyway, there are such amazing clothes out there in all price ranges, and people can look so good in them that I feel if people are wearing logos they haven't "read the user's manual". Just aren't even trying. I know my attitude puts some people off, and I really do understand why, but it's not out of class snobbery, it's that I find advertising so visually repulsive.
- parineum 3y ago
  > To me it immediately signals "more money than sense". There is an amount of money one could have that no amount of sense could make up for. In reality flagrant wealth is often tied to poor financial decisions that have lead to a lack of actual wealth.

It's signaling. Wearing prominent logos sends yourself and others a message that you have the disposable income to pay twice as much for a version of the thing that has a special picture on it.

rendall 3y ago

Yes, agreed. It still does not explain the practice in a way that makes sense to me. There are so many and much better ways to signal disposable wealth. To me it immediately signals "more money than sense".

distcs 3y ago
Honest question. Where you buy your clothes from? As much as I would like to buy clothes without logos, they are not easy to find where I live.
- rendall 3y ago
  I live in Finland. My favorite place to get sportswear and just daily wear is H&M. No logos. My favorite design house is Makia. Really amazing stuff. https://makia.com/ https://makia.com/ but if it has a big-assed Makia logo I don't buy it. When I lived in New York there were so many options it was hard to choose, but I'd check out used clothing boutiques for fun things.
  - FrankoDelMar 3y ago
    You may be interested -- Karhu is from Finland and makes minimally branded sneakers
    - rendall 3y ago
      Thanks for the tip!
  - dpkirchner 3y ago
    FWIW, in the US, H&M is known for fast-fashion, garbage-tier clothing. I've heard the brand is better outside the US, though.
    - fshbbdssbbgdd 3y ago
      I keep hearing people say this, but the few things I bought there lasted many years.
    - rendall 3y ago
      If I lived in the US in a place that didn't have many good stores around I'd buy from retailers online and try out different things. I've had luck with https://www.uniqlo.com https://www.uniqlo.com
    - rendall 3y ago
      Hmm. You may be right. Here is the men's pants section on the Finnish site https://www2.hm.com/fi_fi/miesten/osta-tuotteen-mukaan/housut.html https://www2.hm.com/fi_fi/miesten/osta-tuotteen-mukaan/housu... Equivalent items do generally look better, to me at least, compared to the US https://www2.hm.com/en_us/men/products/pants.html https://www2.hm.com/en_us/men/products/pants.html Equivalent prices, too. For example, compare the "cargo joggers" Finland https://www2.hm.com/fi_fi/productpage.1002227020.html https://www2.hm.com/fi_fi/productpage.1002227020.html to the equivalent item from the US store https://www2.hm.com/en_us/productpage.1002227011.html https://www2.hm.com/en_us/productpage.1002227011.html To me the one available from the Finnish store has a better cut and seems to be made of a thicker material.
FrankoDelMar 3y ago
I think there are multiple sides to this. Some people legitimately do not care whether or not they wear branding or at least prefer to be assured of reliability of the clothing fit and quality. This approach isn't necessarily more expensive either. Something from Nike, Adias, UnderArmor sold at a discount, say at Nordstrom Rack, is superior in quality to the destined-for-landfill clothing of H&M and Primark. I don't like branding either. For normal cotton wear, it's largely Uniqlo peppered with more unique pieces from minimally branded designers. For sportswear I tend to purchase from Lululemon because it's high quality and minimally branded. However, I understand it would be much cheaper to buy a bunch of discount Nike, Adias, or New Balance clothing. So I don't necessarily associate overt branding with disposable wealth per-se and I would say it depends on the brand and the context the clothing is being worn (but maybe that's only because of my understanding of brand differences). I would assume someone wearing all Lululemon to be more wealthy than someone wearing all Adidas even though it's less branding. That said, certain designer brands serve only to be a status symbol like Gucci, LV, Supreme, Kenzo, Bathing Ape, Off-White, Balenziaga..the list goes on. Hell, at least if someone is driving a Mercedes or BMW they're getting a well built car, there's almost no excuse to pay more than $50 for a T-shirt just because it's from Fendi or Maison Kitsune. As we pointed out in other comments, sneakers are an exception and it's almost impossible to find decent sneakers without branding and this probably has to do with the economies of scale.
lisper 3y ago
> There are so many and much better ways to signal disposable wealth. These are not mutually-exclusive options.
- rendall 3y ago
  I mean, for clothing it is. I do not associate logos with wealth. I've seen plenty of people who have very little money wearing logos, but none wearing Loro Piana.
  - lisper 3y ago
    That's because Loro Piana T-shirts don't have the logo on them. They do, however, cost many hundreds of dollars [1] so if your eye is discerning enough to spot one you can be sure the person wearing it comes from serious money. It's similar for other high-end lines like Hermes. To spot them you have to be in the know. Indeed, the ability to spot these well-disguised high-end products is itself social signalling among the extreme high end of wealth. (The same phenomenon exists in other Veblen goods, like wine.) Louis Vuitton, on the other hand, famously has its logo all over its products [2]. But even there you kind of have to know what you're looking for. It doesn't jump out at you the way a Nike logo does. --- [1] https://us.loropiana.com/en/p/man/polo-and-t-shirts/soft-t-shirt-FAF6128 https://us.loropiana.com/en/p/man/polo-and-t-shirts/soft-t-s... [2] https://us.louisvuitton.com/eng-us/products/monogram-gradient-cotton-t-shirt-nvprod2550079v/1A8HKK https://us.louisvuitton.com/eng-us/products/monogram-gradien...
    - rendall 3y ago
      I think we're talking past / agreeing with each other? Anyway, there are such amazing clothes out there in all price ranges, and people can look so good in them that I feel if people are wearing logos they haven't "read the user's manual". Just aren't even trying. I know my attitude puts some people off, and I really do understand why, but it's not out of class snobbery, it's that I find advertising so visually repulsive.
parineum 3y ago
> To me it immediately signals "more money than sense". There is an amount of money one could have that no amount of sense could make up for. In reality flagrant wealth is often tied to poor financial decisions that have lead to a lack of actual wealth.