The Birkin bag resale craze could have hit its peak, serving up a dose of actuality for Gen Z aspirational luxurious buffs coveting the Hermès accent as their subsequent huge funding piece.
The luxurious purse flung throughout the elbow of celebrities like Cardi B and Heidi Klum has appeared to have misplaced a few of its attraction on the secondhand market, new knowledge exhibits, although it continues to promote for larger than its eye-popping five-figure retail worth. Birkin baggage are a very scorching commodity on the resale market due to how tough it’s to get the product new, requiring a buyer to be a loyal Hermès shopper or construct a relationship with a gross sales affiliate.
In accordance with Bernstein Analysis’s Secondhand Pricing Tracker, the common resale premium for Birkin and Kelly baggage—a metric representing the public sale worth in comparison with its retail price—has fallen from 2.2 instances its authentic worth in 2022 to 1.4 instances as of final month. Meaning a Birkin initially purchased for $10,000 and resold in 2022 would have fetched for $22,200, whereas a bag initially retailing for a similar worth and resold at public sale right this moment can be value about $14,000 on the resale market right this moment.
Birkin baggage, prized by many for the exclusivity related to shopping for the bag, grew to become a pandemic resale darling as rich purchasing unaffected by COVID-related financial woes, sought out the in-demand bag on the secondhand market, as Hermès produces a restricted variety of the accent annually. Nonetheless, 2025 has marked the top of a “luxury supercycle” in response to Berenberg analysts, as customers face headwinds like inflation, and retailers fail to woo aspirational consumers. A Bain & Co. report launched this summer time additionally discovered the posh market contracted 3% in early 2025, shedding about 50 million clients.
Gen Z is besotted with Birkin
Luxurious retail manufacturers are concentrating on Gen Z, who’ve entered the posh market sooner than generations previous, however are nonetheless growing their style for what merchandise they search out. Some members of this younger technology—with a penchant for investing and facet hustles—have channeled their love for the finer issues right into a profitable entrepreneurial effort.
“Whoever says handbags aren’t an investment are lying,” one TikTok consumer mentioned in a 2023 video. “What I’m holding in my hands [an Hermès Birkin bag] is undoubtedly a better investment than the S&P 500, stocks, and gold.”
James Firestein, founding father of luxurious resale and authentication platform OpenLuxury, mentioned the appreciating worth of a Birkin isn’t any joke, claiming the resale worth of the purse and its Kelly counterpart, during the last decade, has outpaced gold.
“I know several instances where people have doubled their money based on buying it 10 years ago, and reselling it today in pristine condition,” Firestein advised Fortune final yr. “It’s similar to buying a Picasso and holding it in your home, because you can look at it, you can enjoy it. But then you ship it off in a couple of years and trade it for something else.”
Birkin’s resale worth in comparison with extra conventional belongings, although nonetheless steep, is maybe overexaggerated: $10,000 invested within the S&P 500 a decade in the past can be value about $30,000 to $40,000 right this moment, whereas a Birkin purchased 10 years in the past for a similar worth can be about double its worth, in response to a report launched final week by secondhand retailer Rebag. The evaluation indicated Hermès baggage appreciated a median of 92% on the secondhand market over the last decade.
Resale dangers
Whereas luxurious gadgets like a Birkin bag can soar in worth throughout a interval of excessive demand, most luxurious items are weak to the very developments that when made them well-liked.
Jessica Ramírez, cofounder and managing director at retail knowledge agency The Shopper Collective, advised Fortune that past financial struggles, Birkin baggage could also be shedding some resale worth simply because developments are slowly shifting. In accordance with Ramírez, resellers desirous to get essentially the most on a secondhand sale should time their preliminary buy earlier than the merchandise features an excessive amount of recognition and resell it on the peak of its affect. That peak has doubtless handed.
“From a market perspective and from a brand perspective, you want to cater your trends in the early days and see how early adopters are going to take and mature them, so you can get that mass,” Ramírez mentioned. “It works in reverse for a collector or someone who’s trying to make profit.”
