Unravelling the Complicated Mindset of the Wealthy Consumer

<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">The wealthy person is a complicated creature. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Research indicates the typical top-end-of-towner seeks incremental steps up, in a lot of things, makes major steps up, in one to three things, and remains unmoved by luxury, brand, experience or other factors in many other purchase categories. </span></p> <p><strong>The wealthy are selective in what they indulge in.</strong></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Price is literally out the window in the care and feeding of the poodle, but the wealthy often recoil at the price of a Lexus, often preferring a Toyota.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">This makes marketing to the wealthy a strategic undertaking. </span></p> <p><strong>Clever brands have worked this out.</strong></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Luxury-goods have caught on and are engaging in a strategy called "</span><em><span style= "font-weight: 400;">luxury drop-down". </span></em></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Luxury goods like Mercedes or Coach bags have created lower-priced products - usually smaller, with fewer features, but of the same quality and bearing the brand name - encouraging the affluent consumer to cross the luxury line without qualm. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Further, some luxury brands have found enormous leverage in leaving a huge chasm between their top-priced items and their new lower priced merchandise. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Women who can't afford one, and even those who can, might blanch at a $10,000 Vera Wang dress but be quite happy to pay $199 for a Vera Wang blouse. But without knowledge of the $10,000 dress, they'd balk at such a high price for the blouse. </span></p> <p><strong>It serves to have an ultra-expensive offering.</strong></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Some marketers, even go so far as to create and promote red-herring-priced goods or services they hope no one buys, only to set a standard that makes their