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I Spent $925 on a Fake Canada Goose Coat

theatlantic.com

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Re: I Spent $925 on a Fake Canada Goose Coat

#51

Post by kaybe »

leesec wrote: post #38
ghaff wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Much less"? Not so sure. Good winter coats aren't cheap even when there isn't obvious branding. In any case, most clothing has both fashion and utilitarian aspects. A friend of mine bought a coat from what is probably Canada Goose's main competitor in their Montreal factory store. It was expensive, even on sale, but it was also a very nice cold weather coat that fit well--in addition to looking good.

Some Canada Goose coats are $900+. You can definitely get coats with 95% the same utility for 200-300. That is considerably less. Sure if you want to go to Antartica they might be worth the extra money, but the majority of people buy them for the fashion/status signaling.

If you go to Antartica (professionally, not sure about tourists) you will be issued clothes. For what isn't, Aldi options are sufficient, I've heard.

Re: I Spent $925 on a Fake Canada Goose Coat

#53

Post by dsfyu404ed »

slothtrop wrote: post #43
kache_ wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are very warm and are a godsend for freezing Toronto winters. Though I don't like the excessive labelling, so I replaced it with my own patch.

That's funny. If the label doesn't matter, why not opt for a less expensive option?

Same reason some (not all!) rich people take some of the badges off their very high end cars. Everyone knows you're driving a Mercedes sedan. No need to be a show off and let everyone know you bought the highest trim AMG, that would be impolite.

Re: I Spent $925 on a Fake Canada Goose Coat

#54

Post by BartBoch »

martin_a wrote: post #41
manjana wrote: post #37

Why are these articles in HN feed? Feed used to be great but there have been a lot of irrelevant content for the last month it seems to me?

Can I vote stuff like this (the article) down? Do I need a specific amount of points for that?

Yes, not sure if it's 500 or 1,000.

Re: I Spent $925 on a Fake Canada Goose Coat

#55

Post by jdietrich »

elcomet wrote: post #4

Are Canada Goose coats really worth it in the first place ? I don't own one, but it seems to me that they are very expensive due to marketing and being trendy, but that you could get the same quality or better for much less.

The outdoor clothing market has a slightly weird dynamic. The features that make a garment suitable for use in extreme conditions tend to make them unappealing to casual users. Conversely, outdoor brands need to maintain some semblance of credibility, which is jeopardised if they exclusively make clothes for dog walkers.

There are a lot of fantastic clothing brands and products that are largely unknown to the general public, and a lot of really mediocre garments being sold by big-name brands. Many sponsored mountaineers and climbers wear brand X clothes because they're good, but have them embroidered with brand Y's logo because they pay the bills. Certain brands are known for using very discreet logos on their garments, because they don't want to cause trouble for people with endorsement deals for other brands.

Canada Goose jackets are reasonably well made, but they're fashion items and priced accordingly. The Snow Mountain and PBI Expedition parkas are decent enough garments for arctic use, but they're overkill for normal use. Rab, Montane or Marmot will sell you a jacket of equal or better quality for less than half the price.

Re: I Spent $925 on a Fake Canada Goose Coat

#56

Post by grzm »

martin_a wrote: post #41
manjana wrote: post #37

Why are these articles in HN feed? Feed used to be great but there have been a lot of irrelevant content for the last month it seems to me?

Can I vote stuff like this (the article) down? Do I need a specific amount of points for that?

Submissions can be upvoted or flagged. There's no separate downvoting for submissions. I believe the karma threshold for flagging submissions is 31.

https://github.com/minimaxir/hacker-news-undocumented#flaggi...

Re: I Spent $925 on a Fake Canada Goose Coat

#58

Post by ghaff »

bluedino wrote: post #25
unfocused wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sent an employee to Iqaluit, Nunavut in Canada during winter there for 6 days. He said his Canada Goose coat was great and kept him really warm. They are indeed a very warm coat. So warm, that I prefer a Ski jacket where I can open the armpit zipper when I overheat while walking. Remember, if you are in motion, you will generate heat, so if you are waiting for the bus a lot, a very warm coat is good. If you walk a…

Agreed. I have a large red winter jacket that makes me look like I am going on an artic expedition. I'll wear it to snowblow the drive and halfway through I'm sweating so bad I have the coat unzipped and my hat off.

Yeah, I have a parka I bought for some specific needs I had at the time and was really glad I had it. I rarely wear it these days though. It's just too warm unless I were walking around in sub-zero (degrees F) or I were spending a bunch of time standing around in "just" sub-freezing temperatures. And it's pretty much too warm for any real exercise.

Re: I Spent $925 on a Fake Canada Goose Coat

#59

Post by alistairSH »

endorphone wrote: post #10
xfitm3 wrote: post #2

Very dramatic article. Author made a lot of assumptions, a common pitfall, and got a fake product. She reports she received a refund. I can’t fault anyone but the buyer here.

If someone went on shadyripoffsite.cn and paid 1/10th the normal price for a counterfeit product then sure, blame the buyer for not seeing red flags. But buying a product on Amazon that claims it's by the official seller, selling at the normal retail price of the product, should be a trustable, reasonable exercise. That Amazon lets anyone seemingly be anyone, even major brands, as sellers, and lets blatant frauds con…

But buying a product on Amazon that claims it's by the official seller

This is the key, at least from my perspective. If I go to Amazon (or any other online vendor) and an item is listed as being by "International Brand X", I expect that the item is, in fact, being sold by "International Brand X".

Amazon doesn't list the seller separate from the brand. The way the page is lad out, it is clearly meant to indicate the manufacturer is the seller.[0]

0 - http://oi65.tinypic.com/30t2ykm.jpg

Re: I Spent $925 on a Fake Canada Goose Coat

#60

Post by _asummers »

claudiulodro wrote: post #47
_asummers wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The author chose to buy a coat from a different company and use their platform to encourage others to do the same. Buying a different coat is a totally reasonable choice, but had they bought from an authorized retailer, then this article would have had a much different conclusion. The fake vendor is obviously the bad actor here, but Amazon facilitated them, and Amazon is rewarded at the end with another purchase. The…

The author was unable to purchase a coat from Canada Goose so she went to Amazon. I assume by the time the whole ordeal was sorted it was still not possible to purchase a coat from the Canada Goose site. It's hard to support the company when they are sold out on their site . . .

There's 23 authorized retailers in New York according to Canada Goose's website. While it's possible they were all sold out, that seems unlikely to me, especially since some of those retailers include large companies like Bloomingdales with warehouses of their own and websites accordingly. They could have walked into any of the 23 and purchased one physically. If they wanted one, they could have gotten one, above board. The real thing that happened here is the author had buyer's remorse and had the opportunity to rectify the situation, and while that's completely fine, this article should be much more indicting of Amazon than it is as they're really the culprit for this author's problem.
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