You might be one of the girls who belong to a “brand conscious” group. You really care to wear expensive brand named clothes, accessories, jewelry, and of course purses. It makes you feel attractive and empowered, especially if you worked hard for these luxury items you treat yourself with and paid for those expensive shoes, dresses and purses with your own money. Media through its many channels has been telling women that they are “worth it” and that they should be rewarding themselves with expensive treats, and it’s hard to escape this marketing pressure.
However, you might be losing sight of what wearing these expensive brands communicates to the people around you and specifically men, especially when it comes to purses. While men couldn’t really tell whether your dress or shoes cost a few hundred or a few thousand dollars, this is more obvious with purses, which usually have a shiny brand name tag affixed on them. Inevitably, when a guy sees a girl with a Gucci or Chanel or Hermes bag that he knows costs at least a few thousand dollars, he will inevitably assume that she is high maintenance and pain in the ass on many other levels, and she will be expecting way too much from the guy she is dating. This will happen in those situations, where you don’t want to send this type of message – i.e. when he sees you or tries to strike up a conversation with you.
An expensive purse doesn’t really say anything flattering about a woman to pretty much any guy, regardless of where he is coming from and his income. There are a few guys out there who like flashy, high maintenance women, but they are a small minority. And, the fact that this is what they are attracted to in a woman seriously calls into question their own values and sense of self worth.
If you are into these high end brands, chances are that you have no interest in adjusting your style and your taste for the sake of making yourself somewhat more approachable to men. And that’s fine. You just need to know the potential downside of the statement that these accessories make to the men around you. And if you do consider toning it down a bit, then I have encouraging news for you: switching from a $4000 bag to Michael Kors bag doesn’t make you untrue to who you are. Let’s not forget – this is just a purse.
