This story is part of Glossy’s week-long look at the state of luxury, exploring what consumers and brands are deeming worthy of investment in 2024. To see all the stories in the series, click here.
For today’s luxury shopper considering the virtues of a Toteme bucket bag or The Row’s Margaux, a go-to resource has emerged: Substack.
More specifically, luxury shoppers are turning to newsletters like The Love List by Jess Graves; WIPOT, or What I Put On Today (16,000 subscribers), by Meg Strachan, founder of the lab-grown jewelry brand Dorsey; Magasin (33,000 subscribers) by Laura Reilly; The Cereal Aisle (over 135,000 subscribers) by Leandra Medine; and 5 Things You Should Buy (over 58,000 subscribers) by Becky Malinsky. And, as Glossy first reported in December, they flood the comments sections with inquiries about shopping needs, transactions of high-end items being sold to one another, and investigations centered on which new bags, belts, shoes and sweaters are worth the investment.
Their favorite brands to discuss? The Row, Khaite and Toteme, or, as Graves called them, “the holy trinity.” The Row just received investment based on a $1 billion valuation, Toteme reached $150 million in global revenue in 2023, and Khaite surpassed $100 million in 2022.
Other brands that are popular with Graves’s readership include majors like Loewe and Bottega Veneta. They also discuss smaller brands like Emme Parsons, which sells shoes for $275-$800; Maria McManus, with prices ranging from $300-$2,500; TWP, at $135-$3,000; and Kallmeyer, at $345-$2,500.
Those who spend time on the platform offered several reasons why these shoppers are likely congregating on Substack. There’s the fact that glossy fashion magazines and Instagram aren’t what they used to be. “There are too many interests at play,” according to Graves. Plus, the comments sections in Substack subscriber chats encourage multi-person back-and-forth dialogue in a way that most social media platforms don’t.
“On Instagram, you’re not engaging with people [in the] comments about luxury [items],” said Sogole Kane, a beauty publicist who writes a Substack called Another Fashion Newsletter.
There’s also the fact that Substack’s posts themselves often feature long-form writing about luxury brands and products that read as reviews.
“Instagram used to be more about connecting with friends and sharing pieces of your life. Now, it’s become this hyper-curated competition where everybody has a number assigned to their head,” Graves said, referring to the focus on follower count.
According to Strachan, “On Substack, you get a lot more information about an individual item than you do through a Story on Instagram.”
Strachan said her Substack community members are quite thoughtful about the items they invest in and use Substack to source product reviews. They ask each other questions like, “How much does the bag fit?” And, “How heavy does it feel when you put your laptop in it?” It’s the type of questions people may text to their friends. As luxury pricing has only trended upward, Strachan noted, people want to do their homework before making a big purchase.
Influence runs from the top — via the writer’s posts — down to the comments. Take The Row’s Margaux bag, the “it” bag du jour, which ranges in price from $3,650-$6,810. “I bought that bag, and I use it all the time. … It’s a very expensive bag, and I bought it for myself — it was not gifted. I feel like that translates through — [people understand it’s not] an advertisement,” Strachan said. Seeing Strachan — whose style they may admire and who they have opted to follow — integrate the bag into her day-to-day helps to paint a clear picture of its versatility and functionality, for example.
What is undeniable is that there is an eagerness among Substack’s luxury community to talk to other women with similar interests, and shopping budgets.
Recently, Kane had a gold-star find at her local TJ Maxx: a cashmere sweater by The Row. She immediately went to Substack to post a “note,” which is a status update posted to a main feed. “That was Friday. Now it’s Tuesday, and people are still liking [the comment] and commenting on it, saying, ‘Oh, my God. This is crazy. Which TJ Maxx was this? I need to go,”‘ Kane said, pointing to the enthusiasm among this niche community. At the time, the note had 75 likes and 10 comments.
In early September, Graves collaborated with the shirting company Chava Studio on a $525 button-down shirt. Graves announced the launch at night, expecting a few orders to come in from some night owls. But instead, the shirt sold out in an hour. She and the brand have already released another colorway, and a third is coming — around 150 people have joined the waitlist.
Regarding the shirt’s steep price point, she said, “Every once in a while, I’ll get a comment like, ‘How are people affording this?’ And I’m like, ‘Guys, there are a lot of women working in big jobs who can afford this, no problem.'” Graves’s readers are primarily women in their 30s and 40s who are “founders, vps, CMOs and CFOs,” she said.
Graves stressed that she’s always been upfront about the fact that The Love List is a luxury shopping newsletter, which typically alleviates the “noise” and “shaming” that can come with posting expensive things. After all, she said, “You don’t go into Bergdorf’s and walk up to the salesperson and haggle.”
