Luxe Redux

"How many of these are you selling?" I asked that Prada salesman, my hand on the 36,000 $ crocodile skin suitcase . 

"In 2009?" He paused. "None."

....Luxury brands today, one after another, are making this "flight to quality," lest they fall away like so many Vionnets. "We are seeing the consumer move away from the prestige purchase, the blingy, the flash, to quality," says Mary Beth Whitfield, senior vice president of the consulting firm Retail Forward. "Consumers will still resonate with something that is marketed as premium or classic."....