Police say ease of re-selling, twinned with growing demand, has encouraged gangs to target luxury leather goods
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series of million-euro robberies of luxury handbags from boutiques and brand headquarters in Paris has shown that high-value leather goods are now a bigger target for organised criminals than jewels or cash, as French police pursue sophisticated gangs targeting designer bags.
Paris has been the scene of several high-profile robberies of handbags over the past year, fuelled by the growing global demand for designer leather goods, which are increasingly being displayed by influencers on social media. As designer handbags sell for record prices at auction – with the late singer Jane Birkin’s Hermès bag fetching €8.6m (£7.4m) this summer – prices are rising in boutiques and secondhand bags are gaining value as collectors’ items.
Jérôme Lalande, an expert on leather goods at the Paris appeals court, said demand for designer handbags was so high that the secondhand market was flourishing, making bags very easy to sell on. “There’s a lot of money to be made,” he said. “Handbags have come to represent social status.”
