Prada and Chanel are two of the most luxurious fashion brands in the world, but which is more expensive?
Chanel is the more expensive label by a considerable margin, with many comparable Prada products coming with a price tag several thousand dollars cheaper than Chanel. Prada is cheaper in most aspects, including entry-level, average price-per-product, and most expensive product.
Read on to learn more about Prada and Chanel, and where they both fit into the wide world of fashion.
Italian Stallion vs. French Finery
If there’s an industry more competitive and capricious than the fashion industry, we don’t know what it is. From day to day, trends, labels, offerings, and regulations are changing, seemingly at the drop of a hat (no pun intended).
Today, there are tens of thousands of brands vying for the top spots in their respective niches, each fighting valiantly for a credible reputation within the industry. However, there are a few brands in particular that are constantly battling at the top of the table for the title of the most valuable label.
For example, there’s Louis Vuitton, the most valuable fashion brand in the world; Hermés, dramatically expensive and exclusive, and Gucci, a revered icon. According to the ‘fashion pyramid’ of brands, Chanel is worthy of the top spot in the ‘supreme’ section, with Prada sitting closely behind in the ‘aspirational’ rank.
These two brands have been trading for almost the exact same amount of time, with Prada being founded in 1913, and Chanel in 1909. While the latter was formed in France, arguably a fashion capital of the world, the former found its feet in Milan, Italy.
Throughout history, a few locations have been pivotal for the fashion industry, such as Paris, New York, and Milan. It’s no big secret that the competition between the popular French and Italian fashion houses has always been an intense one.
However, while these two brands mostly manufacture the same product lines today, their origins differ somewhat. While Prada cut its teeth in leather goods such as handbags and luggage, Coco Chanel was hard at work creating fine ladies’ clothing.
Chanel has been known as a revolutionary force focused on disrupting the industry since its inception over one hundred years ago. Prada, on the other hand, while popular, is more of a mainstream label; it’s much more affordable and plays it a little safer than Chanel.
It’s All A Matter Of Money
If there’s one thing these labels have in common, it’s that they’re all remarkably expensive. Of course, some are much costlier than others, with some brands offering items that seem staggeringly expensive to the average shopper.
In many cases, you can expect to pay tens of thousands of dollars for a simple handbag or an individual fashion accessory. It isn’t unheard of for limited edition items to ascend into the hundreds of thousands of dollars – anything is possible in the fashion world.
We compared a range of items from both Prada and Chanel to determine which was more affordable, and the answer was clear. Prada isn’t just cheaper to get into as a label, but its average price-per-product is considerably lower.
For example, an entry-level Prada bag can be purchased for as little as seven hundred dollars, but we couldn’t find a single low-tier Chanel bag for less than two thousand dollars. At the higher end of the spectrum, the finest Prada handbag will set you back around three and a half thousand dollars.
However, if you want to purchase a fine, high-quality handbag from Chanel, you need to be prepared to pay as much as eleven thousand dollars. It’s slightly bizarre, but one of the most expensive bags on Chanel’s website is a tiny, twenty-centimeter wide handbag, worth almost twelve thousand dollars.
This trend continues across almost vertical, regardless of whether you’re in the market for women’s shoes or men’s fashion. Wherever you look, Chanel is substantially more expensive than Prada.
Once upon a time, the most expensive bag released by Chanel was worth a staggering quarter of a million dollars. It was named the Chanel Diamond Forever bag, and it was adorned with more than three hundred diamonds.
It was crafted almost entirely from rare alligator leather and boasted an eighteen-karat gold chain. This bag is one of the most expensive handbags ever seen in the fashion world, and it only seems fitting that it originated from the dramatically exclusive Chanel fashion house.