The Telfar Shopping Bag just received a major co-sign—not that it really needed one.
On Thursday, Beyoncé was spotted walking in Brooklyn while carrying the must-have accessory from Telfar Clemens. Bey’s bag was the medium-sized white version that retails for $202; but just like every other model, this particular piece has been sold out for a while.
The design, aka the “Bushwick Birkin,” has become one of the most in-demand bags over the last couple of years and is known to sell out within minutes of each drop. Designer Clemens even launched the Telfar Bag Security Program in an effort to give customers better access to the highly coveted totes, which have been praised for their simple yet luxe aesthetic and relatively affordable price points. The typical small version retails for $150 and the large goes for $257, however, some resellers have listed the sold-out bags for twice as much.
In July 2020, Telfar shut down its website due to a high volume of traffic driven by the Shopping Bag restock. Some initially speculated that bots were to blame for the crash, but Clemens told Complex the effect of bots was “exaggerated.”
“The demand has been growing exponentially since January. We’ve been around since 2004 and this bag has been around for five years,” Clemens said. “It’s actually quite a deep question to ask why it’s popping off right now. I think people who know don’t need an explanation. If we are talking about this particular drop, it’s the first time we teased [a restock]. All we said was ‘set your alarms’ … If there were no bots roughly the same thing would have happened. A vast majority of bots are buying for individual customers from what we see. I think it’s well known what we are about and what our bag is about.”
Bey isn’t the first celebrity to rock Telfar’s signature bag. Everyone from Oprah and Bella Hadid to ASAP Ferg and Ashton Sanders have been photographed with the design. Even congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez secured her very own piece.
Although the Beyoncé co-sign is great publicity for Telfar, some Twitter users expressed concerns that the photos would increase demand for the bag, thus making it even more difficult to cop.
You can read some of the reactions below.
