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| A baby Dior boutique at Shinsegae Department Store in Seoul / Courtesy of Shinsegae Department Store |
By Kim Jae-heun
The children-focused products of international luxury brands such as Burberry, Moncler and Dior are enjoying growing popularity, as parents here are opening their wallets without hesitation for their children, according to industry officials Wednesday.
South Korea has the world's lowest fertility rate, dropping down to lower than one child per woman in 2018. This makes the absolute number of students at elementary schools quite small. As the saying goes, "bear one child and raise them well," Korean parents are certainly following the maxim and spending money generously on their children.
The child-focused products made by luxury brands are as expensive as those for adults. Burberry's school bag and a trench coat for kids are sold for 1.05 million won ($828.5) and 1.45 million won ($1,144) at local department stores. The prices of Moncler's padded jackets are mostly way over 1 million won and many of them were out of stock here last year.
Galleria Department Store, a well-known luxury department store in the country, recently launched Thom Browne Kids' pop-up store for the first time in Korea. Thom Brown is a luxury fashion brand based in New York City that became popular here after K-pop stars such as G-Dragon and BTS wore its clothing and accessories.
"The domestic market for luxury brands' children's lines is growing significantly at the moment. Department stores of Shinsegae and Hyundai have opened several children's clothing boutiques of luxury brands and they are all doing well. We expect the segment to expand continuously in the next few years," a local department store official said.
According to the Korean Federation of Textile Industries, the size of the domestic fashion market stood at 43.35 trillion won last year, up 7.5 percent year-on-year. The children's clothing market increased 16.8 percent to register 1.6 trillion won during the same period, which is more than double the overall fashion market's growth rate.
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