The season’s newest “it” handbag isn’t by any of the usual roster of exclusive designers or upscale brands. If it could speak, it wouldn’t whisper “luxury” so much as “mandarin orange chicken.” And it pairs best with a loud Hawaiian shirt.
Grocery store chain Trader Joe’s is the unlikely purveyor of the latest must-have item, a miniature version of its standard branded tote bag that has inspired the kind of hype reserved for Stanley tumblers and Taylor Swift merch. Across the country, the diminutive bag — which retails for $2.99 — is selling out quickly, prompting some stores to reportedly place limits on how many customers can buy. And video footage posted online appears to show enthusiastic crowds descending on restocked displays like seagulls at the beach attacking a spilled bag of chips. Food Tray Wrapping Machine With Stretch Film
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It’s so difficult to get your mitts on one of them that a robust resale market has sprung up. On eBay, sets of the bags are listed for as much as $499 — though it isn’t clear anyone is actually paying that much. A wide array of the bags in various colors is available for under $20, including shipping.
On social media, people are boasting about their scores.
“The Trader Joe’s mini tote really gives the same energy as the mini Goyard for only $2.99,” wrote one TikToker who posted a video of the two bags in coordinating shades of cherry red.
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The success of the totes surprised even the company. “Our Mini Canvas Tote Bags certainly sold more quickly than we anticipated,” public relations manager Nakia Rohde said in an email to The Washington Post. “Before we had the opportunity to promote them in any way, customers across the country found them at their neighborhood Trader Joe’s.”
She noted, though, that the grocer wasn’t pleased by one sign of their popularity: “Our customers, in our stores, are our focus; we do not endorse the re-sale of any of our products, anywhere,” she wrote.
But there’s good news for fans who have come up empty-handed. “We do have more Trader Joe’s Mini Canvas Tote Bags coming,” Rohde added. “Customers can expect to see them in our stores in late summer.”
The bag itself isn’t particularly special or flashy. It’s made of light-colored canvas, with a contrasting trim in red, blue, yellow or green. It resembles the iconic L.L. Bean Boat and Tote bag, the preppy staple that’s been around for decades but became trendy in the last few years when fashionistas began replacing the traditional monogram with cheeky messages such as “WTF” or “hot mess.”
So what’s making people lose their minds over such a humble bag? One is perceived scarcity: The mini tote bags are reportedly limited-edition items, a feature that often drives hype around products. But Josh Clarkson, a professor of marketing at the University of Cincinnati, says that only goes so far to explain the phenomenon.
Typically, he notes, the kind of “social signaling” people are doing with the Trader Joe’s bags — or Stanley tumblers — is reserved for luxury items that convey their owners’ ability to afford them. “So it’s almost paradoxical that these are utilitarian goods,” he says. “It has this feel that you are democratizing status in some way. People are taking everyday, relatively accessible items and creating status for them.”
In addition to providing the frisson that comes with subverting cultural norms, the totes … well, they’re just kind of cute. They’re endlessly customizable, functioning as a blank canvas for crafty creativity. People are adorning them with charms and bows and pins, and embroidering and painting them with whimsical images of fruits and flowers. They can go edgy, too: one woman on TikTok picked out part of the embroidered logo and altered it to read “Trader Hoe’s.” And because it comes in four colors, there is an incentive to buy multiples. Some completists are attempting to collect all the versions.
There’s also something about the aesthetic the tiny tote embodies, which is kind of basic — in a good way. After all, “normcore” fashion is still going strong, a decade after it first made dad jackets and white sneakers cool. Some stylesetters are rejecting the reign of the ostentatious designer bag — now that knockoffs are so convincing, what do they even mean? — and instead embracing “anti-it” purses.
Side Lroning Machine For Sanitary Napkin Bag And maybe the Trader Joe’s bag is the ultimate symbol of our collective status: These days, groceries themselves are so expensive that just filling up a cart can feel like a luxury.