The fallout from the demise of traditional shopping as we knew it at stores like Filenes and Jordan Marsh in New England or Bonwit Teller and Best and Company along with the rise of the Internet as a global market, has forever changed how we think about buying almost everything.

The large Macy style department store model of thousands of pieces of merchandise will not survive, and perhaps, just as well. We acknowledge we have more than we need and probably even more than we want;

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/business/wp/2016/04/05/there-really-are-too-many-stores-just-ask-the-retailers/

As we have been chronicling over the past several months, the retail store has taken a hit but you never walked into a Talbots and assumed that the clothes were rip-offs of some other chain.  The rise of the Internet marketplace is the perfect opportunity –too much money at stake – not to cultivate deception:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/sapna/say-no-to-the-dress?bftwnews&utm_term=.cg5VvPkMK#.iozlJYyVB

Finally, if we were to really shop more simply and pick a few choice items (some with significant price tags attached) what would we buy if we also had an eye for enduring value:

http://www.racked.com/2016/4/5/11339332/tradesy-resale-designer-bag-data