albertabrightalberta | Volunteer Community Mentor
Dear Community / To Whom it may concern,
I'm an established seller, but am relatively new to selling preowned / name brand handbags.
My area appears to have a nice selection of used condition, name brand items at decent prices to purchase for my small business inventory. But I am seeking a guide / mentor in my beginning phases of the journey towards learning proper authentication of bag model / style / etc numbers.
Currently, I have several coach bags that I've been examining the Leather Bag #'s on, but would like help on verifying my findings to better my personal knowledge on Coach tag identification. To start, I've uploaded 2 of the labels I currently have photographed, and if the forum has some general interest in helping me, I'll add a few more in the comments.
I strive to provide accurate and clear listings, so this is my first attempt at reaching out to the public for good advice and starting points. I do my own research and have read dozens upon dozens of articles / sites about this topic, but am looking for direct / current knowledge bases to learn from.
Thanks for your time! I've included the photos with my research notes / thoughts for constructive feedback below.
A.) I believe this is a City Willis Color Block 70th Anniversary bag (70th per the leather tag).
My understanding currently, is the "K" means "November", "11" is the year 2011, "20" is where it was made?
"19035" would be the Style #...?
B.) I believe to be pre-1994 due to the 3 digit first half of the serial # ? It could be random generated first 3 digits as I've read the "year" digit didn't start until 1994 with association to digit reference "4". The bullet suggests it was a full price boutique bag, sold in an outlet for a discounted price (aka not Full Direct from Coach Price). The STYLE # would then be "7593"?
1 BEST ANSWER
Accepted Solutions
A very knowledgeable and trusted member of a large purse forum has collaborated with ebay seller salearea to publish some of the few accurate and comprehensive guides intended to cover many of the most common facts and myths about Coach. Google "SaleArea guides | PurseForum"
Understand that the guides do not include every invalid serial number nor every detail about what makes items fake.
As for your specific bags
1. made in October, 2011. Coach usually skipped "I" as a month code so as not to be confused with 1. But there are legit bags with I month codes.
2. Bag was made in 2003. (Read the Salearea guides, specific the one teaching how to read and understand serial numbers.)
Actually, China did use the month code 'I' sometimes so they may be November bags...see how easy this is? 🙂
Here are examples of authentic "I" codes.
@crematia18 wrote:
I won't be asking for my money back on the fakes from purchases that I find, however they will be stored in a "do not sell / for future reference" box to take them off the marketplace.
I have completed / determined that one of my newer purchases was a definite fake, and am taking notes on what I learned from that. I have at least 5 more bags I'm in the process of looking over, but haven't had a chance to photograph yet, so I will update my post comments with those later in the week probably.
If you bought a fake, you shouldn't eat the loss. Post pictures to verify that your suspicions are correct before discarding.
It's commendable that you want to keep any fakes off the market.
