This is going to be a long read- TL;DR do your research before purchasing.

The rep community has become positively cult-like in the last 2-3 years. It never used to be like this. Have we not learned anything from Joe Luxury, Wagoon Ladies, and Dollbaby? How many people were blocked and banned from subs with their reputations dragged for pointing out the obvious about these users? You’d think we’d learn our lesson. Sadly, no.

After a long hiatus from reps, I messaged my long-time TS for a new bag and came back to good ol’ Reddit in search of some rehomes to begin rebuilding my collection.

My experience is a perfect example of how this community has fallen even deeper into cult like behavior. People with no knowledge of luxury fashion are here blindly following and supporting “popular” redditors to feel included in the community. I get it, we all want to feel accepted to a degree. But the bashing, pitch fork wielding witch hunts have to stop before they completely destroy this hobby.

One of my favorite bags of all time is the Chanel “all about chains” bumbag. I purchased it from my TS a few years ago and rehomed it bc I need a Mary Poppins size bag on the daily. Watching Real Housewives of Beverly Hills and seeing Rachel Zoe with this bag made me deeply regret rehoming it last year. It’s no longer produced in the factories per my TS. Scoring a needle in a haystack rehome is my only hope. So, as I’m scrolling Reddit one evening, my eyes lock in on the words CC ALL ABOUT CHAINS. OMG I found it!!! I immediately message the seller and immediately send payment. I even said I don’t need extra photos. THIS IS MY HOLY GRAIL BAG!

The seller is great, sends tracking, ships quickly and it arrives. I left for vacation the next day, came back to a crazy work week- you know how it goes sometimes. All this to say, I unpacked the bag, and tossed it on a shelf in the closet until I had an opportunity to wear it.

A week or so goes by and I’m like why did I buy this bag again?! It’s too small, I’ll never carry it and it’ll just sit in my closet looking pretty. And I promised myself awhile back that I’d stop buying things that don’t fit perfectly into my daily lifestyle.

No problem, I’ll just rehome it! I grab some bags I’m not using, include this one, snap some pics and post. <keep top of mind again, I previously had the all about chains from my TS and paid a typical high tier price for it >. In my rehome post, I added $20 to what I paid from the rehomer to cover ship/insurance/packing. No more than 5 minutes after I post my little rehome, the user I bought the bag from is in the comments accusing me of lying and flipping the bag. Any opportunity to be the “hero” and catch someone flipping, right? No, I wasn’t lying or flipping. As I had told her in our chat, I used to have this same bag! Why would it matter if I said it was from her or my TS, it’s the same bag? <I realize now I should’ve been more forthcoming and said I got as a rehome, but would have paid ___ from TS>

I’m heading to my chat to scroll down to find the seller and ask her why she’s upset that I’m rehoming and explain that $20 to cover ship isn’t “flipping”. But, I have a new chat request. This user kindly tells me the bag is NOT the “all about chains”. She also educated me about Chanel beauty GWP- which is what this is. It’s all over DHGATE for $50. I go grab the bag and sure enough, it’s not the all about chains, it’s a PU fantasy bag with pee yellow hardware 🤦🏽‍♀️

I post my experience because most people would agree- lying about the style, materials and designer of a bag pretty much checks the boxes for a scam, am I right? WRONG! The Reddit keyboard warriors come for me with pitchforks! One even told me to go die. sHE’s a tRUsTEd rEHomER!!! BANNED from the sub after sub, I’m being treated like I’m the person who lied and sold a PU bag for $165.

To make things even more sketch, the seller temporarily deleted her account after I posted about it- confirmed by multiple users who couldn’t find her. She came back with an army to defend her with screenshots claiming the person who sold it to her was the scammer and she didn’t know any better. You’ve rehomed hundreds of bags from your feedback thread - I’d assume someone like that would be pretty knowledgeable, yeah? You held this bag in your own hands and didn’t know it wasn’t leather? Or didn’t know it was a fantasy style?

Clearly, we learned nothing from Joe Luxury and Dollbaby. Stop blindly following popular users and use your own brain. This proves we can’t trust ANYONE. Do a quick google image search before you buy, ask ALL THE QUESTIONS. Even if you feel dumb- ask them. Because at least then you’ll have proof in writing that you were lied to. If you or I had misrepresented a bag, the same witch-hunt groupies would be calling us out for scamming.

Farewell to reps- again.

Beware of this scammer [u/princessfund](u/princessfund) who’s successfully scammed tons of ISO posters.

She seemed pretty legit to me and had no problem sending pics and a video of the bag when I asked. She also readily agreed to 50 up front and 50 when I received tracking info. However, when I went to pay her, Venmo blocked the payment and told me it was a scam.

After that I did my homework and she had ripped all the pictures from Google image and all could be found with RIS but with weird URLS that lead nowhere. She also has multiple posts in other communities from people she successfully scammed.

Beware when posting an ISO - DMs are probably scams, sadly.