William & Mary Business Law Review
Abstract
Luxury fashion retail has become a behemoth of an industry. Through acquisitions and strong brand recognition, some brands have developed significant market power in the luxury retail space. Chief among these brands is Hermès, a luxury leather retail boutique known for its highly sought after quota bags, like the Birkin and the Kelly. Quota bags are handbags that can generally only be bought by customers who have developed a substantial purchase history and relationship with the brand. Through this sales model, Hermès has created what plaintiffs have alleged to be an antitrust tying scheme, in which the purchase of one item is tied or conditioned on the purchase of others.
Some customers, including plaintiffs in Cavalleri v. Hermès, challenged this practice as unfair and unlawful under federal and state antitrust statutes. On September 17, 2025, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California dismissed the plaintiffs’ federal antitrust claims with prejudice, holding that the complaint failed to plausibly allege a relevant product market, market power, or antitrust injury. Though the United States’ legal system may not currently consider Hermès’s sales tactics to be illegal tying schemes, this Note explores precedent in the European Union that could pave the way to stricter enforcement of anti-tying schemes in the United States. Otherwise, the luxury retail market, without strict enforcement, could worsen the already-present signs of a monopoly in the market.
Repository Citation
Madeleine Chou, Playing the Hermès Game: Quota Bags, Antitrust Law, and the Limits of Consumer Protection in Luxury Markets, 17 Wm. & Mary Bus. L. Rev. 727 (2026), https://scholarship.law.wm.edu/wmblr/vol17/iss3/5Included in
Antitrust and Trade Regulation Commons, Consumer Protection Law Commons, Litigation Commons