[nyx]

You're right, of course, but I don't think blame rests solely on the individual consumer here... I guess it's a bit of a chicken-and-egg problem, wherein Apple makes $200 knitted iPhone scrotes because they know people will line up to buy it, and people will line up to buy $200 knitted iPhone scrotes because Apple made them.

And people have brand loyalty to Apple stuff because quality, or design, or something... but for a product like this, which to me is prima facie a ridiculous, impractical, high-priced, fast-fashion item, you know that the marketers are cashing in on that brand loyalty almost exclusively (in the absence of any intrinsic value).

Half-baked thoughts, I'm sure people have written properly about this. But the conclusion I leap to is that marketing people are the great Satan here. Fuck those guys.

[artyom]

Pretty sure the profit margin for these bags is 10x at least. Way better (and simpler) that dealing with expensive computer/phone hardware and it supply chain, even if their pricing is ridiculously expensive.

Marketing guys just know and exploit a very well known human weakness. It's annoying because it's Apple, but everyone has been doing this forever.

Non-standardized phone chargers? USB-C and its patent hell? HDMI and its licensing? There's plenty of examples for creating wasteful items without them being fashion ones.

[bborud]

Oh it is going to be a more than 10x profit.

The materials themselves probably cost no more than a few tens of cents, so all the cost is going to be the in the manufacturing process. The knitting pattern does look somewhat advanced, so I guess it would require a relatively high spec knitting machine. I suspect what would drive up cost is a combination of throughput and somewhat that you need an expensive knitting machine. Since this is a high volume item that will probably bring down the average cost by quite a bit.

I would guess somewhere in the region of $2 to $5 per pocket to mass produce these? Anyone have a more qualified guess?

[docmars]

This is the perfect example of a product nobody asked for, but someone brilliantly decided to create waste with.