The French luxury brand refuses to sell its products to Russians unless they can prove that they live outside the country and declare that they will not buy in Russia.
Several Russian influencers and customers claim to have been prevented from buying Chanel products. One influencer even accused the fashion house of “Russophobia” for not allowing her to shop in a Dubai shop.
“As I often come to Dubai for Fashion Week, Chanel officials recognised me, approached me and said : ‘We know you are a celebrity in Russia, we know you will bring your purchases there, so we cannot sell you our brand’s items,” Kalashnikova said in her Instagram post.
Meanwhile, Russian interior designer and influencer Liza Litvin posted an Instagram story detailing a similar experience, again in Dubai. In the post, Litvin claimed she had to sign a document at a Chanel outlet stating that she did not live in Russia and would not wear the bag on Russian soil. “I went to a Chanel shop in the Mall of the Emirates. They didn’t sell me the bag because (mind you!) I’m from Russia acheter kamagra oral jelly en ligne!” the young woman wrote in the post, according to Fortune.
On her side, Ukrainian socialite Snezhanna Georgieva said that some Russian buyers had managed to find schemes to negotiate the purchase of Chanel items, according to the New York Post.
Last Friday, the pro-Kremlin tabloid Pravda published a rebuttal of Chanel’s position by Maria Zakharova, a representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, who accuses the brand of Nazism by not selling products to Russian customers.
“We have just opened a wardrobe from which 80-year-old skeletons have fallen that were not yet decomposing,” Zakharova‘s statement on Chanel read. “We are a very patient and forgiving country. We have forgiven everyone for everything, turned the page and made room for the future. However, if this path is a ring road, we will break this vicious circle.”
On 4 March, Vogue Business reported that luxury shops in Russia were seeing a tripling in the number of customers as people “tried to buy as much as possible while they could still afford it“. A few days later, most luxury brands announced the temporary closure of their shops in Russia.
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Featured photo : © Chanel
