The realization that anything over a $12 F-91W is more jewelry than a timepiece helps explain much of the watch market. Once you own more than one watch you're gonna get many of them, which is something some watchmakers count on.
This is one area I think Apple has done a pretty good job in. They'll happily sell you a basic watch with a nice elastomer band for a few hundred bucks. This is the smartwatch equivalent of that F-91W. But Casio can't sell you a fancy F-91W that looks stylish and makes them an extra thousand bucks in profit.
Well you can actually buy a $4000 Casio GShock. They also have the Casio Oceanus line which are fancy and expensive. The $20 Casios are just the gateway drug and a lot of people with one Casio tend to have many.
It has worked so well for Apple that I'm honestly surprised they haven't gone down the "bling route" with the iPhone, limited edition super-high end status symbol phones.
That is a good point. I think the most expensive case you can buy for an iPhone from Apple is about $60. Even if you check off all available options you still can't break $2000 for a new iPhone. But there are third-party cases costing multiple thousands of dollars, so there must be some market for it. Though I suspect Apple knows more about the size of that market than I do. Still, I'm surprised they don't even try to sell an ugly Hermès multi color case for $600.
Apple isn't really in the business of low volume luxury/status goods. Yeah, some people will mock Apple users as status-seeking. But, really, everything Apple sells may not be bargain goods but they're a pretty long throw from one of those many Vegas clothing etc. stores where, at least figuratively, I couldn't buy a single item--or at least wouldn't even consider it.
But they do sell $600 Hermès watchbands. And the stainless steel watch, which is essentially a designer choice. So a designer phone case would be a decent analog to that. I'm actually surprised $59 is the most expensive case they sell.
The primary thing here is the Hermes band is made by Hermes and sold in Apple's stores. They don't actually make it.
Apple will make higher-end stuff if they continue to have trouble selling new hardware tho. I expect that they'd actually go both directions, more low-end and more high-end.
