Large Tote Bags: The Miche Bag Solution

May 20th, 2010

Is it time to finally splurge on that new tote bag? Lucky you! This is the one bag in a woman’s collection that really matters because it’s probably the one she turns to the most. For this and many other reasons, you need to do a lot of research on what’s available out there and then pick the one that will help you get through the day with your stuff (not to mention your sanity) in one piece. But with so many to choose from how do you know which one is THE ONE? It’s mainly a gut decision, like choosing the right lipstick, but you can be thrilled with your decision if you look for these three essential characteristics: quality, a modern designer look, and a price you won’t kick yourself for paying the next day. Miche has provided a tote bag solution in the form of The Big Bag.  The big base bag has numerous big shells to choose from, so you can quickly and easily change the look of your tote bag without having to remove all the contents!  What’s more, the Big Bag encompasses all of the quality characteristics you should look for when buying a tote bag.

No falling apart allowed! A bag that is not sturdy enough to withstand the demands of everyday living is not worth paying a single penny for, so opt for quality first and foremost and you’re sure to be one happy camper. It can be leather, it can be fabric, or it can be made from something else altogether: the one you choose is largely a matter of taste. As long as the materials inside and out are made from durable, sturdy stuff it doesn’t really matter which one you choose. Don’t fall for the first “pretty face” you see: be realistic about what you’re going to put that tote through and think quality and strength of construction before all else.

Thanks to today’s consumer-aware bag designers, there are all kinds of high-fashion looks to choose from out there: so you don’t have to compromise on good looks for the sake of functionality and roominess. You compromise in just about every other area of your life; isn’t it nice to know your purse can be chic? If you like different looks but don’t want to pay for separate totes, look for the latest trend in bags: the Miche Bag with interchangeable “shells” that slip right over your tote and give you a new look to suit your outfit or mood anytime you like.

In this day and age, you don’t have to pay high-fashion prices to get a high-fashion look. You just don’t! So be smart about the price you pay while not compromising on quality and good looks, and you’ll be able to pat yourself on the back for your wisdom and outstanding judgment.

Large tote bags are a necessity for any woman nowadays. When you go for quality, a high-fashion look and a reasonable price you’ll have what you need along with a guilt-free conscience. What more could a gal ask for?

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What’s in Your Miche Bag?

April 18th, 2010

If you’ve attended a purse party lately, you’ve likely thought about what it is you typically keep in your purse, and how much space it takes up. Most women feel scorned for carrying more than a few things around with them in their purses, especially by men (some of whom feel superior for having spacious enough pockets that they don’t need to carry purses—but wasn’t it male designers who started the trend a few centuries ago of women wearing tighter clothing, which prevents them from having large and spacious pockets like men do?) No matter. Whether you tend to carry a lot or a little, the Miche Bag allows you to organize and carry all of your purse contents. As an added bonus, Miche Bags, allow you to keep the contents of your purse in the basebag and just change the shell,  a huge timesaver for those of us that love to carry around the kitchen sink.

Purses have changed considerably over the centuries, and so have their contents. In the 18th century, women had bags for every type of occasion, but typically they carried face powder, rouge, a scent bottle, and smelling salts, and sometimes love letters and bank notes. In the 1900s women carried opera glasses, fans, mirrors, and powder puffs. Women of the early to mid 20th century often carried matches and cigarettes in cigarette holders; and reading glasses, glasses for distance, and sunglasses.

Currently, purse owners vary considerably in what they tend to always have in their bags, but there are some basics: a wallet with IDs, driver’s license, credit cards, debit cards, membership cards, business cards, work badges, key cards, transit cards, checkbooks, cash, and receipts; a cell phone; key chains with keys; at least one pen; at least a minimal amount of makeup, such as lipstick or lip gloss; and lip balm. Other very common items in purses include: cameras; sunglasses; MP3 players; coin purses; loose change; notebooks; and hair accessories such as bobby pins, ties, and barrettes. Slightly less common items are: cell phone chargers, hand sanitizers, lotions, hand creams, moisturizers, PDAs, books, tissues, toothbrushes, toothpaste, dental floss, medications, mini hairbrushes, planners, gum, mints, candy, and perfume.

More items that are not atypical in purses, especially larger ones, are: calculators, stain remover pens and wipes, water bottles, band aids, sharpies, highlighters, shoes, deodorant, mirrors, mini umbrellas, snacks, cook books, tea, Splenda, baby wipes, diapers, change of clothes for a child, mini laptops, post-its, fortune-cookie fortunes, magazines, oil remover sheets, calendars, safety pins, pepper spray, throat lozenges, mini staplers, headphones, grocery lists, unpaid bills, lighters, cat toys, dog collars, DVDs to return, Blue-tooth devices, reusable shopping bags, coupon books, to-do lists, mouthwash, plastic cutlery, napkins, hand wipes, breath spray, paper, sketchbooks, and flash drives.

We commonly need much of the above when we go out. If we don’t carry these items, we sometimes borrow them from other purse owners. If you attend a Miche party, you might enjoy content comparisons with your co-attendees.  So, what do you carry in YOUR Miche Bag?

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Miche “Hope” Shell to Support Cancer Research

March 5th, 2010

Miche Bag is offering a chance for women to help fund cancer research through buying a specially designed Miche shell named “Hope.”  The Hope shell is available and has been a popular item at purse parties everywhere.  It is available for both Miche’s small base bag and big base bag, and the design incorporates numerous quotes from cancer survivors and patients in bold white lettering on a black faux-leather background. Included in these quotes are the following: “It’s not about living or dying; it’s about living until I die,” “No regrets,” and “Love.”

Now you can buy this gorgeous new “Hope” shell for your Miche purse, generating a Miche Bag donation of $5 towards cancer research at the Huntsman Cancer Institute. Additionally, your total donation is doubled because the owners of Miche Bags Texas (Billy and Anna Bohannon) are personally matching your donations, giving to the M D Anderson Cancer Center and the Christus McFadden Ward Cancer Center. Miche’s goal, says Jennie Platt, a designer at Miche, is to donate one million dollars worldwide to fighting cancer.

The Huntsman Cancer Institute is a part of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN), which is a not-for-profit alliance of the leading cancer centers in the world. The NCCN is dedicated to improving the effectiveness and quality of care given to cancer patients. The Huntsman Cancer Institute is also a National Cancer Institute-designated cancer center, meaning that it meets the highest national criteria for cancer research and care. It also means that it receives support for scientific research. The physicians and scientists at Huntsman Cancer Institute (at the University of Utah) endeavor to understand cancer at the genetic and molecular level. The U of U has been a leader in the study of human genetics for a long time, and this is helping in devising new and better ways to treat individuals with cancer.

The Huntsman Cancer Institute was founded by Jon Huntsman, Sr. who has, to date, donated in excess of 250 million dollars to the cause. Miche Bag enthusiasts can now join Mr. Huntsman and other donors by raising cancer research funds. The “Hope” is for a million dollars before 2011.

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From Tupperware to Miche Bag

January 15th, 2010

The History of The Home-Party Method of Sales

The home-party method of sales was implemented more than 70 years ago, and today it has expanded into home parties of almost every kind, with one of the biggest trends being purse parties. In1931, a previously successful door-to-door Fuller Brush salesman started his own direct-marketing company called Stanley Home Products. One of its salesmen started making record-breaking sales by implementing his new home-party method. Stanley converted its marketing from door-to-door to the home party model by 1940. Throughout the 40s, this marketing style brought women into sales, giving them the flexibility they couldn’t get in other jobs. It allowed them to work a lot or a little and to set their own schedules.

In the early 1950s, one single-mom saleswoman took her Stanley home-party success with her to the head of the Tupperware company, which became a leader in the home party field. Virtually all other early home party sales companies were started by people who’d been involved in Stanley or Tupperware. And the concept is alive and thriving today.

The concept is that products can be demonstrated (mostly by females since the 1960s) in the living rooms of female hostesses who volunteer their homes and invite their female friends to attend a “party.” The saleswomen demonstrate to many people at a time and take orders from many people at once. This system is more efficient than knocking on one door at a time. The hostesses are rewarded with prizes or free products. The guests have a good excuse for an evening out and are rewarded with a few hours of fun interaction and bonding with their peers. In return, the guests feel somewhat obligated to the hostess to place an order for the product. Today there are home parties for every kind of product: candles, arts and crafts, health, wine, baby, lingerie, adult novelties, beauty, and home (including Tupperware).

What is puzzling about the long-lastingness of the home party method of sales is that it is so contrary to the overall growing social trend away from in-person socializing. People used to regularly get together with friends and relatives for fun, work bees, visiting, worshipping, playing, and more. People used to interact with their neighbors. Now we can live next door to someone forever and never introduce ourselves. We are more likely to interact with people through email, instant messaging, gaming, social networking, or the telephone than go for coffee with someone.

The continued success of home parties has been apologetically explained as an overall retro trend toward nesting and adding luxuries to our lives. It’s deeper than that. It’s still a successful way of selling products, some of which aren’t sold any other way. (To buy, you must attend.) I think its biggest reason for continued viability is that the sellers, hostesses, and buyers are women who are still turning the sales process into a fun, social shopping event that continues to fill an ever-growing social void in our lives. Is anyone ready for a Miche bag purse party?

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What Every Purse-Loving Woman Should Know About The Different Types Of Purse Parties

January 5th, 2010

Purse parties are the hot new trend in home-based retail. Basically, there are two varieties of purse parties, the illegal type and the legal type. Illegal purse parties are for selling designer bag knock-offs at low prices. Designer bags that are typically between $150 and $500 would sell for illegal knock-off prices of $30 to $60 or so at designer purse parties. There is currently a law-enforcement crackdown on such illegal activities, which reportedly have links to terrorism and organized crime.

It certainly is a crime to sell knock-off designer-label purses with fake designer labels. It’s a federal trademark violation, and it’s viewed as trafficking in counterfeit goods—even for the in-home designer purse party host. This kind of offense can bring prison terms as much as ten years and fines as big as $2 million. The people who purchase fake designer bags at handbag parties, however, are not criminals. But they are getting ripped off if they think they are getting designer-quality bags. They are getting very cheaply made bags, so they aren’t getting a bargain.

Legitimate designer purses come along with legitimate warrantees. They have labels that aren’t blurred, don’t peel off, and aren’t misspelled or altered. They come with a printed warrantee, state where they’ve been manufactured, and are sold in actual stores (not on the street or in someone’s home.)

The other type of designer purse party is the legitimate, legal purse party, where wannabe high-end designers sell their look-alike designer-inspired purses with their legally owned labels on them. These are legally safe to buy and sell as there is no fraud occurring. Some attendees, however, are disappointed when they find out they aren’t there to buy illegal knock-off bags. Others are worried that they might be at an illegal purse party.

There is a third type of purse party as well, also legal. This is when purses that have nothing at all to do with big-name designer bags are sold through in-home marketing. Instead of having a likeness to a designer bag, they have some other marketable feature. One company in this category is Miche Bags. Their handbags are firstly designed for practicality and functionality, with attractiveness of style being a secondary feature. Primarily, these bags were designed to have numerous quickly and easily interchangeable outer Miche shells so that women don’t have to actually change their purses with their outfits, but just the outer covers. This purse company began marketing their unique product through in-home purse parties, but they’ve since expanded to online and in-store sales and have become a multi-million-dollar international business.

By now you should be able to figure out which kind of purse party you’ve been invited to or want to attend: (1) a purse party that markets designer knock-offs of probable inferior quality for still-too-high prices (2) a purse party that sells designer-wannabe, designer-inspired styles of reasonable quality for reasonable prices, and (3) a purse party that presents some original purses designed on some unique, new concept. Happy handbag hunting!

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The Purse Party- A New Trend In Handbags

December 18th, 2009

A current handbag trend that you might not be aware of is purse parties. You may think (especially if you are very male or very young) that handbags are simply that: bags that you carry with your hand so as to keep your important stuff organized and with you anywhere you go—things like your keys, cash, credit cards, driver’s license, makeup, medications, brush, nail file, and other handy things to take with you when you leave your home.

But it isn’t true that handbags, or purses, are just for carrying your things in. A secondary function of handbags is to accessorize. Historically, handbags have been expected to closely match your shoes, and your shoes and purse together have been expected to reasonably complement your outfit. These fashion expectations appear to have diminished in recent decades, with an almost-anything-goes attitude. Or possibly it’s just the ideas about matching that have changed.

Another current function of handbags is that of status symbol. Modern fashion magazines all seem to have pictures of purses that cost thousands of dollars—each! Celebrity magazines often show photos of real people actually owning such purses. And some online sites help avid designer-bag collectors have the opportunity to show off their prestigious collections.

Online support is also available to those at the other end of the handbag-loving spectrum—people who’ve designed and created their own handbags out of everything and anything, including clothing labels, pockets, soda-can tabs, trash bags, neckties, scarves, t-shirts, wallpaper, heirlooms, memorabilia, and anything at all vintage. Such sites offer free tutorials and patterns for people to access for knitting, embroidering, painting, stenciling, stamping, cross-stitching, beading, weaving, quilting, dyeing, collaging, appliquéing, mod podging, hand-stitching, and silk-screening their own handbags. There are directions for memorializing a worn-out favorite t-shirt into a purse. There’re also directions for making a purse-shaped table centerpiece out of a watermelon!

For people who are somewhere in between the at-home recycle-whiz purse designers and the affluent designer-bag-collecting consumers, there are purse parties. These are social get-togethers in the home of a friend, acquaintance, neighbor, or relative, where you can catch up on the latest handbag trends, such as the affordable and stylish purses (both large and small) that come with changeable exteriors. These long-overdue bags make it simple to match your purse to your outfit and your mood. You never have to take your stuff out of one bag and put it into another. Instead, you just almost instantly change the outside shell of the handbag. And all of your shells fold up into almost no space at all. The most amazing thing about this type of bag—other than the fact that it has interchangeable exteriors, of course—is that it doesn’t require a ton of money to have a bag that can be made to match any outfit and to make it appear as if you have many beautiful purses.

If you’ve felt out-of-the-loop on handbag trends, perhaps this is your chance for a purse party.

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Fall Fashions Made Simple with Miche Bag and Purse Parties

September 25th, 2009

Just as the seasons change, so do fashion trends. Thank goodness my Miche Bag easily changes to fit the styles of the season. With my Miche Bag, I can simply change the magnetic shell to match my summer or fall ensemble. And, with the great new styles from Miche, I can always be fresh and in fashion!

Miche Bag purse parties are my favorite way to collect more shells. Purse parties let me mingle with good friends, eat good food, and get the latest styles from Miche! It seems that when the warm weather is upon us, I find myself gravitating towards many of Miche’s bright and summery shells. The great slouchy Stacy style has become my favorite shell as we move into fall. I especially like the shell in brown, as it complements my fall wardrobe perfectly. The style is the newest in my expanding collection of shells, I just got it at a purse party, and I have already received many compliments!

So, although Labor Day may mark the end of long summer days, it also marks the beginning of a wonderful fall season. The change in seasons marks a change in fashions, and my Miche Bag is always right there with me as my versatile year-round bag.

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