Simple Solutions: The 10-Year Hoodie

This is an interesting campaign I came across on Kickstarter.  The concept is to redefine quality, and provide consumers with a product that will last a long time, to prove that customers would rather have quality than the current products whose lifespan is determined through careful calculations and shoddy work, ensuring its’ obsolescence in a few years time.

Personally, I prefer to purchase high quality items that will last.  However, is this concept actually going to work?  Will you pay nearly $100 for a unisex hoodie available in only a few select colours?  One which, if it is torn, you will have to send in to be fixed?  I am not sure that in the long run, this item will actually be successful as intended.  Big consumer items such as appliances and vehicles are becoming more and more disposable.  In a world where the satisfaction of one’s wants is as simple as owning a credit card, regardless of income, I wonder if this will be another trend, or whether the growing environmentally-conscious public will take a look at their habits and decide to make a change.

What do you think?  Will today’s average, immediate gratification groomed, trend-following consumer actually wear this sweater for 10 years and send it in to be mended when needed?  Or will it simply be another fad, something to tell friends about, an item without much choice for personalization that is soon relegated to the back of the drawer?