Demo's

When shopping for a nice dress i get so frustrated at the fact, there seems to be no Demo's so you can try the dress on. How do you know what a 1000L plus dress looks like on if you cannot try it first. Come on now surely if paying that much for a dress, a Demo would be nice.

Two thoughts come to mind.

1) Maybe there's a reason they don't offer demos.
2) There's a reason why I never pay that much for dresses in SL...

Seriously, though. Demos for clothes that are texture only are kind of hard to do because, well - you'd essentially get the dress. A lot of the stores I frequent though do offer demos for the prim parts so one can check out if it works with your ava or can be adjusted to fit. If this store doesn't... well, there IS probably a reason for it.

Sachi Vixen of Adam and Eve has demos of clothing - she overlays the textures used for clothing parts with a watermark so that you can check the quality (excellent) and 'fit' without getting the garment free. I believe the demos are free or L$1. Possibly other designers do this; you could ask in one of the many shopping groups in world - I recommend Hey Girlfriend.

Blaze has some nice demos on their gowns. What I find worse though, is when skin or hair stores have no demos....

Sascha's Designs also have free demos, they have a watermark on them, but you can check the fit is ok. Also if you join the group you get a free dress every month, and she makes beautiful clothes.

You don't pay that much for a dress, period. 100-300L will do for a dress. Reason most outfits do not have demos unless they're attachments is because it's hard to put huge "demo" letters onto the dress without preventing you froms seeing what it looks like. Four digit prices are reserved for complete avatar makeovers, AOs, super-complex vehicles/systems, etc. Whoever sells a dress for 1000L must be really ignorant of the pricing system in SL or just simply doesn't care if it gets sold, no matter how fancy their stuff are.
Go to Bare Rose, every single costume/outfit there is under 180L, and 90% of them are top quality that is unmatched anywhere else, especially since other stores would sell these outfits for at least 500L each.

Who are you to dictate what prices a designer may charge?

I agree with you that I've found many great outfits for under $L300, and Bare Rose is a great example. But I have also bought many wonderful dresses for L$1,000 or more, and felt that it was money well spent. Blaze, Digit Darkes, Jador, and Nonna Hedges come quickly to mind.

And I'm not even in the top tier. I've heard tell of dresses selling for L$5,000, or even L$20,000 (and my jaw dropped, believe me!)

Now, if only Bax Cohen would have a sale on boots.

I've also paid $1,000L for a dress, and been quite pleased with it. As long as people will buy it at that price, charge whatever you want. Some of the expensive dresses are amazing, IMHO.

I'll pay 1,000L or more for a gown or really nice outfit. Has to be pretty exceptional though. Most casual outfits run me 200-600L depending where I go. I once seen an ugly gown that was 5,000 L. I laughed till it hurt.

If you make 1 sale at 1000, or 11 sales at 100, which was the better price?
- That one is obvious...

But... consider 1 sale at 1000, or 6 at 100... those 6 are 5 more people who become walking billboards of your products...
- at that point its not so easy to call it.

Personally, I'm not going to spend a lot on something unless there is a demo, but what is a lot varies. And I don't mind it when a texture only item has demo on it in big letters somewhere.
- I can tell from the quality on the parts that don't have that what its likely to be like on the parts that do.

I often spend 1000L + on an outfit but it is often able to be broken up into several outfits and also includes shoes or boots