Akubra Overload

[intulor]

Thanks. I like that teardrop shape.

Thanks. Had no idea what I was doing. Took a lot of trial and error and watching YouTube videos. The teardrop shape is rather wide, wider than I wanted, but I believe that's because I kept trying to get the overall height lower, forcing the sides out.

My dog hair donor decided to photobomb my attempt at taking a pic of the crown. I'm still rather shy about putting my own face online.

 

[daddy0d0]

Good evening everyone, it’s been quite a while since I’ve been here. Health issues between myself and immediate family tends to put your focus onto ther things! Along with that I made the mistake of taking up fly fishing
Anyway, I’m out and about today in my BlueGrass Green CampDraft.
Nice to be back!!
NO IDEA WHY PICS ARE SIDEWAYS!!
I have some Akubra’s listed in the classifieds if anyone may be interested.

 

[intulor]

Good evening everyone, it’s been quite a while since I’ve been here. Health issues between myself and immediate family tends to put your focus onto ther things! Along with that I made the mistake of taking up fly fishing
Anyway, I’m out and about today in my BlueGrass Green CampDraft.
Nice to be back!!
NO IDEA WHY PICS ARE SIDEWAYS!!
I have some Akubra’s listed in the classifieds if anyone may be interested.

Welcome back!

 

[Marcus G]

Hi All,

Regarding the online selling of Akubras in 2025, at the end of December, I spoke directly with Trudi at the Hattery. She said that they are still able to post photos of the Akubra inventory that they have for sale, but that they cannot post the prices online and also cannot sell online. Now for the good news. . . you can still purchase Akubras from The Hattery if you contact them, I suppose by email or phone. While the hats cannot be ordered from the website, The Hattery will still send hats in the mail like before. I guess it will be a phone transaction. The prices will match the prices on the Akubra website, meaning that most discounts seem to be gone. Different stores got different deals from the Akubra company.

Now, in the past 5 months, I've purchased an Akubra in Australia and worn it on the plane back to my home in Japan. In addition, I've also purchased several other times online. One concern that I have is regarding price. If you buy in Australia, you pay the normal retail tax of 10% at the retailer, but you get a voucher that you can claim at the airport to have the tax refunded. So, a hat costing $320 (that has the 10% Australian sales tax build-in to that price) actually has a cost of $290 if you claim the tax rebate at the airport like I did. Then you'd probably have to declare the hat at the airport in your home country to pay duty if required.

I believe that one of the reasons we get cheaper prices at Everything Australian is because they recognize that we live outside of Australia with their International store on their website (as opposed to their domestic store), so we don't have to pay the sales tax in Australia because we have to pay duty on the imported item when the hat arrives in the mail. No problem. My concern lies in whether or not we'll have to pay the Australian tax in addition to the import duty. That would be kinda maddening.

 

[The Shoe]

Hi All,

Regarding the online selling of Akubras in 2025, at the end of December, I spoke directly with Trudi at the Hattery. She said that they are still able to post photos of the Akubra inventory that they have for sale, but that they cannot post the prices online and also cannot sell online. Now for the good news. . . you can still purchase Akubras from The Hattery if you contact them, I suppose by email or phone. While the hats cannot be ordered from the website, The Hattery will still send hats in the mail like before. I guess it will be a phone transaction. The prices will match the prices on the Akubra website, meaning that most discounts seem to be gone. Different stores got different deals from the Akubra company.

Now, in the past 5 months, I've purchased an Akubra in Australia and worn it on the plane back to my home in Japan. In addition, I've also purchased several other times online. One concern that I have is regarding price. If you buy in Australia, you pay the normal retail tax of 10% at the retailer, but you get a voucher that you can claim at the airport to have the tax refunded. So, a hat costing $320 (that has the 10% Australian sales tax build-in to that price) actually has a cost of $290 if you claim the tax rebate at the airport like I did. Then you'd probably have to declare the hat at the airport in your home country to pay duty if required.

I believe that one of the reasons we get cheaper prices at Everything Australian is because they recognize that we live outside of Australia with their International store on their website (as opposed to their domestic store), so we don't have to pay the sales tax in Australia because we have to pay duty on the imported item when the hat arrives in the mail. No problem. My concern lies in whether or not we'll have to pay the Australian tax in addition to the import duty. That would be kinda maddening.

I’ve never had to pay duty in Japan on any of the seven(?) Akubras I’ve had sent over from The Hattery or Hats by the Hundred.

 

[Marcus G]

I’ve never had to pay duty in Japan on any of the seven(?) Akubras I’ve had sent over from The Hattery or Hats by the Hundred.

Lucky you! I've now had four Akubras sent to me here in Japan since September, and got clipped for duty every single time. Average duty was ¥1,600 per hat, so pretty minimal. I've now had hats sent from The Hattery and Everything Australian. The customs agents even open my boxes and held the shipping up for a day or two. Rumor has it that customs has clamped down a bit as of about 6 months ago in Japan. Once, I even got a special letter from customs making me send a printed copy of the receipt showing the price that I paid, and they held up releasing my hat for delivery until I sent in that receipt. That shipment was delayed about a week. I guess that they just have it out for me

 

[Zombie_61]

Is it just me, or does it seem the new owners of Akubra bought the company simply to sabotage it and shut it down? It could simply be that they're assessing the way Akubra did business and have put everything on hold during that process, but judging by the way they're either not doing business or are making it difficult for people to buy Akubra products, it seems they took possession of Akubra purely to put an end to it.

 

[Obsessed]

Is it just me, or does it seem the new owners of Akubra bought the company simply to sabotage it and shut it down? It could simply be that they're assessing the way Akubra did business and have put everything on hold during that process, but judging by the way they're either not doing business or are making it difficult for people to buy Akubra products, it seems they took possession of Akubra purely to put an end to it.

I don’t get that sense. Seems like they just wanted to take control of the mail order themselves, and perhaps also wanted to make things easier for their overseas distributors like David Morgan, to incentivize them and to free them from some troublesome competition. It sucks for those of us who like to order from merchants like Hats Direct and Everything Australian, and it sucks for those merchants, but I don’t see it as attempt to tank the brand. Whether it turns out to be a smart move for Akubra is a different question.

By the way, as someone else noted, you can still order the Fed IV from Hats Direct. I hope Akubra keeps supplying that hat to them and letting them sell it as before. .

 

[intulor]

Is it just me, or does it seem the new owners of Akubra bought the company simply to sabotage it and shut it down? It could simply be that they're assessing the way Akubra did business and have put everything on hold during that process, but judging by the way they're either not doing business or are making it difficult for people to buy Akubra products, it seems they took possession of Akubra purely to put an end to it.

As an investment company, If you want to keep things at a company the same, you don't buy it, you just invest and take your share of the profits. When they took over, they made statements about keeping the company Australian and creating more of a presence in international markets. If they want to push more internationally, I imagine they need to exercise more control over international sales, or at least that's how they feel they can better achieve the goal.

 

[Zombie_61]

I don’t get that sense. Seems like they just wanted to take control of the mail order themselves, and perhaps also wanted to make things easier for their overseas distributors like David Morgan, to incentivize them and to free them from some troublesome competition. It sucks for those of us who like to order from merchants like Hats Direct and Everything Australian, and it sucks for those merchants, but I don’t see it as attempt to tank the brand. Whether it turns out to be a smart move for Akubra is a different question.

By the way, as someone else noted, you can still order the Fed IV from Hats Direct. I hope Akubra keeps supplying that hat to them and letting them sell it as before. .

You're probably right. It just seems odd that all of the ways we've been able to order over the years have been removed. Regarding the Fed IV, I'd guess Hats Direct/The Hattery is following whatever their legal agreement with Akubra states, and maybe they have to wait until that expires?

 

[doberdadinmd]

Hi All,

Regarding the online selling of Akubras in 2025, at the end of December, I spoke directly with Trudi at the Hattery. She said that they are still able to post photos of the Akubra inventory that they have for sale, but that they cannot post the prices online and also cannot sell online. Now for the good news. . . you can still purchase Akubras from The Hattery if you contact them, I suppose by email or phone. While the hats cannot be ordered from the website, The Hattery will still send hats in the mail like before. I guess it will be a phone transaction. The prices will match the prices on the Akubra website, meaning that most discounts seem to be gone. Different stores got different deals from the Akubra company.

Now, in the past 5 months, I've purchased an Akubra in Australia and worn it on the plane back to my home in Japan. In addition, I've also purchased several other times online. One concern that I have is regarding price. If you buy in Australia, you pay the normal retail tax of 10% at the retailer, but you get a voucher that you can claim at the airport to have the tax refunded. So, a hat costing $320 (that has the 10% Australian sales tax build-in to that price) actually has a cost of $290 if you claim the tax rebate at the airport like I did. Then you'd probably have to declare the hat at the airport in your home country to pay duty if required.

I believe that one of the reasons we get cheaper prices at Everything Australian is because they recognize that we live outside of Australia with their International store on their website (as opposed to their domestic store), so we don't have to pay the sales tax in Australia because we have to pay duty on the imported item when the hat arrives in the mail. No problem. My concern lies in whether or not we'll have to pay the Australian tax in addition to the import duty. That would be kinda maddening.

Thanks for this. I guess Hats by the Hundred got a different deal/or interpret it differently. I'm in the US and when I reached out to them the other week about placing a phone order rather than an online order like I have previously they said they couldn't do that either.

 

[Marcus G]

I don’t get that sense. Seems like they just wanted to take control of the mail order themselves, and perhaps also wanted to make things easier for their overseas distributors like David Morgan, to incentivize them and to free them from some troublesome competition. It sucks for those of us who like to order from merchants like Hats Direct and Everything Australian, and it sucks for those merchants, but I don’t see it as attempt to tank the brand. Whether it turns out to be a smart move for Akubra is a different question.

By the way, as someone else noted, you can still order the Fed IV from Hats Direct. I hope Akubra keeps supplying that hat to them and letting them sell it as before. .

Yes, I spoke directly with Trudi at Hats Direct and she said that Hats Direct is one of the shops that will continue to sell Akubras. Not all shops in Australia were allowed to continue selling them.

 

[Marcus G]

Is it just me, or does it seem the new owners of Akubra bought the company simply to sabotage it and shut it down? It could simply be that they're assessing the way Akubra did business and have put everything on hold during that process, but judging by the way they're either not doing business or are making it difficult for people to buy Akubra products, it seems they took possession of Akubra purely to put an end to it.

I agree with Intulor. The new owners don't seems to be sabotaging Akubra at all. They are changing distribution channels for what they think is a better way to profit. That means that they are trying for more control. I'm not at all sure if it's a good idea, and I certainly don't like it at all because at this point, buying has actually become more difficult for international customers to make purchases. Now, we have to actually call or email stores in order to get prices, which is an added step. Why would a company make their items more difficult to purchase?

One thing to note is that Brisbane Hattery still has their prices listed on their website, but my understanding is that they won't ship to the country where I live. I do believe things will get a bit more sorted once things get settled with these new policies. I strongly suspect that Akubra want all international shipments to occur from their own website and not places like Hats Direct or Everything Australian, but that's just a guess.

 

[CRH]

So much speculation. The new owners, Tattarang, is a private company so no public disclosure of business decisions is required like for a publicly owned company.

I sure did get sucked into the new "Limited Edition" fern Cattleman offering. Ordered direct from Akubra website. DHL is showing the shipment as "on hold" about 30 miles from me.

 

[Marcus G]

So much speculation. The new owners, Tattarang, is a private company so no public disclosure of business decisions is required like for a publicly owned company.

I sure did get sucked into the new "Limited Edition" fern Cattleman offering. Ordered direct from Akubra website. DHL is showing the shipment as "on hold" about 30 miles from me.

Those fern Cattlemans look super cool! I didn't realize that Akubra would ship internationally.