Your old Levi's denim could be worth $33,000 — just check the hidden detail on the label
Although ancient artifacts and coins are usually considered valuable antiques, there are some old discarded items lying in our closets, attics, or basements that may be a lot more precious than they seem to be. Among things that have recently emerged as vintage treasures, Levi's jeans with some tiny details have become more valuable than their price tag. According to reports, jeans made by the brand between 1949 and 1954 are selling for a lot of money online on sites like eBay. While Levi’s does not print the year of manufacture on the jeans, the trademark red tag makes a difference.
Between the '50s and the '80s, Levi's, which was known as "Levi Strauss & Co.," used the Big E logo to emphasize the word Levi’s, which is written in white capital letters on a red background, according to the New York Post. Today, the little red tag on the back pocket is in all caps barring the "e". However, this wasn't the case all along.
Up until 1971, this red tag on the jeans was truly in all capital format including the "E" and the small detail plays an important role in telling if the garment is vintage or not. Some of the jeans with all capital red tags are selling for as much as $33,000 on eBay. Most resellers are pricing these jeans at anywhere between hundreds and thousands of dollars, and people are rushing to buy them in any case.
While these may look like astronomical figures for jeans, nothing compares to some of the Levi's jeans that were sold for hundreds of thousands of dollars at auctions. One such example is a pair of jeans which is being billed as the world's oldest jeans and was sold at an auction for $100,000. The pair made in 1873, was found two decades ago in a mine in Nevada, according to Artnet.
Another pair of Levi's jeans from the 1880s was sold at an auction in a small town in New Mexico for more than $87,000. The pair of jeans was found in an abandoned mine by a “denim archaeologist,” and was bought by 23-year-old Kyle Hautner and Zip Stevenson, a veteran of the vintage denim market, as per CNN Style. While the condition of the jeans is an important factor, some of these pairs have sold for astronomical prices despite being found in bad shape. However, normally people only collect the jeans that they can actually wear.
People have been wearing the 501 jeans for 150 years and any vintage 501 jeans is worth a lot of money. "Not only are jeans a timeless fashion statement, but they’re also made to last, meaning that even an old pair of jeans can still be of fantastic quality…vintage jeans are even better than new jeans, and finding yourself a great vintage pair just proves how long-wearing high-quality denim is," Levi’s said on their website. The classic red tag is also a trademark extremely well known. It first became a thing in the 1940s, when Levi's wanted to trademark the signature blue jeans. "Since then, the red tab has changed in subtle ways, switching from lowercase to uppercase, and one-sided to double-sided," the company mentioned on the website.
