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 ina merkel “Ex,” and the Delikat stores even became “Freß-Ex” (Posh Nosh). This is surprising given their high prices, and can only be explained by the status value of their goods. Exquisit shops functioned, in an otherwise thoroughly standardized consumer culture, as a hallmark of the exceptional. They attained the status of a brand.The effect of a brand is based on the connection that is established between it and the commodity. In the case of Exquisit, the brand name testified to a particular provenance, the West, and to a particular quality, luxury. Despite the high acceptance of such shops, the state and Party leadership still faced problems legitimizing them. This is evident in their refusal to engage in public debate or argumentation about their existence. Only in 1965 would an article first appear in Young World ( Junge Welt) under the provocative title: “Do You Think It Is Right That We Have Exquisit Shops Here?” The problem addressed was that the young did not have enough money to shop there: Fritz: What don’t you like about select goods being sold in particular shops? After all, that’s what Exquisit means in German: select. Horst: The prices. Only a few people can afford to shop there.22 The specific object of their discussion was nylon shirts, for which one had to pay 80 marks in Exquisit, while in the West they only cost 15 to 20 Deutschmarks (DM). Thus, imports from the West were the issue, but Young World carefully sidestepped this: Fritz: . . .Because they are the latest thing,there aren’t many of them at first. Usually just one designer or design group created them, and only a single manufacturer has picked them up. As long as there is only a relatively small number of them, they count as high fashion. Horst: I see.You mean that as long as there are only a few, they should have a high price. Fritz: Yes, don’t you think so? If someone wants to be the first to wear a high-fashion coat, or pullover, or a scarf like this or to wear a newly launched shoe style, why shouldn’t they pay more for them? And they do so too.23 The article went on to explain why the GDR was not yet able to afford, in economic terms, to produce more goods of this sort and thus lower the prices correspondingly: luxury in socialism  Horst: So Exquisit shoppers contribute, to some extent, to higherquality goods being produced for everyone. I like that.24 Those with higher income levels were to pay for general prosperity. Justice was thus restored.While under Walter Ulbricht,Exquisit and Delikat shops were conceived as a necessary evil because they generated income, under Honecker they became the chief instrument of consumption politics. He developed them into regular alternatives for GDR citizens without access to Western money. They became a kind of equivalent to the Intershops. Such explanations as the discussion presented on the pages of Young World did not, however, remove the basic problem that the two classes of prices or products indirectly promoted the formation of level-specific differences; they only made them more acceptable. From the start all strata of society shopped at the HO, and at Exquisit and Delikat. For those who earned little, these were rare excursions into a fascinating world of goods, while for higher income groups shopping in these stores became the norm,a habit they could not do without.The policy of having two classes of products was at first targeted at the distinctive needs of the elevated levels, in order systematically to siphon off their buying power.In the end,it led to a deeper social inequality that not only expressed itself in income differences but also consolidated cultural distinctions.If the Exquisit and Delikat shops were originally only aimed at elevated,exclusive demands, over the years, they came to be seen as normal. This shift also reflected transformations in GDR consumption patterns, which became increasingly oriented toward enjoyment and pleasure in shopping. Subsistence Versus Life Building In cultural terms, GDR consumption politics were concerned with the structure, manner, and extent of the needs of the socialist society’s inhabitants . These needs were assessed, influenced, and, in varying degrees, also satisfied. Socialist ideals of equality aimed at the abolition of differences between the living conditions of the rich—a squandering, profit-oriented, parasitical...

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