I have to preface this review by saying that my rating is based on a standard. I purchased this exact belt 12 years ago in 2006. I have worn that belt nearly every day or every other day since, implying that I conservatively have worn this belt for 2,190 10-14 hour days. That belt is in relatively good shape still. Additionally, the leather is still quite beautiful. I've worn it in torrential downpours, at paint parties, etc. This belt has literally seen it all. It is also probably one of the oldest garments that I still wear to this day.

With all of that being said, when I decided that I wanted to order another one to keep in case the older one was destroyed or worn away somehow, and received the belt that came from Amazon, I was flabbergasted. The new version of this belt is HORRID. I purchased a black leather Tommy Hilfiger belt two years ago, and was disappointed in the quality... I figured I just bought a belt that they had outsourced the manufacturing to some crap shop to sell in Macy's. The 2018 brown belt has the exact same vinyl-feeling surface as the black belt has. I've attached a bunch of photos comparing the new and old brown belts, as well as the black belt, with two years of wear (and this one I wore maybe 1-3 days a week for the past two years (208ish 10-14 hour days of wear)). You can see that the newer ones have this fake vinyl stuff covering the fronts (if you take the belt and bend it the opposite way you'd bend it if it were being wrapped around one's waist, you can see the surface material bunch up. Genuine leather does not allow air to accumulate under such a thin layer and bunch up that layer. There is indeed genuine leather on the backside of the belt, but it's bonded to this fabric inner-core which is covered with this fake vinyl stuff. I guess that means the manufacturers can call it "genuine leather". They should have to specify what % of genuine leather the "leather" parts of the product are.

Basically, two out of two tommy hilfiger belts I have purchased in the past two years have not been genuine leather as I've come to expect from their 12 year old product. I'm done shopping the brand. :( RIP

Everyone's gotta lower prices while maintaining margins, and I understand that. I just have a very hard time when a product goes from a higher quality manufacturing process/material down to one that is an entirely different category.