From Mink Coats to Miami Trips, Cold Wave Spurs Winter Splurges

The cold plunge that has enveloped New York City and the Northeast for weeks has many well-heeled residents coping the best way they know how: spending money.

At Madison Avenue Furs & Henry Cowit Inc. in Manhattan’s Garment district, $1,500 mink jackets and raccoon coats are selling at unusual levels for the doldrum weeks of winter. Spa appointments for sauna and jacuzzi treatments across the city are surging. And four-figure “mercy trips” to warm destinations have normally cost-conscious travelers pulling out their credit cards.

In New York City, a nine-day stretch of below freezing temperatures from late January into early February was the longest since 2018, according to the National ...