Most lizard leather is coming from farms now and most farmers are small business owners.
If you frame the meat as the product and the skin as a waste product, the argument is something like, “We already farm alligators for meat, so why force us to throw out the farmed skin and the tax revenue it generates along the supply chain?”
I could see the logic changing in the future and maybe California legislators are not as stupid as they seem. Right now lab grown meat is expensive, much more than farmed meat. But it’s getting much cheaper. When the economics flip and we switch to cultivating alligator and chicken type meat in reactors, then the leather cannot be excused as a waste product. At that point, if the Millennials and Gen Zs are still invested in animal welfare, legislators will point to California law as a precedent.
For now, I think this opens up the door grey market alligator and vegetable substitutes. Embossed leather straps will not work as a top end material because they are still made of animal and are known as an economic substitute. Just as imitation crab will not appear non-ironically on the menu at a high end restaurant. There is nothing feel-good about killing a farmed cow to spare a farmed alligator, just a savings in cost.
The big luxury conglomerates are forward thinking, so they will respect the ban. The people who appreciate non-animal alternatives will age into watch collecting and it will be up to marketing to convince them that synthetic straps can attain the same level of craftsmanship seen today in, for example, a Hermes alligator strap. I’d bet Hermes themselves are experimenting synthetic solutions, but again educating the client is just as important as mastering the new craft.
And what if lab grown leather becomes possible right around the time that lab grown meat does? Certainly it need not be as economical to fabricate as lab grown meat.
The future is not so easy to predict.