The vicuña is now believed to be the wild ancestor of domesticated alpacas.  Vicuñas produce small amounts of extremely fine wool, which is very expensive because the animal can only be shorn every 3 years.

When knitted together, the product of the vicuña's fur is very soft and warm. It is understood that the Inca raised vicuñas for their wool, and that it was against the law for any but royalty to wear vicuña garments. Both under the rule of the Inca and today, vicuñas have been protected by law. Before being declared endangered in 1974, only about 6,000 animals were left. Today, the vicuña population has recovered to about 125,000, and while conservation organizations have reduced its level of threat, they still call for active conservation programs to protect population levels from poaching, habitat loss, and other threats.

The vicuña is considered more delicate and graceful than the guanaco, and smaller.  Until recently it was thought that the vicuña was not domesticated, and that both the llama and the alpaca were both descendants of the guanaco. But recent DNA research has shown that the alpaca may well have vicuña parentage.  

The fiber is popular due to its warmth. Its warming properties come from the tiny scales that are on the hollow air filled fibers. It causes them to interlock and trap insulating air. At the same time, it is finer than any other wool in the world but since it is sensitive to chemical treatment, the wool is usually left in its natural color. However, the vicuña will only produce about one pound of wool a year and gathering it required a certain process during the time of the Incas. Vicuña fibers were annually gathered through communal efforts called chacu. Here, hundreds of thousands of people would herd hundreds of thousands of vicuña into previously laid funnel traps. The animals would be sheared and then released and was only done every four years.