Product Counterfeiting
You're not always getting what you paid for on the street or internet
Product counterfeiting has grown into a huge business. Just about every imaginable product is being counterfeited, with
designer watches (pss! Wanna buy a Rolex?), DVDs, and software among the more popular products.
It should be obvious when somebody is trying to sell you a counterfeit product. If someone is offering you a $20 Rolex
you can be assured that the product is a fake. Genuine Gucci handbags sell for $1000 each. If someone wants to give
you a great deal and sell it to you for just $100, it's a fake. If a street vender is selling a movie that is either
still in showing in theaters, or better yet, has not been released, it is pirated, a copy, a knockoff.
Seeing products on the street is one thing, but what about products for sale on the internet? The same theory applies.
Beware of prices that seem too good to be true for products you see being sold by mom and pop internet vendors or at
lesser online auction sites. There is a good bet that these are counterfeit items. And if they aren't counterfeit,
they are probably stolen.
Some people don't mind buying counterfeited items. Hey, who doesn't want to buy a hit movie for $5? Remember, in most
cases you get what you pay for. The quality of counterfeited products is usually very, very poor. That movie will
likely be so grainy that it is impossible to view, and that Rolex will usually corrode before that battery has a chance
to die, or the cheap gears to stop running.
Another cost of product counterfeiting
Last year, the World Customs Organization estimates, product counterfeiting caused $512 billion in lost sales. You may not have
considered this, but when you buy countefeit products the real manufacturers lose sales. These companies sometimes poured a lot
of money into developing these products. Software piracy and counterfeit medications top the list and these cheap knockoffs threaten
both the manufacturers bottom line and the jobs that go along with producing the real products. We hate to get too preachy
but not everyone acquires countefeit goods unknowingly. Fake car parts may not only be unsafe for you and your family but deliberately
purchasing them can cost someone their job.
Common Counterfeit Products:
- Auto parts
- Aircraft parts
- Baby formula
- Toys
- Apparel
- Purses
- Jewelry
- Shampoo
- Cosmetics
- Sunglasses
- software
- Movies
- Music
- Medical devices
- Consumer drugs and medicines
- Food products
- . . . and many, many more
Related Product Counterfeiting Links:
Yahoo!Finance Special Edition: The Global CounterfeitBusiness
|
