If someone is making fake products based on your designs, they are stealing your intellectual property. They’re also attempting to steal your sales.
There are a lot of problems with this, from the loss of those sales themselves to the impact that the proliferation of fake products could have on your brand’s reputation. If people know that fake products are common, will they assume that your products aren’t as good? It can devalue the reputation you’ve created.
But how cheap are these products going to be? If someone’s making the same product for 10% less, are they really going to get any of your sales? What’s the important price point?
Saving 50%
As you can probably imagine, the big thing that matters to those who buy fake products is just how much they have to pay. The number one reason that they’re looking for these products or enticed to buy them is simply that they feel like they can get them for less money.
Although the total savings can vary from one type of product to the next, along with the consumer confidence in fake products, it has been found that most people want to save about 50%. When the price of the fake product gets to that point, they’re more likely to buy than if it’s higher. They would still save money if it was 25% off, for example, but they may not be willing to risk buying a fake product that has subpar quality. Once they know that they’re saving half, they’re more likely to take that risk.
So what can you do?
It’s frustrating to be facing something like this. You put a lot of time, energy and money into developing these products. These are your designs and no one else has the right to sell them, and yet it is happening.
The good news is that you do have legal options. Under intellectual property laws, anything that has been patented or trademarked and is clearly owned by another business cannot be used by a third party. This means you can take legal action not only to put a stop to the sale of these fake goods, but you may also be entitled to monetary compensation for the sales that you have lost or the damage that was done to your brand.