Maybe They Should Call It Knockoff.com
from the everyone-makes-mistakes dept
One of the suits I own (yes, I own some suits) is a Brooks Brothers suit with the label cut out - which I bought via an online site that sold overstocked items. I only knew it was from Brooks Brothers because a friend at the company selling it told me that the company had bought the suits directly from Brooks Brothers. While selling overstocked or out-of-date items online is becoming increasingly popular, sometimes the companies selling these products are discovering problems when they find out the products are really knockoffs instead of overstocks. Overstock.com has now run into that problem with a set of (what they claimed were) Tiffany necklaces, that many shoppers are complaining about. Tiffany's claims they're knockoffs, and are planning on suing Overstock. Overstock stands by the offering, claiming that they have an invoice that clearly shows they're from Tiffany's (Tiffany's claims the invoice is faked). It does bring up an issue about selling these sorts of goods online. In the case of my suit, the site only claimed that the suits were from a "top name" brand and had the labels cut out, to avoid this sort of mess. However, in cases where the brand names are being used on such "gray market" items, many of the original companies are getting frustrated with companies selling knockoffs under their brand names.
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But it's more interesting when the knockoffs are l
You sort of danced around a point: it's equally interesting when the items sold on these overstock sites ARE legit, but the original vendor doesn't want to be associated with a "discount" label.
I can think of two examples of prior art: First, chauffeurs of a certain brand of car with a gloriously winged lady on the hood are schooled never to open the "bonnet" when the car breaks down. The company doesn't want to be associated with mechanical faults.
Secondly, here in the DC area, lawyers will dispose of their older suits in thrift store *in the outlying suburbs. I imagine that they drop off that Brooks Brothers suit wearing dark shades, a muffler and a wide-brimmed hat.
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