Masking the flaws: Fake cosmetics in China's online shopping boom
Staff Reporter
2015-02-11
Leader Cosmetics facial masks. (Internet photo)
More than 100,000 bootleg facial masks "made in Korea" are circulating in China's market, reports the Henan-based Dahe Daily.
The Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO) has announced a crackdown on a Chinese-owned factory that counterfeits the popular medical cosmetic facial masks of South Korea's Leader Cosmetics.
The factory, owned by a Chinese national surnamed Cai, is located in Paju in Gyeonggi province, close to the border with North Korea. The syndicate has produced 260,600 masks with an estimated market value of US$720,000. More than 100,000 of the products have been exported to mainland China, said KIPO.
The packaging of the real and fake products is identical, but the cosmetic content contains antiseptics that are hazardous to the human skin and body. The KIPO has officially requested for assistance from China's judicial authorities to prevent the bootleg masks from circulating in China and protect the brand's reputation.
In March 2014, a syndicate counterfeiting popular Taiwan-based facial mask brand My Beauty Diary was also busted in China.
The majority of the fake masks are distributed through professional buyers, the individuals who take shopping requests from clients on personal social media pages and sell the products for less than retail. The sellers claim they have direct access to the manufacturers or wholesalers, which allows them to cut prices.
A recent study by China's Shenwan Hongyuan Securities suggests that individual sellers on social media, largely the Weibo microblog in China's case, tend to give customers a better shopping experience because of its instant, interactive nature, said the article.
This new mode of business is growing rapidly but lacks regulations to curb sellers from distributing unlicensed or pirated products. In an online survey conducted by a major website in China, 27% of the 189 respondents said they have had bad experiences purchasing facial masks with professional buyers online. About 52% said they would not buy from individual online buyers again because "there are too many fake products."
A supervising body for sizable businesses on microblogs should be established to ensure the rights of consumers, said the report.
