The Truth Behind Fake Designer Items
Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Prada, Hermés...
Almost everyone knows these big names. As we’re all getting older and earning more money for ourselves, our taste starts to change. For some of us, that means we’re discovering more of these designer brands. In High School, I began to notice when someone was carrying the Louis Vuitton Neverfull or had a Gucci belt on, but I didn't have a job and there was no way my parents were going to pay for that. When I got into college I started at a job and began selling some of these pricey pieces where I worked, which made me fall in love with them even more.
Recently, I’ve begun to notice a trend in Gucci belts on campus. I thought it was a little odd at first that everyone would go out and buy them all at once. I asked around and come to find out, a majority of them were fake. Apparently, they are being sold on Amazon and places like that for around $20-$30 each. The catch was that these look almost identical if not exactly like the real thing. About the same time, I started coming across Youtube videos and bloggers showing off their dupes of designer purses for less than $50.
So, is there really anything wrong with buying fake luxury items? While it might seem like an innocent purchase through Amazon Prime, this could actually be directly correlated to organized crime and even child labor.
I know that seems a little far-fetched, doesn't it? I thought the same thing. Now don't write me off so quickly, I myself look for some of those replica Gucci phone cases. In the grand scheme of things, it probably doesn't mean a thing. More research and investigation is coming to light with the rise of popularity with these items, and the main reason that it’s not talked about more widely is mainly that people don’t have any idea that these things are happening. So what is it? What’s the big secret? Let me tell ya…
As most people know, counterfeiting is a crime, and even though it seems like a victimless crime, it does, in fact, cause social and economic problems in the industry.
Fun Fact: Louis Vuitton actually has a whole team dedicated to finding and shutting down fake stores and sellers.
The people who run these counterfeit operations are part of a larger organized crime, that might be causing more harm than you think. A lot of large-scale counterfeit operations — whether it be luxury items, car parts, or whatever — use the profit from those sales towards drug trafficking, child labor, sex trafficking, and even terroristic groups.
Now with all that being said, I’m not condemning you for purchasing any of these things, I do the same thing because let's be honest: we’re all pretty broke college students and we’re ballin’ on a budget. I just ask that you educate yourselves on where these products are coming from and to keep that in mind next time you go browsing through these knock-off sites.
