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Amazon's Chinese Counterfeit Problem Is Getting Worse (cnbc.com)
A report on CNBC, citing sellers, says that counterfeit problem on the platform has gotten worse after it made it easier for Chinese manufacturers to sell goods to U.S. consumers. The report gives an example of a seller Jamie Whaley who started a bedding business on Amazon that reached $700,000 in annual sales within three years. Her patented product called BedBand consists of a set of shock cords, clamps and locks designed to keep fitted bed sheets in place. Whaley found quite an audience, selling up to 200 units a day for $13.99 a set. BedBand climbed into the top 200 selling products in the home and kitchen category. That was 2013. By mid-2015, the business was in a tailspin. Revenue plummeted by half and Whaley was forced to lay off eight employees. Her sheet fastener had been copied by a legion of mostly Chinese knockoffs that undercut BedBand on price and jumped the seller ranks by obtaining scores of reviews that watchdog site Fakespot.com determined were inauthentic and "harmful for real consumers." The report adds:Spend any time surveying Amazon sellers and Whaley's narrative will start sounding like the norm. In Amazon's quest to be the low-cost provider of everything on the planet, the website has morphed into the world's largest flea market -- a chaotic, somewhat lawless, bazaar with unlimited inventory. Always a problem, the counterfeiting issue has exploded this year, sellers say, following Amazon's effort to openly court Chinese manufacturers, weaving them intimately into the company's expansive logistics operation. Merchants are perpetually unsure of who or what may kill their sales on any given day and how much time they'll have to spend hunting down fakers.
Many Americans want their stuff cheap and this is a reflection of that.
There is nothing wrong with that. The woman in the summary is selling an overpriced product, and then trying to hide behind a patent. Similar products have been on the market for decades, and my family used them when I was a kid in the 1970s. So I have no idea why she deserved a patent. If someone else is able to make a comparable product, and sell it for less, then that is a good thing. TFA's implication is that a white person has a right to make $700k/year, while the Chinese don't deserve to make a living because they are yellow skinned sub-humans.
Hey Americans, welcome to capitalism! Your politicians, backed by large companies and army, are pushing it globally down everyone's throat for 50 years now, at least. Now it is coming back home. Prepare soon to find out that there is guy in China or India capable of doing anything you can do for 1/3 money you need only to keep food on the table and pay bills. And forget about Sanders, capitalism will crush any Sanders standing in his way.
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