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Germany Orders Amazon To Stop Taking Advantage of People Who Can't Spell 'Birkenstock' (qz.com)
Germany has barred Amazon from drawing in online shoppers who misspell iconic German sandal maker Birkenstock in their Google searchers. "Amazon reportedly won business for common Birkenstock misspellings by booking variants like 'Brikenstock,' 'Bierkenstock,' and 'Birkenstok' in Google AdWords, so that they produced search results for shoes sold in Amazon.com," reports Quartz. From the report: According to Reuters, Birkenstock turned to the court because it feared shoppers might unwittingly buy shoddy counterfeits, which could damage its brand reputation. "For us, Amazon is complicit," Birkenstock chief Oliver Reichert told German magazine Der Spiegel, according to Reuters. Birkenstock first walked away from Amazon.com in July 2016. Besieged by counterfeits and rogue merchants, the company said it would no longer supply products to Amazon for U.S. customers starting Jan. 1, 2017. "The Amazon marketplace, which operates as an 'open market,' creates an environment where we experience unacceptable business practices which we believe jeopardize our brand," David Kahan, Birkenstock's CEO for the Americas, wrote in a memo at the time.
A year later, Kahan denounced Amazon in a lengthy memo for attempting to get Birkenstock retailers to sell it their inventory, even though the company had explicitly removed its sandals from Amazon.com in the U.S. "I share in no uncertain terms that this is unacceptable and will not be tolerated," Kahan wrote. "[A]ny Authorized retailer who may do this for even a single pair will be closed FOREVER."
A year later, Kahan denounced Amazon in a lengthy memo for attempting to get Birkenstock retailers to sell it their inventory, even though the company had explicitly removed its sandals from Amazon.com in the U.S. "I share in no uncertain terms that this is unacceptable and will not be tolerated," Kahan wrote. "[A]ny Authorized retailer who may do this for even a single pair will be closed FOREVER."
Why is it shoes and cosmetics are obsessed with price fixing? We had this debase with grey marketing many times before.
It goes like this - you are not allowed to sell that pair of shoes for less that $80. Most countries ban this anti competitive practice.Cameras watches and i Phones are also price fixed to extents, including controlling spare parts.
Price fixing means you - the consumer pays more, and probably geolocation price fixing as well. Authorized re-seller is just a code word to control prices though treats of dealership cancellation, which is why Birkenstock made that promise.
You see real outlet stores have to pay for shopfronts and sales staff And the other rule is they don't want alternative choices displayed next to theirs. Lastly franchise license fees can go off to an untaxed tax haven, mostly.
Amazon devalues brand names - really simple. No storefront means consumers get a cheaper price for a standardised product, while Amazon rakes off a slice. Physical store sales slump, some go out of business, brand awareness declines.You wont see Coke and Pepsi displayed in the same outlet if they have their way.
The bit about fakes is just noise and makeup. Amazon wants to greymarket supply it cannot get, and cannot induce retailers to sell.
I think any brandname vendor who refuses to sell openly should be hit with a sales tax, say 100%, before state tax is applied.
For instance I like Garmin GPS products, but when I want a new GPS device I'm not going to fuck around browsing individual websites and opening accounts right and left and dealing with weird shipping rules, I go on Amazon. If there's no Garmin there I'll give another brand a chance because my loyalty doesn't trump the convenience of just adding it to a shopping cart full of other stuff already connected to my credit card and shipping info.
I'm almost the polar opposite. Once Ive fonud a product I want, I'll go where I can get it. I figure that if it's above a certain amount and I'm going to be using it a lot, then the time saved by getting a good quality one that I know will work and I know how to use will trump the one off cost of 3 to 4 minutes required to buy it from not amazon.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
The Birkenstock crowd has a rep for being the laid-back hippie Earthmother types. This guy sounds like he's engaged in a scorched-earth battle with Amazon and is willing to burn down anyone else who gets in his way.
No, he sounds like a guy fed up with unsatisfied consumers who bought "beercanstocks" thinking they were authentic, which will damage a reputable brand and product.
And if the manufacturer allegedly stopped selling valid product to Amazon US customers a year ago, no wonder he's pissed. Amazon hasn't done jack shit to deter counterfeiters from selling knock-offs. There's a fucking Birkenstock Amazon store which features their logo, valid photos, obscene prices (one pair had a $130 - 817.78 price range?!), and plenty of reviews warning people about fakes.
Even hippies have their limits. Everyone does.
Well, I think you got the right conclusion, but I don't support how you got there. You can't allow somebody to do something wrong because if they don't do it, someone else will. No the real issue is that Amazon didn't do anything wrong here -- and I can't believe I just wrote that.
As long as they don't represent themselves *as* Birkenstock, or sell counterfeit goods, what they're doing is looking for people in the market for sandals.
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