The effects of counterfeiting on consumers
November 7, 2014
Word count: 1653
It is a common moral belief that brand names and designer products represent the person's success, social status, and the quality of life. There have been many researches, with diverse approaches, proving the consumers' attitudes towards counterfeit products, the difference between those who purchase them and those who do not, and the intention of the purchases. Counterfeiters will never stop, as the quality of these fake brand items started to improve due to the evolving technology. This paper will include summaries of some studies done to show different aspects of the new phenomenon – counterfeiting and its effect on the consumers.
High-end brand names are the biggest targets to the counterfeiters. However, to the consumers of the luxury, non-counterfeit products and to those who own the intellectual property rights (IPR), the brands have a meaningful value (Gentry et al., 2006). $300 billion is the estimated sales of the global counterfeit products, according to the International AntiCounterfeiting Coalition (2003). Today, as much as 20% of the products are estimated to counterfeit in China (Alcock et al., 2003). Although the general belief is that the Western consumers are less familiar with counterfeit products, recent studies illustrate that an enormous amount of counterfeit golf equipments are sold in the US (Swift and Yaegar, 2003). Counterfeit products range from jewellery, clothing, shoes, to gasoline, auto and industrial parts. The continuously developing technology plays a major role in the increase in the production of counterfeit products and the consumers, as the quality has improved greatly. As a result, more consumers find it difficult to differentiate the counterfeit products from the branded goods (Foxman et al., 1992).
To gain better knowledge of the consumer's attitudes and thoughts on purchasing counterfeit products,...