Markenbusiness News, a magazine for brandname owners, with daily news about names, trademarks, brands and legal issues, wrote that French Customs at Le Havre had confiscated 61, 4 percent more imitations than the previous year. The trends in counterfeit goods from China, Hong Kong, Thailand and Taiwan were:
- more than half of the seized goods were cigarettes. Almost three million packets fell into the hands of the customs, the ‘Marlboro’ brand being an especially common find;
- copies of replacement parts for automobiles, from 2,946 items in 2004 to 44,824 in 2005;
- reduction in the quantity of textiles seized, from 16% in 2004 and 25% in 2003 to 11% in 2005. However, counterfeits of street wear, sportswear and casual wear brands are still as much in favor;
- growth in the number of falsified belt buckles from upmarket labels: 178,437 were confiscated in 2005 against just 48,000 in 2004;
- In the general area of drugs, the number of uncovered imitations sank in comparison with 2004. But Pfizer’s Viagra still remains as one of the most commonly imitated medications.
Read the article of Markenbusiness News here.
