National media features publishers battling Chinese marketplace rip-off merchants
The Temu greeting card copying row is rumbling on with Lola Designs, Lil Wabbit, and Cheeky Zebra the latest to raise the issue in the national media.
In the Daily Mail yesterday, 9 January, Amanda and Frank Mountain told how they’ve lost around £100,000 worth of sales from their Lola Design business over copycat cards sold on the Chinese marketplaces Temu and Shein.
And just recently The Telegraph covered Georgi Doig at Lil Wabbit and Cheeky Zebra’s Sasha Gupta, alongside specialist IP legal firm McDaniels Law explaining how it had tackled Temu for copyright infringement.
PG Buzz has already raised the issue with stories over the past few months from publishers, McDaniels and Thortful as well as a takedown guide from the GCA to help those affected tackle Temu specifically, and how the EU is investigating – a recent issue of Progressive Greetings magazine also has a four-page Viewpoints feature on the subject.
But raising awareness with the public through national media coverage shows how damaging these foreign marketplaces are proving to creative small businesses and is key to persuading people not to buy the cheap, inferior quality, counterfeit goods.
Frank told the Mail they’d found over 50 of the designs created by Amanda had been stolen and copied on to thousands of products sold at significantly cheaper prices by unverified sellers on the platforms, normally using fake emails and operating in China, and he reckons they’re losing around one in every 10 sales to a design thief.
“We’re currently losing around a 10th of our earnings. We first noticed it several months ago and were completely shocked, these sites allow for these accounts to sell items without any checks and this means we are being stolen from,” he said.
“We have been fighting this problem ever since and it feels like a real David vs Goliath battle. But it’s not just happening to us, it’s impacting small businesses across the UK and we need to raise awareness.”
As a small business, Frank and Amanda feel they can’t afford to pay solicitors to chase the thieves with cease-and-desist letters, so went to their local MP Rachael Maskell, who raised the issue in Parliament in November.
And they have since met with the UK Intellectual Property Office which said it was continuing to engage with e-commerce sites to remove products featuring stolen designs.
Temu told the Mail its marketplace is for third-party sellers to offer their products, and these sellers have to sign an agreement pledging “to maintain lawful and compliant business operations, protect consumers’ legal rights and intellectual property, and adhere strictly to the legal standards and regulations of their specific markets”.
The company said: “When we receive reports of infringement, we promptly investigate each case and take appropriate action. Temu has strict policies against sellers who infringe on intellectual property rights.”
Cheeky Zebra’s Sasha told The Telegraph: “I was getting daily messages from customers showing me that my designs were on Temu, and when I saw that two of these listings had over 2,500 sales, I felt sick,” explaining her calculations show she has lost over £18,000 in sales.
She added: “It’s already challenging enough to compete as a small business owner, but now the creativity that sets us apart is being stolen and our designs barely have a two-week life cycle before they’ll be on Temu for a cheaper price.”
“If things carry on as they are, in terms of design theft happening as quickly as it’s happening now, I won’t be in business in a year from now.”
Lil Wabbit’s Georgi has been fighting against sellers copying her watercolour dog designs for over six months, and said it’s made her feel “helpless”, adding: “It seems fairly impossible to hold Temu sellers to account. The site is quite good at taking one listing down, but they just pop straight back up, and the sellers don’t seem to face any kind of punishment.
“If I were to be on another marketplace, like Etsy, and replicate this kind of design theft, my shop would be shut down pretty quickly, but Temu doesn’t seem to be taking it seriously in any respect.”
Having taken on the issue for publishers Bold & Bright and Dandelion Stationery pro bono as a case study, McDaniels Law MD Kelly Hudson told the Telegraph: “Temu said they will keep a check on the listings that have been reported, to ensure that those designs aren’t coming back up, but that if there’s a new product being stolen, it again falls to the original designer to bring that to Temu’s attention.”
She explained she had informed Temu of its responsibility not to facilitate the clear copyright infringement and the platform was responsive: “It is a positive step forward, but it involves us having to get involved and send letters and not all small business owners can afford to have us fighting for them.”
The paper said Temu claimed intellectual property-related complaints account for 0.0019% of its total product listings.
The platform’s spokesman said: “While no platform can entirely eliminate infringements, we continuously refine our tools and processes to minimise the risk of repeat infringers. This includes deploying an advanced identity verification system that utilises document forgery detection, image and video verification, and other technologies.
“These tools cross-reference historical data on false information and malicious behaviour to accurately verify the authenticity of identification and business documents submitted by sellers.”
