From a blog on Fashionista.com:
At least one company’s so annoyed with getting knocked off that they’re taking serious anti-counterfeiting measures –
Rather than relying on police cracking down on fakes, Loro Piana’s decided to make their goods un-fakeable.
They’ve created their own metal ring bearing the Loro Piana logo that’ll be sewn into each of their cashmere products. The rings will be engraved with an identifying serial number that can be used to trace the origins of each product, down to which piece of fabric it was cut from and which batch of yarn was used to weave its raw fiber.
We think their initiative is great, even though we think it would be fairly easy for a counterfeiter to just throw any old number onto a metal ring to make the scarf appear genuine at first glance, but then again, maybe the process would just be too expensive to make the fakes worth it.
(In other counterfeit news, we hear Forever 21 is about to be embroiled in a huge fake-related battle – a tipster says an LA lawyer is “representing a handful of names bringing some big suits against them” – care to take some guesses?)”
Source: Fashionista.com & British Vogue
Does anyone else think this is similar to Louis Vuitton using serial numbers in their bags? The fakers can just do what this blog stated above and slap any old number on there. Will this help stop counterfeits, and do you think denim-makers will try something similar any time soon?
And on the part about a Forever 21 lawsuit, I am surprised that hadn’t happened sooner – I constantly see L.A.M.B. by Gwen Stefani rip-offs in Forever 21’s, as well as handbags that look like designer knockoffs of Birkin’s, etc. That one was just a matter of time.