Consumer Power: Fighting Against Damages Caused By Duplicate Brands

What is the general reaction when people buy gold, silver or any expensive jewel? It is a very a common reaction which most of us have come across where we see that they are so excited and at the same time very cautious and also scared as they think a number of times before the final buy of such expensive jewels because its costs heavy and is an investment more than a buy. Further, consumers prefer branded jewels today as they feel they will not be cheated but what when they are cheated in the name of brands? They feel shattered. It’s not only in the case of gold or jewels as this was a big and expensive example but the feeling remain the same even if they are cheated in small items on day to day basis and let me remind it may not be expensive but leaves a heavy impact on the customers and sometime these inexpensive items may risk life in many ways.

Risks of using duplicate products are innumerable. It can at times become life threatening like use of duplicate medicines or packaged food products. It is not at all surprising to know that there is a whole racket of all these pirated products which may ultimately affect the health and happiness of consumers very badly. This shows that consumers are not secured from all sides. These gaps between the real branded products and brand piracy can be filled only by proper efforts made by the consumers as they are the main focus point around whom all these revolve.

For taking proper step the consumers should know the implications and damages caused by duplicate brands which can range from casual damages to grave injuries like:

Ø  Financial loss when buying the fake brand as real,

Ø  Dissatisfaction caused due to unavailability of what was expected,

Ø  Food poisoning caused due to intake of duplicate packaged foods,

Ø  Skin diseases caused due to use of fake cosmetics,

Ø  Disappointment due to lack of quality assured,

Ø  Fatal results by the use of fake medicines and death in severe cases, etc.

These are just a few examples to show the severity of the damages which is caused by the duplicate products but there are more which can happen on usage of duplicate brands. The only precaution which can be taken by the consumers is to stay careful and alert. Apart from this there are steps which can be taken further when they are already exploited.

This starts with simple complaint which should essentially be made by the consumers when they have any such encounters and they should not worry about where to complain as this is not tedious anymore. There are innumerable online portals which help in such cases but it’s also necessary to find a reliable and well received portal and one such platform is Brands and Fakes which can help consumers to start from scratch and deal with all complaints registration and investigations for intellectual property rights which is the most difficult part as it is the main part in order to establish strong evidences against the exploiters. This shows that these steps can not only be easily accessed but also are effective enough to reduce such piracy. So, one should stop cribbing and start taking actions in order to get rid of brand piracy and duplicate brands.

  

A Way Out for Fighting Back Against Trademark Infringement and Piracy

Trademark is a mark which can be graphically represented and differentiates goods of one producer from another producer and is directly related to the reputation of a brand owner or trademark owner. Today, when one goes to any general store where we can find all sorts of products and innumerable brands, there we become careless because of reasons like:

·         The infrastructure of the shop;

·         Or we tend to get distracted by seeing so many different types of items and commodities

These are few reasons which make us careless and give the retailers a chance to use that opportunity. You must be wondering why? This can be explained from a simple example that generally we buy our monthly needful in bulk in the starting of the month, where in every time it’s not possible that we go to some kind of mega mart and shop by ourselves but sometimes it might happen that we shop from small retail shops, here, because of the above mentioned two reasons the retailers can easily cheat on us by putting fake products instead of real ones in our shopping bags. When we reach our home then we see that there is something different or sometimes those fake products even go unnoticed.

This forms the base of the piracy which further results in trademark infringement. Trademark gets infringed when somebody tries to sell his product in the name of some established brand by deceiving the consumers and giving them the impression that their product is the branded product itself by creating similar trademark or names and also selling similar products as of the trademark.

Cheating like this can only happen when there is lack of information on fake products among the consumers and here they pave the way for piracy and trademark infringement. A consumer should not only have knowledge about his trademark but also should be very careful while shopping. A consumer should always keep a check on what is being given by the shopkeeper and should try and individually check the packaged products which helps in differentiating between fake and genuine products. It also creates a fear in the mind of shopkeeper as he will not try to cheat the customers by seeing them so alert and cautious.

These are the precautionary measures but the problem arises when these things have already happened and the consumers are not able to find any remedy to such problems. These problems can be solved by registering complaints about any trademark infringement incident that happens or any complaints regarding fake products on online portals or platforms that provide all solutions relating to these problems faced by the consumers and also the brand owners. Consumers and brand owners can go for trademark infringement investigation which will further corroborate as strong evidence and thus help in fighting against piracy and one of such strong and reliable platform is Brands and Fakes.

 Piracy is deep rooted and will take time to go but one can take these small steps in order to make it a big revolution as it requires equal participation from everyone in order to fight back against brand piracy and trademark infringement.

Investigations on Fake Products: A Guarantee to Win the Fight of Fake and Real

Piracy and fake products go hand in hand as; if there is piracy there will be a fake product involved and if there is a fake product there will be piracy. Isn’t it funny but unfortunately that’s the truth. The second thing which I want to focus upon is the connection of investigation to these two different words that is piracy and fake products. Why is investigation important when it comes to these two? The answer is that investigation provides us with proof and a proof can be in any form, just that much which can help in justifying the fact that there is piracy and that has caused damage to either the consumer or the brand owner or both (whoever is the plaintiff).

The burden of proof lies on the person who files a complaint who is also called plaintiff in legal language. He has to prove that there is misuse of his trademark and damage is caused to his reputation because of that misuse which further should be corroborated with proper evidence. Many a times the plaintiff fails in proving his claims due to lack of proper evidence which again is a result of improper investigation of the same. So even if the plaintiff is correct on his part, he loses everything because of lack of evidence. Is this right? No, not at all!!! I know this is the possible answer that readers will give and this is correct but not in the real world. This unjustified decision can be reverted if proper efforts are taken by the consumers or brand owners who suffer from problems relating to the fake products.

Investigations on fake products can be a huge help in these cases as this can collect strong evidences against such violations which in terms can provide justification and correct decision to the needy. It is very easy to recommend this but it is all the more difficult to execute it because even if we know that we should opt for investigation as a method, we still don’t know that where to ask such help from? Will it be easy or will it be tedious just like other court procedures? These questions will run across our mind hundred times before taking any such step, but then this can be made easy. This is the generation of internet, as in, every possible thing is available on internet then why not this?

Internet can solve all such problems as there are many online platforms which provide such investigation and thus help both the brand owners and the consumers in such difficult situations. Here, they can easily file complaints and also ask for services relating to the same; all their queries can be answered in a jiffy. One such very popular and reliable piracy investigation service provider is Brands and Fakes which help in all such problems and thus protects the stakeholders from the damage caused due to fake products or can be caused due to the same.  

It’s really not a tension to go for investigations now because of such easy way outs. Investigations should be encouraged more and more so that one would never hesitate in taking strong steps against brand piracy.