Youth fashion depends on fake goods

Using fake goods has become a new tendency among Vietnamese youth.

Dung, 22, just bought a “Louis Vuitton” handbag and shows it off everywhere. She boasts that it is a “high-grade copy” that looks exactly like the real thing and that she spent two million dong to purchase it.

“No one knows that this is a fake handbag. It is a lifelike product. It is very difficult to tell the difference between the real product and my handbag,” she bragged.

Dung is a typical young person in the modern day who likes using fake goods. They like luxury products with well known brand names, but they do not have enough money to purchase real goods.

“I do not want to spend too much money on handbags, watches or mobile phones. The real goods are always very expensive. Therefore, the best solution is using fake goods. They look like the real goods, while I do not have to spend too much on them,” explained a fan of fake goods.

Many online forums have been set up where these fans share experiences about what to buy and where. They share addresses that sell ‘super fake goods’ and talk about how to differentiate first class, second class and third class fakes.

As the demand is very high, a lot of shops advertise very attractive pieces: “LV, Hermes – First-Class Fake Goods’, “Nokia 8900 Super Fake” or ‘Selling Fake Perfume First Class Nearly the Same as the Real Thing”.

The trend of using fake goods has been encouraged by both sellers and buyers. Fakes mostly sell at online shops, because sellers want to evade market control agencies.

Handbags prove to be the favourite product, especially those with the Louis Vuitton label. Hermes handbags are also popular, but the demand is lower than Louis Vuitton products.

“A real Hermes handbag is priced at tens of thousands of dollar. Therefore, a fake Hermes handbag is also very expensive. If you only spent three million dong on the handbag, then you purchased a low-quality fake,” an online seller maintained. One fashionista had to spend 16 million dong on a “real” fake Hermes handbag.

The market has recently become a bit chaotic, because sellers advertise first class fake goods, but really offer only second or third class fake products.

According to a handbag seller, there are different grades of fake goods. Low grade handbags, made with normal materials, sell at markets and supermarkets for 100,000-300,000 dong per handbag. Meanwhile, higher grade handbags made of good materials like cowhide, are much more expensive.

Fake goods fans are not only hunting for fake handbags, but they also want fake perfumes, watches, jewelry and mobile phones. A bottle of fake perfume now runs 200,000-500,000 dong. A seller revealed that her main clients are students who have little money, but still want ‘high grade’ products. Meanwhile, fake watches with brand names like Rolex, Longines or Tissot sell for several hundreds of thousands of dong only.

While some have become fans of fakes, many others do not like using fake goods. “If you are rich and you have money, then use real goods. If not, don’t buy anything,” suggested Mai Ha, 25, of Dong Da district in Hanoi.

Other young people think that it is not good to use fake goods because this lends a hand to counterfeiters.

VnExpress

Tags: fake goods in Vietnam