In this article we will go through the 5 major reasons to protect against counterfeiting despite the fact that anti-counterfeiting solutions will only allow you to spot counterfeits: liability, regulation, reputation, profit and company value.
Counterfeit protection improves your liability
The first and most important reason to protect against counterfeiting is, of course, liability. As brand owner you have a moral and ethical responsibility to make sure that you won’t harm people trusting your brand.
This is especially true if you are producing goods that may harm the health or safety of your customers should they get a counterfeit product; particularly if you are in the pharmaceutical or the tobacco industries. But this is also true should a counterfeit product damage your customers’ properties. For example, a fake automotive lubricant could severely damage a car’s engine.
Adding counterfeit protection measures will protect your customers and therefore improve your liability risk. As the leader in anti-counterfeit solutions AlpVision has customers in all these industries.
Counterfeit protection is necessary to cope with regulations
The second reason to protect against counterfeiting is to cope with regulations. In some industries, like the tobacco industry, the brand owners are expected, by law, to show that they take the counterfeiting issue seriously and that they apply measures to fight counterfeits.
Some regulations are extremely restrictive like the plain packaging for tobacco in Australia (in that case only covert security features could be added). Some are less prescriptive and will let the brand owner decide which type of anti-counterfeit solutions should be added.
AlpVision provides the most effective anti-counterfeit solutions that meet these requirements.
Counterfeit protection improves your company reputation
The third reason to protect against counterfeiting is your company’s reputation. This is especially true for companies in the luxury goods industry. It is perfectly true that the owner of a watch that is bought for 50 Euros on the beach will never think that it is a genuine one. However, counterfeiters are becoming cleverer and a watch that is bought for 20% less than the usual price may be seen as a “good deal” on an original product, and also returns more profit to the counterfeiter. This will then harm the brand’s reputation as the counterfeit item won’t have the same quality as the original one. This is also true if you are selling precious metals
Counterfeit protection may increase your profit
The fourth reason to protect against counterfeiting is to increase your profit. If your communication around the way you are protecting your brand against counterfeit is well driven, it may even become a commercial advantage. Indeed, some of your best customers may prefer to pay for a product which they can ensure is genuine. In this case you will be able to recover the costs of the security solution thanks to the additional sales and even make additional profit from its use.
Counterfeit protection my increase your company value
The fifth reason to protect against counterfeiting is to increase your company value. In many sectors, companies are already fighting against counterfeits. Some extracts from annual reports are displayed below:
- Fédération Horlogère annual report 2018
- “The fight against counterfeit copies of Swiss watches remains a priority and the FH is making sustained efforts to eliminate their sale, in particular on the internet and social media”
- “confiscation of some 1’100’000 counterfeit watches”
- Merck annual report 2017
- “The Global Pharma Health Fund (GPHF), a non-profit organization funded by Merck, works to combat counterfeit medicines in developing and emerging countries. To date, the GPHF has supplied 836 Minilabs at cost to detect counterfeit medicines to around 100 countries; 41 Minilabs were provided in 2017 alone. According to a report published by WHO at the end of 2017, the Minilab made it possible to identify more than 1,000 counterfeit medicines out of 20,000 tested medicines.”
- “The impact of these risks on business operations depends on the respective individual case, product-specific factors, the value chain, as well as on regional aspects in particular.”
While the cost of counterfeiting is not clearly evaluated, it is clearly understood that it is important enough to be mentioned in annual reports.
With the 5 points above, we can clearly state that even if it won’t prevent fake goods from being produced or sold, it is still important to protect your brand against counterfeit as it allows you to identify potential problems and take action against them. AlpVision is the ideal partner as we have provided turnkey solutions to our customers for almost 20 years.
Please contact us to get more information.