Nike Praises $28 Million Counterfeit Bust
Customs agents seized tens of millions of dollars’ worth of fake Nike shoes in the Philippines recently.
The Nike Asia Pacific Brand Protection Team recognized the Philippines’ Bureau of Customs “for its exceptional efforts” in seizing 1.56 billion pesos, $28.1 million, of counterfeit Nike footwear, the agency announced Monday. According to CNN Philippines, authorities confiscated about 2.2 million pairs of fake Nike sneakers.
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“We will continue to strengthen our efforts in combating nefarious counterfeiting activities and ensure the enforcement of intellectual property rights,” Customs commissioner Bienvenido Rubio said in a statement.
A report released by StockX earlier this month identified Nike styles as three of the top five most counterfeited sneakers of the past year. The 2021 Nike Dunk Low Retro White Black Panda took the top spot, while the Jordan 1 Retro Low OG SP Travis Scott Reverse Mocha and Jordan 1 Retro High Dark Mocha ranked third and fourth, respectively. Colorways of the Adidas Yeezy Slide placed second and fifth.
StockX, which is currently battling accusations from Nike that it lets counterfeits proliferate on its platform, detailed its latest verification advancements and metrics in a “Verification Report” released on World Anticounterfeiting Day—June 8. According to the report, the resale platform rejected nearly $90 million worth of products that did not meet its verification standards in the 12 months ended May 31. This included nearly $30 million of fake sneakers, according to the company, which recently opened three more authentication centers.
The company’s authenticators reportedly stopped nearly 300,000 individual products from trading on the platform. On average, it noted, 1 million products go through its verification process every month. Only 20 percent of rejected products were weeded out because they were fake, however. Manufacturing defects proved the most common reason, making up 27 percent of rejections, while a damaged box and “used product” tied for third at 13 percent. StockX rejected another 12 percent for being the wrong product and 11 percent for being the wrong size.
The report comes well over a year into StockX’s ongoing legal battle with Nike. Though it began as a trademark infringement complaint related to the resale platform’s then-new NFT program, Nike added allegations of counterfeiting last May. At the time, it claimed that it found four pairs of counterfeit sneakers on StockX’s website. In March, it added allegations that the platform sold 38 pairs of fake Air Jordan 1s to a single customer between March and July last year.
