Keeping It Un-Real: George Estrada
Last Sunday at church, I saw an old friend flaunting an expensive and prestigious item – a Fendi handbag, the “Zucchino Mama” model. Approximate retail value: $850.
“Is that real?” I asked, worried a bit that I might offend her Philippine pride, but fully aware that counterfeit branded items are available back in the islands for a fraction of the price.
“Of course it is,” she said. “What do you think of me?”
Well, since you asked, I think that it’s a fake and it was bought in a Philippine shopping mall.
I know because I personally own several Rolex, Nike, Ferragamo and other cheap replica items that I bought in Philippine department stores. My wife, in fact, also owns a Fendi product, a carry-on flight bag – a $1,200 item if real. We purchased it for only $40 at a seemingly respectable store during our last trip to Davao City.
“Oh, it’s real,” the saleslady told my wife at the time. “It’s an authorized replica made in Indonesia under license from Fendi.”
The sales girl seemed awfully sincere at the time, and we wanted so badly to believe her – so we bought it. And when I went downstairs later to check out the Rolex watches, I got almost the identical rap from the salesgirl at the jewelry kiosk.
“It’s an authorized replica made in Indonesia under license from Rolex,” she said. “It has some genuine Rolex parts.” The price: only $35 each.
And so it was that we walked out of that Davao City mall with a Fendi flight bag and two Rolex watches. Total retail value of the genuine items: $9,200. Total cash outlay: $120.
OK, OK, we’re stupid. Well, “stupid” is too harsh a word. “Naïve” is kinder. We’re also “showoffs” and “wannabes.” We just wanted to have the finer things in life, or at least stuff that looks like the finer things in life.
The thing about these knockoffs is that they look so genuine. I’ve fooled many people here in America with my Rolex. Only a jewelry dealer in Las Vegas was able to identify it as a fake because it wasn’t the proper weight and because the grooves on the rim weren’t cut with the same depth and precision.
OK, whatever. I’m still happy to wear it whenever I need to flash some bling – which is pretty much every day. At the very least, I’m able to show off the replicas and regale my friends with stories about how these fakes are openly available for sale in the Philippines, not in some dark alley, but out in the open in respectable malls and department stores.
I was convinced that this could only happen in the Philippines, land of magic, mystery and rampant copyright infringement. And so when I returned home to America, I regained my grounded retail-sales orientation. We won’t see fake branded items in stores here, by God.
Then a funny thing happened this week as we strolled through one of the local discount stores. We saw a black Chanel purse with raised white C’s staring at us from a bin. My wife looked stunned when she read the price tag. It said $49.95.