Mishustin, however, went on to lift a ban on so-called parallel imports – effectively allowing unauthorised agents or distributors in Russia to source merchandise abroad, ship it and sell it to customers, without the brand owner’s explicit permission.
If you can get – from within Russia, of course – the permission to get the hard currency then you’ll be able to make a fortune at this.
Good luck. But it’s that money transfer that’s the secret to it. But the seconds out of the factories in Bangladesh and off you go…..
Perhaps not. The seconds are unbranded.
It’s more than a bit wanky that “brands” think they can dictate who is allowed to buy their stuff, and I am hoping this leads to more knockoff Soviet ZX Spectrum clones
@TMB: branding can be trivially added. There used to be a market in Hong Kong that sold “branded” goods. Friend of mine went there to get a coat as the weather was about to turn nasty. He bought one and the vendor said “5 minutes”. He asked why and was told they needed to find the logo and sew it on. My friend pointed out that he only wanted a coat because it was about to rain and didn’t care about the logo, at which point the vendor said “oh, in that case you can have it without the logo for half the price”. They’d thought he was a tourist.
Meh. I was in Kuala Lumpur once and they had next season’s footie shirts before they were available in England.
Who are Nike et al gonna sue ? They won’t get far in any Russian court.
OT: Tim, some time ago you linked to an organisation in Bangladesh that you donate your Bangladeshi writing fees to, that helps feed street kids etc, could you provide the link again please? I donated some money to them before, if they are still going I’d like to send some more.
https://onetakameal.org/
https://www.facebook.com/1Tk.Meal/
It’s very vaguely possible that I was one of the founding donors of this. Certainly, when my fees first went to them it was just a few folk buying up Ramadan lunches for kids (kids don’t fast during Ramadan, but adults do, meaning there’s often no cooked food at lunchtime. So, it’s a standard Islamic thing for charity to provide those Ramadan lunches to poor kids).
It’s more than a bit wanky that “brands” think they can dictate who is allowed to buy their stuff
Boooooo! People being free to decide with whom they wish to trade. Boooooo! Bet your chum Vlad wouldn’t put up with any of that free market liberal nonsense, eh?
Harry – lol, calm down.
“Boooooo! People being free to decide with whom they wish to trade. Boooooo!”
Well, it’s more that they want to decide who other people can trade it. So, Chanel sell a load of stuff to Bob. It’s now Bob’s property. But Chanel can stop Bob selling it down the Sunday market from the back of a van.
That said, if you’re buying luxury brands you’re a moron who somehow got money and deserves to get fleeced. For almost any Nike, Dyson, Apple, Tiffany there’s a product that does the same job and costs 30+% less. And this feels like evolution to me, so long may it continue.
Brilliant thank you. Are they part of the Bidyanondo Foundation? (https://bidyanondo.org/) I get emails from them once in a while with an audit file attached, and I assume they can only have got my email from that first donation. They have a link on their site to the site you mentioned above (https://onetakameal.org/)
BoM4
Yeah but your mobile phone won”t have patented Cyclone technology !
‘Bet your chum Vlad wouldn’t put up with any of that free market liberal nonsense, eh?’
The Russkies actually just abolishing a regulation!!!!
Maybe we won the Cold War after all.
AtC – that’s absolutely true and I have some knock-off Lacoste polo shirts complete with crocodile to back you up. If the brand owner refuses to supply distributors in a given market, there will likely be fakes available but my contention is the punters aren’t going to pay through the nose for fakes or for seconds from Bangladesh. So as business ideas go, this idea isn’t very attractive.
“I am hoping this leads to more knockoff Soviet ZX Spectrum clones”
I’ll drink to that.