Chinese officials in Kunming have ordered two fake Apple shops to close, not because of piracy or copyright concerns, but because the stores in the southwestern city did not have an official business permit.
Five self-branded “Apple Stores” were found to be selling Apple products without authorization from the California-based company but only two were told to shut, officials said.
I must admit this went much quicker than I thought it would.
Quicker, only because these were the ‘low-hanging fruit’ and trade-dress wasn’t even an issue. The others, those with permits but misrepresenting themselves, are the cases where I am curious to see how they are handled and how expeditiously.
Good point.
Unless Apple exerts large amounts of pressure (read: money) the bigger ones wont be closed.
Only threatened legal action (read: money for the authorities) will even impress the larger ones, which are often operated by well connected business men (read: they paid large amounts of money to the authorities).
It is my belief that Apple will only go after the ones that actually try to pose as genuine Apple Stores, thus potentially tarnishing the retail brand.
Similar interior design can be found almost at every retailer that sells Apple products in China and believe me, there are many. I don’t think Apple minds those, because they work in favour of increasing Apple’s market and mind share in China.
MC: I think it’s clear that we’re not talking about the elements of décor themselves.
Even if the ‘Stoer’ misspelling was intentional (that’s saved countless ‘BULOVIA’ watches from seizure, right?) or if the 蘋果商店 meant ‘just kidding, bro’ (which it does not), the sum of the elements only demonstrates willful intent. I can see it now: “No really; we found all this glass, stainless and hardwood flooring at the ‘Dollarr Stoer’ and decided to decorate with that.”
Oh, I get it: you’re saying that far-away, foreign Steve ‘Milquetoast’ Jobs has no clout vis-a-vis these ‘well-connected-business-men-who-paid-parge-amounts-of-money-to-the-local-constable.’ Going after them would shatter confidence and cause irreparable harm to the domestic influence market. One can see the quoted price of bribe futures plummeting already. 🙂
Exactly 😉