Counterfeit Sneakers Seized in Germany
Nov 14th 2006 – German customs overlooks the destruction of fake designer shoes in Hamburg, northern Germany. German customs officers have seized what they said could be the world’s largest haul of counterfeit goods, including nearly 1 million pairs of ‘knock-off’ Nike sneakers. The customs department in the northern port of Hamburg said it had confiscated a total of 117 shipping containers filled with fake goods since the end of August. The equivalent amount of genuine branded goods would be worth about euros 383 million (US$ 490 million), it said in a statement. The goods included 101 containers loaded with 945,384 pairs of counterfeit Nike sneakers, and 10 more containers with about 105,000 pairs of fake Adidas and Puma sports shoes. Also impounded were 76,760 fake watches and 1,454 toys.
So this information is important to know for all of you PUMA consumers & sneaker lovers also alot of these fake good are spread on auction websites such as eBay & iOffer, so be careful when you’re shopping for trainers. If you are concerned about the authenticity of a PUMA sneaker please join our dicussion forum and ask for some advice and we’ll gladly help you out. Here are additional pics & click the “PumaTalk’em” to take you to the FAKE PUMA discussion topics in our forum.
November 29th, 2006 at 6:16 pm
[...] German customs seized a massive amount of fake sneakers on November 14th. The fake sneakers that were seized included Nike, Puma, and Adidas. 101 containers loaded with 900,000+ fake Nike sneakers and 105,000 pairs of fake Adidas and Puma shoes were seized. This is crazy and this is just a small percent of the fakes floating around. On another note I love what the German customs did with all the fakes, don’t you? They were destroyed in Hamburg, northern Germany. If you look at the bottom right corner you can see a pair of fake Air Max 97s. The counterfeit market has definitely gotten out of hand in the past 5-6 years. This is what should happen everytime fakes are caught in customs. It’s just a shame other customs aren’t on top of their game like Germany. Info/Pics via pumatalk [...]
November 29th, 2006 at 10:06 pm
they should of sent them to africa where kids have no shoes to walk in…. not right just trashing them… puma/nike/adidas already get millions of $$
November 30th, 2006 at 2:12 am
I understand the politics of the situation, but why couldn’t German officials or puma/nike/adidas take the initiative to donate these bootleg shoes to 3rd world countries? Don’t take me wrong, I hate the fact that there are FAKE shoes on the market…but come on, 1,000,000+ pairs of shoes shredded to pieces?!! That’s like throwing away fur coats during a snow storm, because the company lied about producing artificial fur!
November 30th, 2006 at 9:14 am
Hey Fellas,
PUMA (EU) does alot of donations & fund raising events mostly to Africa – however I’m not sure if Nike & Adidas do the same. I also agree to just tair over a million pair of sneakers is a little fantatic well it’s mostly Politics but yah there are alot of kids in third world countries that can use a pair of sneakers as opposed to walking bear foot!
my best,
Joey Dee
December 1st, 2006 at 8:36 pm
it wouldnt be right for them to send fake shoes to third world countries. fake stuff is ILLEGAL and that is why all of those shoes were shredded, it would be like if the cops found a bunch of special brownies and shipped them off to third world countries. (that was the best analogy o could come up with)
Nike has a program that allows people to bring in theyre old shoes so they can recycle them to make shoes to kids that cant afford them. people just have to do their research.
the bottom line for me is they are illegal, and yes sometimes you have to break the rules to do a good thing but the fake shoe/clothing industry is really hurting Nike/Bape. . .
and i think people dont care about fake stuff as much as they should, people really should care about this problem. i have thousands of dollars in bape and nike stuff and i dont want people thinking they can get my shirt($100) for $10 on ebay or my $600 Dunks on ebay for $80. its demeaning to poeple that have the real stuff!
BUYING FAKE SHOES SUPPORTS IST.
December 4th, 2006 at 12:34 pm
anybody who has sneakers that are at an amount they cant even remember count of needs to do something with a portion if not all of them toward people who cant even remember their last pair of new shoes. this has to be the worst idea for this problem by jus getting rid of these shoes like this. dollars make the world go around but think abouth those kids who run around with no shoes on their feet.what hurts more “the pocket of these companies or those feet” …..step it up
December 19th, 2006 at 10:00 pm
They could have spray painted over them and sent them to missions.
Otherwise you would see them back on the market again.
You might see them on ebay anyway as Rare Nike.
January 15th, 2007 at 2:49 am
What a waste! You gota love the stupidity of human beings.
April 4th, 2007 at 1:14 am
these “illegal” shoes would not hurt nike or puma or adidas one bit if sent to a country where kids dont have shoes . . . they could be painted or whatgever so they wouldnt show up again for sale somewhere-i dont want to “hurt” the sneaker companies, especially PUMA, cuz i love my Pumas, but these companies make SOOOOOOO much frickin money it aint even funny! and it wouldnt be the same as sending “special brownies” to the 3rd world, necause these shoes would not get anyone high or sick . . . dude, that wasnt even CLOSE!
i always hear about fake sneakers gettin found and destroyed-never hear about them catchin the dudes makin the fakes-catch them, and make them pay for paintin the shoes and transportin them to where they are needed.
a last comment-no one wants to “hurt” the sneaker companies, but the PRICES they charge-WOW! anybody think those sneakers cost even 10% of some of those prices? yeh, sure, i want a nice slick pair of Puma X Schedoni-buthow much them suckas gonna cost? talk about the 3rd world-when the cost of a pair of sneakers could feed a village of stravin people for a month-SOMEBODY got their priorities all twisted jack! but, hey, we gotta look good, huh? just never think how “good” starvin kids look, tho, do we?
May 14th, 2007 at 1:37 pm
Maybe the problem of counterfeit footwear lies in the fact that to the avearage member of the public these shoes are expensive and not value for money when the recommended retail price is charged in the shops. Considering all these shoes are made in the third world for a couple of euros wether they were destroyed or not doesnt really matter to the big corporations as they already make astronomical profits. The people who live in the countries that manufacture these shoes would probably have to save for a few years just to be able to buy them. I always buy counterfeits now as they come from the exact same factories that originals do but at a fraction of the price. Maybe when Nike, Puma, Adidas etc reduce their prices then counterfeits will end.
May 30th, 2007 at 2:43 pm
[...] One of which is that huge trade in fake NIKE and other brands’ product drives the whole blackmarket industry, and not just in these category. There are lots more products such as pirated dvds’, bags, t-shirt and so on. One article i found that is so interesting was that the German customs seized 1 million pairs of FAKE SNEAKERS in november 2006. These counterfeits items sometimes are made in by legitimate manufacturer of the brand it self. Legitimate companies gets all the negative effects from the black market act of counterfeits, one company in Malaysia i believe have declare bankruptcy in 2000-01 because of blackmarket CDs’ and DVDs’ that are making lost of money from the companys’ product. [...]
July 11th, 2007 at 2:32 am
GUYS I AGREE THESE SHOES ARE NOT AUTHENTIC TO THE COMPANIES STANDARDS BUT THEY ARE STILL GOOD SHOES THAT CAN BE WORN. THERE IS NO SENSE IN SHREDDING THAT MANY SHOES.
September 14th, 2007 at 1:17 am
Why waste them?
November 15th, 2007 at 10:10 am
yes,can send them to the poor area?
November 19th, 2007 at 2:28 am
Yah, man…why waste all the shoes. Fake though they are, they can still be worn by some poor children who need them more than the Nike/Adidas/Pumas people do…whats it gonna cost these companies to do that? Next to nothing compared to what they’re making…
November 27th, 2007 at 4:53 am
WHAT A WASTE!!! so where does the leftover waste from the disposal of these one million pairs of sneakers go anyway? I collect sneakers and abhor fakes or variants but that is unnecessary waste. Even where I live, which is a poor area the kids here would love to own even one pair of those fake sneakers so I can imagine how children in third world countries would have felt upon receiving a free pair of (‘fake’) nike airs. The companies could have afforded to donate these and i agree it would not have hurt their business to do so. I disagree with the brownie comparison, these shoes would only benefit people who go without.
December 15th, 2007 at 10:15 am
very interesting, but I don’t agree with you
Idetrorce
December 22nd, 2007 at 10:52 pm
thats a lot of kicks
January 30th, 2008 at 6:15 pm
The problem is that these shoes are not “good shoes”. Although there are many people in the world who lack appropriate footware, sending them defective merchandise is not right. When people counterfeit merchandise, they sacrifice quality for quantity. In fake shoes, the technology is lacking or missing altogether. If these shoes were shipped to third world countries, the recipients of this fake merchandise would be put in danger. This is wrong.
February 17th, 2008 at 10:10 pm
I understand they are fake. However Fake shoes would not be such an issue of brands such as Nike and Adidas weren’t so driven buy retailing on such hig mark ups. The average mar up from the manufacture of a pair of shoes to the retail is over 500%. This would stop the sale of fake shoes.
February 17th, 2008 at 10:13 pm
A lot of shoes to go to waste. Why not ship them to 3rd world countries. There out there walking around with bare feet!
February 17th, 2008 at 10:16 pm
They should definitely be shipped to less fortunate people!
February 21st, 2008 at 10:34 am
they should find a way to recycle them
March 8th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
you can’t send faulty and potentially dangerous merchandise to people. these fake shoes were made only for profit with no regard for safety. sending these shoes to people puts them at risk for serious injury and jeopardizes the integrity of the company. donating counterfeit shoes is no more ethical than donating counterfeit advil or or home made appliances.
April 7th, 2008 at 12:02 am
a German customer returned a fake puma that he got in China, they looked good lol…. anyways then he just got some speedcats…
= peace
June 17th, 2008 at 6:57 pm
lol Frank, you posted twice saying that these shoes are deathtraps. they are shoes mate, its not like a movie where a kid will be running down the street and a little bit of stitching is about to come out, he runs faster and the the stitching comes out a little further, he speeds up then BAM! the stitching comes out and he goes careening off the road into a bunch of barrels on the side of the road, then hits a ramp which makes him fly into the air flipping, then he comes crashing down in a heap onto a pit of poisoned rusty spikes, gets tetanus and dies!
December 21st, 2008 at 9:32 pm
Yep, its exactly like giving impoverished children hash brownies. NOT. That has to be the most stupid analogy I have heard, like ever.
If they gave them away, the corporations look good, the children don’t have to get their feet cut up playing outside (‘potentially dangerous merchandise’, what bollocks they’re shoes not grenades) and the counterfeiters have already lost out.