NYT – “Before Models Can Turn Around, Knockoffs Fly”

Originally posted September 5, 2007.

“Before Models Can Turn Around, Knockoffs Fly”

This New York Times article is one in a growing chorus of complaints from American designers that lower-end retail stores are copying their clothing. The Council of Fashion Designers of American (CFDA) is lobbying Congress to extend copyright protection to garments and individual designers are sueing stores, such as Forever 21, who they think have copied their clothing too closely.

I think the designers are being a bit ridiculous. I understand their indignance at being copied but do they think they’re actually losing money? Do they think that the shopper who spent $25 on a dress at Forever 21 was actually going to buy the designer version for $250? Or $2500? The consumer base doesn’t overlap – not even the other way around. A shopper who can and will pay $200 for a shirt doesn’t want the cheap, low quality massed produced version for $20.

Now, I realize that the proliferation of knock-offs could potentially reduce the exclusivity factor. A boutique may carry only 5 of an item while Forever 21 carries 5000 so instead of being the only one on your block to have something, everyone on the train has it. I admit, that kind of sucks. But what would the designers have – 1% of the country looking like class and the rest looking like trash?*

If the CFDA and its designers want to recapture the market they will need a new business plan, a plan which a small handful of designers have already adopted: collaboration. Collaboration. Whether with Target, KMart, H&M or whomever, it can give shoppers the access to designers that they ultimately crave while still allowing designers credit for their work and some degree of control over the quantity that they put out in stores.

At this risk of sounding trite, this is the 21st century and the internet has changed the way consumers interact with producers. It changed the music business, and it will change the fashion business regardless of what designers do; however, if designers stopped whining about being copied they could make the internet and mass distribution work to their advantage.

*That line came from what song, by which artist (female group), popular around 1998/2000? Bonus points for album name.