SAD LOVE QUOTES: Fake Apple stores: Chinese officials find 5 in Kunming city

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Fake Apple stores: Chinese officials find 5 in Kunming city

Last updated at 8:52 AM on 26th July 2011

Chinese officials have discovered five bogus Apple stores in the same city just days after a foreign blogger exposed one as an elaborate fake.

An investigation was launched after an Apple store was spotted in Kunming by U.S blogger BirdAbroad, who was convinced at first that it was a real store.

But then she noticed that the signage said 'Apple Store' - and Steve Jobs' electronics giant never writes that on its signs.

Shutdown: Five fake Apple stores have been found in Kunming, China

After news of the elaborate fake shop went global Chinese officials investigated and found five fake Apple stores.

They ordered two of them to suspend business while they're investigated, a local government website said.

Officials couldn't do anything about the other three stores - which prominently displayed Apple signs and logos - because they did not find any fake Apple products for sale, according to a report by a local newspaper posted on the Kunming city government's website.

The investigation follows a blog post last week by an American woman who lives in Kunming in Yunnan province, who stumbled across three shops masquerading as bona fide Apple stores in the city.

Feeling blue: The staff even wearing authentic-looking Apple T-shirts

Feeling blue: The staff even wear authentic-looking Apple T-shirts

Would you be fooled? The outside of the Apple shop looks very convincing - but the 'Apple Store' sign is not the correct branding

She took photos and posted them on her BirdAbroad blog.

She said they were modelled on the company's iconic stores right down to the winding staircase and the staff wearing the customary blue T-shirts.

Upon closer inspection, she noticed other things that weren't quite right.

'The name tags around the necks of the friendly sales people didn't actually have names on them – just an Apple logo and the anonymous designation "Staff",' she wrote on her blog.

'Also, the stairs were poorly made and the walls hadn't been painted properly.'

She added: 'This was a total Apple store rip-off. A beautiful rip-off – a brilliant one – the best rip-off store we had ever seen. Even the salespeople genuinely thought they worked for Apple.'

An Apple spokeswoman confirmed that BirdAbroad was absolutely correct.

Reality check: It looks real, but this Apple store in Kunming is anything but

The exception: BirdAbroad did think the products looked genuine

Stairway to a lawsuit: The blogger realised that the stairs weren't built to Apple standards

After the blog appeared on Wednesday, the Kunming Trade and Industry Bureau inspected more than 300 electronics stores in Kunming and found the five fake Apple stores, the city government's website said.

Calls to the Kunming Trade and Industry Bureau rang unanswered Monday.

The maker of the iPhone and other hit gadgets has four company stores in China - two in Beijing and two in Shanghai - and various official resellers.

The proliferation of the fake stores underlines the slow progress that China's government is making in countering a culture of a rampant piracy and widespread production of bogus goods that is a major irritant in relations with trading partners.

The real thing: The Apple store on Fifth Avenue in New York, complete with its glowing fruit signs

She told MailOnline that the Kunming store was indeed 'unauthorised'.

The fake shop, however, certainly isn't in danger of denting Apple's profit margins.

It has just managed to set a record for its quarterly profit and revenue, driving its shares up to more than seven per cent.

Blockbuster sales of the iPhone and strong Asian business are being credited for the surge as sales of its iconic products far outpaced forecasts.

This helped drive a near-doubling of revenue in the fiscal third quarter. Its shares leapt to a high of $405 after a brief after-hours trading suspension and closed at a record high of $376.85.

Apple sold 20.34 million iPhones during the quarter versus an expected 17 to 18 million, which analysts say helped it vault past Nokia and Samsung Electronics to become the world's biggest smartphone maker.

One weak spot in Apple's strong quarter was the 7.5 million iPods that the company sold, which is about 20 per cent lower than its iPod sales last year.

Last quarter marked the first time Apple's tablet outsold its iconic MP3 player.