Burberry in Vietnam
Vietnam is the land of knock-offs, copies, fakes, whatever you want to call them.
It’s not just Rolex watches, DVDs and Gucci sunglasses. They will copy anything. Major industrial equipment, antiques, blackberries, computer programs, motor bikes. You name it and you can buy a copy here. A lot of them are very good copies. A bloke I know here whose company imports large industrial equipment tells me that it is copied and they have difficulty identifying them as copied.
Sometimes the copies are made in China or Cambodia and smuggled across the border. Sometimes they are legitimate products. Some clothing manufacturers work on the basis that “if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em”. When they have end of run products, it is better for them to invite tenders forthe 10,000 shirts, or whatever the product is, and the tenderer has to take the whole lot regardless of colour and size. Some products, like electronics, might not be so well done. DVDs are a well-known joke, particularly in the case of new movies where things can go badly wrong. You find that you have the wrong movie, or someone in the audience sneezes, or the audience laughs in hte wrong place. The boxed sets of TV shows and old movies (you can buy a boxed set of all the movies by actors like John Travolta, the complete James Bond collection, the entire West Wing series, all the Coen Brothers movies), tend to be better but certainly not always perfect.
There are IP laws here, but it’s fair to say that they are not enforced to any great extent. It would result in significant job losses in the markets if they were enforced. It’s not likely to change soon. The companies point out that their products are effectively being stolen. On the other had the people who make these goods for a salary of a few hundred dollars a year would be asked to pay a hundred times more than it cost to produce here just because some foreign company puts a label on it.
There has been general agreement amongst those who’ve visited me here that the Burberry knock-offs deserve special mention due to their versatility. You see Burberry in many unusual places. Burberry dresses in the street, Burberry shirts on labourers, little girls with Burberry dolls in the park. I found a website about fashion which said this:
Ahh the trench coat. The wardrobe staple that every chic girl in town has that never goes out of style and is perfect with everything. Naturally if one is going to splurge on a trench coat, one should splurge it on a Burberry. You can’t get more classic than Burberry. Just look how cool Gweneth Paltrow and Kate Bosworth (and Helen and Marce) look in their Burberry trenches! I am especially inspired by Kate Bosworth (and Helen and Marce) updating the classic look with ankle boots, which we will still be seeing a lot of this season. Especially in Saigon, although perhaps not in Manly over summer. Although they are freely available here, surprisingly there’s not a lot of local demand in Saigon for trenchcoats in a city where the humidity is 90% and the temperature 30 degrees. Although I thought I saw Gweneth at the markets last week trying one on.
Another fashion site says A classic trench coat will always be in vogue every winter. No one else does them better than Burberry. Therefore, a Burberry trench coat is an investment! Indeed it is. At $15 or so in Saigon Square.
Marce has set the challenge. I have to combine 2 national features. I have to find a Burberry bride. No luck so far but there will be one out there somewhere. Someone will do it. I just hope I have my camera at the time.
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