Nearly 80% of the luxury goods offered on social media turn out to be copies or replicas.

The survey examined over 10.000.000 posts that mention 20 luxury brands, of which about 5.000.000 offer goods for sale. Of the latter, 3.500.000 postings were revealed to be selling fakes.

posts selling counterfeit luxury items

The volume of counterfeit luxury items sold on social media grew by 28% over one year

Right now is exceeds ₽23 billion compared to ₽18 billion last year.

The most targeted category is apparel: 32% of ads offer such fakes. It is followed by footwear at 17% and handbags and backpacks at 15%.

2019

2020

₽23 bn

₽18 bn

After one year, new accounts selling counterfeit luxury products are opening at double the rate

At least 9,000 new accounts selling counterfeit luxury items pop up every month: almost twice the number compared to 2019. Overall, more than 625,000 postings designed to sell fake goods of luxury brands went online in the period from June 2019 to June 2020, with the total number of active accounts pushing counterfeits reaching 192,000. At the same time, only 11% of sellers openly admit that their goods are not genuine.

accounts selling fake goods are created every month

At the end of the first half of 2020, the rate at which new fake-selling postings appear increased by 15% compared to the same period in 2019 (333.000 new postings versus 292.000, respectively). More than half of the accounts specializing in fake luxury items target a single brand. 73% of accounts offering counterfeit luxury items stay active for a maximum of 1 year, while 14% of accounts remain in business for up to 1.5 years and another 6% are around for at least 2 years.

'Life expectancy' of accounts that sell fakes, %

<0.5 yrs

42

0.5–1 yrs

31

14

8

6

1–1.5 yrs

1.5–2 yrs

>2 yrs

Such accounts enjoy a loyal audience with a high engagement rate (from 1.89% to 4.77%). The average monthly sales generated by an account with an audience of 10.000 people amounts to ₽450.000, with an average profit of ₽115.000.

A third of accounts selling fake luxury products have showrooms in Moscow

A further 10% of profiles operate through brick-and-mortar stores in Saint Petersburg and Krasnodar, while 3 to 7% use this channel in other cities with a population of 1 mn or more people. A showroom with fakes can store at least 300 items of clothing, handbags and 1,000 pairs of shoes. The most popular payment methods include cash paid to couriers and card-to-card money transfers (a Sberbank-issued card is suggested in 95% of cases, while a card issued by Tinkoff Bank is an option in 4% of transactions).

items of apparel, handbags and footwear are in stock at showrooms that sell counterfeits

Designer:

Anna Ilyina