allegedly bogus bath & body

...i'm a criminal mastermind

08.07.05

I got this hideously fragranced Victoria's Secret lotion and body scrub as a gift from a client, and I know that she purchased it from the store down the block from where I work, because she told me that was where it was from, and I believe and trust her.

True, I could have just returned it to any VS store, like maybe the one down the block from where I work, and exchange it for something less offensively-odored, but that means I'd have to actually go to a VS store, and then sniff noxious lotions and stuff until I found one I could tolerate.

Which is too much work.

So, I decided to sell it on eBay.

And after all my effort, I made like $1.50 profit, which is still better than a poke in the eye, or having to actually own and use Amber Romance bathcrap.

Today, I read the feedback the buyer left, which was, "fast shipping thanks although it doesn't look authentic."

What the fuck? These are the photos that I posted with the listing, because they're the ones that I took of the product with my little ol' camera.

Looks pretty authentic to me, but then I'm the photographer, so I'm biased. Or sane. I get those two things confused every once in a while.

Okay, so here's my take on the whole issue at hand.

I'm a person selling one VS listing, and a few other random listings of haircare products.

As a potential buyer, I would expect that the shopper would check out all the stuff I was selling, see that it was a bunch of random crap, see the pictures of authentic product, and figure that it was either a purchase I'd made, or gift that I'd received.

I would also expect that the buyer would check out my profile, see that I've had nothing but incredibly positive feedback in the last 6 years I've been on eBay, and go from there.

I wouldn't expect that the buyer would be suspicious that the product was counterfeit, because I'm not selling fifty kajillion other VS products, like some vendors on eBay do.

When I see someone selling 50 Kate Spade handbags, New With Tags, I get suspicious when they're selling them for 1/3 retail price. I expect that they've either been shoplifted from the stores directly, or else fell of the back of a department store delivery truck.

I don't imagine that the seller has some sort of mass production facility for designer impostor bags, with official paperwork and authentic-looking sales tags still attached to them.

I think generalized crime.

For criminy's sake, maybe I'm naive, but I don't really see a huge VS body care knock off market.

You can buy it at the stores all the time for like 3/$20.

I can't imagine selling it online in sets, at $1.50 profit per sale, and actually recouping the cost of the actual knock off production. Especially in multiples of one.

I'd have to locate the appropriate packaging, and then reproduce the labels, before concocting two products that smell exactly the same as the stuff at the stores, as well as having the right consistencies and textures.

I am neither that motivated or clever, and I am definitely not endowed with that sort of mad phat skillz; Recognize what song the carousel's calliope is butchering? Yes, I can do that. But mass produce near-authentic body care items and then sell only one set of them on eBay, presumably having arranged somewhere else to distribute them off of eBay? I don't think so.

Or maybe I just bought one set of knock off products that someone else made, and then make a whopping $1.50 profit for all the effort involved in purchasing, listing, packing and shipping the items off to some unwitting dupe somewhere far from here.

I think we've established that I'm too lazy for that many steps. List, pack and ship? Sure. Go out and buy it first? I don't think so.

And if the buyer felt it wasn't the product as specified, I would expect to hear about it from the person. Or that they'd contact eBay with their suspicions, and eBay would contact me for some sort of resolution.

Whatever.

I left a response saying, "It was purchased at a store. Take up product design with VS, since they made it."

And now, I wonder if VS would be insulted if they knew that someone thought their packaging was bogus looking enough to suspect it wasn't authentic.

Maybe they need a new design team.

But that's totally not my problem.