Nordstrom division retailer show of Birkenstock sandals on the Retailers at Merrick Park, Miami.
Jeff Greenberg | Common Pictures Group | Getty Pictures
Birkenstock, the long-lasting sandal maker based in 1774, filed its paperwork for an preliminary public providing on Tuesday, and warned buyers of the dangers posed by counterfeit manufacturers that use social media to advertise their merchandise.
The footwear firm, which was began in Germany and is now primarily based in London, plans to go public on the New York Inventory Alternate, beneath ticker image “BIRK.”
Birkenstock has lengthy struggled to guard its mental property, as copycats have taken benefit of the model’s recognition and premium costs to try to undercut the corporate with cheaper alternate options. In its prospectus, Birkenstock says that among the competitors comes from “non-public label choices” from retailers, however there are additionally “knock-off merchandise” which are stealing its IP and attempting to persuade individuals on Fb and elsewhere on the internet that the objects are genuine.
“Up to now, third events have established web sites to focus on customers on Fb or different social media platforms with ‘look alike’ web sites supposed to trick customers into believing that they have been buying Birkenstock merchandise at a steep low cost,” the submitting mentioned. “Ought to counterfeit merchandise be efficiently offered on e-commerce platforms managed by third events, our manufacturers and status might be broken.”
Birkenstock does not identify Amazon wherever within the 206-page — plus footnotes — submitting, nevertheless it does say that it has “refrained, and we might sooner or later chorus, from utilizing sure third-party web sites to distribute our merchandise because of the promoting of counterfeit merchandise on such platforms.”
Seven years in the past, Birkenstock publicly give up Amazon within the U.S. as a result of an eruption of counterfeit and unauthorized gross sales on the positioning. The corporate additionally mentioned on the time that it will not permit licensed Birkenstock retailers to promote on Amazon.
“The Amazon market, which operates as an ‘open market,’ creates an atmosphere the place we expertise unacceptable enterprise practices which we imagine jeopardize our model,” then-Birkenstock USA CEO David Kahan wrote in a memo on July 5, 2016, addressed to “our valued Birkenstock companions.”
Kahan, whose title is now President Americas, went on to say that “policing this exercise internally and in partnership with Amazon.com has confirmed unimaginable.”
Previous to its departure from Amazon, legions of Chinese language sellers had been selling Birkenstock’s flagship Arizona sandal for $79.99, or $20 beneath the retail worth, in accordance with CNBC’s reporting on the time.
Since 2016, in accordance with the prospectus, Birkenstock has “considerably expanded” its direct-to-consumer efforts in e-commerce within the U.S. For the fiscal 12 months ending Sept. 30, 2022, that channel represented 38% of income, the corporate mentioned, including that “one among our methods is to proceed to extend the proportion of our revenues from e-commerce.”
Subsequent to the Amazon conflict, Birkenstock offered a majority stake within the firm to LVMH-backed non-public fairness agency L Catterton in February 2021. After the IPO, L Catterton will proceed to personal a majority of Birkenstock, in accordance with the submitting.
“We see ourselves because the oldest start-up on earth,” the corporate mentioned within the submitting. “We’re a model backed by a household custom of 1 / 4 of a millennium with the resilience, timeless relevance, and credibility of a multigenerational enterprise.”
Fb guardian Meta is nicely conscious of the efforts taken by counterfeiters on its platform. In 2021, Fb and luxurious model Gucci filed a joint lawsuit in California, alleging {that a} person of Fb’s U.S. websites was utilizing the platform to promote pretend Gucci merchandise.
The businesses mentioned in a press release that over 1,000,000 “items of content material have been faraway from Fb and Instagram within the first half of 2020, primarily based on 1000’s of stories of counterfeit content material from model homeowners, together with Gucci.”
Within the six months ending March 31, Birkenstock’s income climbed 19% to 644.2 million euros, or $693.2 million. Web revenue over that stretch dropped 45%, largely as a result of a international alternate loss.
WATCH: Birkenstock recordsdata for U.S. IPO on NYSE
