American Eagle has filed a lawsuit against Amazon, claiming the ecommerce giant has used and manipulated trademark branding for its Aerie and Offline by Aerie lines to deceive online shoppers. The retailer is seeking a tripling of its actual damages, punitive damages and demanding that Amazon cease further infringements, according to CNBC.
In the lawsuit, which was filed in a Manhattan federal court earlier this week, AEO claimed Amazon participated in “flagrant, unauthorized use” of the Aerie and Offline by Aerie names in advertising copy for sponsored ads, advertisement URLs, and in page titles and URL results within the search function, leading customers to “inferior quality knock-offs” or “dupes” created by third-party sellers. After American Eagle warned Amazon to cease redirecting consumers to its third-party sellers, Amazon attempted to avoid further retribution by using misspelled variants of the brand name in sponsored ads, such as “Aries,” “Aeries,” and “Arie.”
The infringement allegedly began after the Gen Z apparel retailer denied Amazon’s request to sell Aerie through its marketplace platform to protect its brand equity, according to Yahoo Finance. “Although Amazon has requested rights to sell Aerie merchandise, AEO has intentionally declined so Aerie can foster its own brand identity and customer experience,” the complaint states. “AEO protects its brands and cannot allow bad actors like Amazon to confuse and deceive consumers” by steering them towards substandard imitations, “piggyback[ing] off the goodwill, success and popularity of the Aerie marks.”
Retail TouchPoints reached out to both AEO and Amazon for comment. While AEO declined to comment, Amazon did not respond at publishing time.
Has ‘Dupe Culture’ Gone Too Far?
Product “dupes” have become widespread online, with third-party marketplace sellers and “ghost brands” creating their own copycat versions of products, from luxury skincare and beauty products to sweatshirts and workout leggings.
And in today’s volatile economic climate, consumers are looking for the best possible price — even if it means the product’s quality is a bit lower. Nearly one-third of adults (31%) have intentionally purchased a dupe of a premium product, with Gen Z (49%) and millennials (44%) doing it the most, according to Morning Consult. Social media influencers, especially in fashion, have content focused solely on dupes.
Brands like Lululemon are trying to tackle the issue head-on by creating their own incentive programs and experiences that encourage consumers to turn in their dupes. The fitness brand created a “Dupe Swap” at its store in Los Angeles, turning a possible negative brand moment into an exciting customer experience. Additionally, wellness tech company Therabody partnered with Best Buy to offer consumers $50 off the purchase of a Theragun Device if they traded in any alternative “percussive massage device.”
Amazon launched the Amazon Counterfeit Crimes Unit (CCU) in June 2020 and in 2023 alone seized and disposed of 7 million counterfeit products worldwide. The unit also decreased the number of bad actors creating fake selling accounts by 88% within a four-year period. This success was largely driven by the CCU’s “proactive approach” to keeping counterfeit products off the site, but also going directly after counterfeiters themselves, according to Kebharu Smith, Director of the CCU.
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“We’ve been working up the supply chain, all the way to counterfeit manufacturers in places like China and Turkey, as well as working with law enforcement in the U.S., Europe and China,” said Smith in an interview with Retail TouchPoints. “We’ve also sued [counterfeiters] in partnership with small, medium-sized and luxury brands.”
Although Amazon lauded its work in this area, its crafty efforts to bypass trademark law for its advertising efforts show how nuanced and tricky it is to pinpoint the line between a counterfeit good, which is designed to be a convincing copy, and a dupe, which aims to be an “accessible homage,” according to the Washington Journal of Law.
“One of the important elements of counterfeiting is the ‘intent to deceive,’ and this element is a significant piece of what separates dupes from counterfeits,” the article stated. “Dupes do not claim to be the real-deal. In fact, part of their allure is that purchasers are getting the same or similar quality and functionality of the original without the original’s branding (and the associated price mark-up).”
