"Looks Familiar" Dongdaemun Merchant's Designed Clothes Sold Cheaper in China

Chinese Company Using Stolen Clothing Photos from Online Platforms
"Only Stealing Photos, Selling Different Clothes... Selling Cheaper to Sell Better"

A clothing wholesale market in Dongdaemun, Seoul. The photo is not related to the specific content of the article. Photo by Moon Honam munonam@

[Asia Economy Reporter Hwang Sumi] The story of a Dongdaemun clothing wholesaler suffering damages due to photo theft by a Chinese company has been reported.

According to Yonhap News on the 29th, Mr. A, who has been running a clothing wholesale business in Dongdaemun for 9 years, recently discovered belatedly that clothes he personally designed were being openly sold on the wholesale and retail online platform Shinsang Market.

Shinsang Market is a business-to-business (B2B) service that allows wholesalers to upload products on the platform and sell them to retailers. It digitizes the traditional method where retailers visited the Dongdaemun wholesale market in person to place orders. It is known that many wholesalers and retailers use this platform because it enables transactions in a relatively simple way.

However, on this platform, one wholesaler was using photos of clothes designed by Mr. A’s company exactly as they were. Due to the nature of Shinsang Market, once registered as a wholesaler, one cannot see products uploaded by other wholesalers. Because of this, Mr. A only became aware of the photo theft after receiving a tip from a retailer he was acquainted with.

Mr. A contacted the company in question to demand an explanation. The company responded that they "did not know there was a Korean original creator." They said they had simply used photos of clothes selected and ordered from a Chinese shopping site and were unaware that the designs were stolen. According to Yonhap News, the company stated, "If we had known the design was made by a domestic wholesaler, we would not have placed orders with the Chinese company or used the photos in the first place."

Meanwhile, Mr. A lamented to Yonhap News that such photo theft cases occur frequently. He said, "When I upload photos I took myself on online platforms, Chinese companies illegally use those photos and distribute them to other wholesalers," adding, "Since the clothes with stolen photos have different fabric materials and size specifications, they are essentially different clothes, but because the price is cheap, the Chinese counterfeit products end up selling better."

In fact, design theft in the clothing industry is known to be carried out mainly by numerous unspecified Chinese merchants and clothing sales sites. Especially in the case of individual theft incidents occurring in small-scale Dongdaemun wholesale businesses, it is pointed out that it is difficult to detect in advance and prove the order of precedence.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.