Foreign brands that are actually Russian. Russian brands that “pretend” to be foreign. Why do some Russian brands pretend to be foreign?
Many buyers do not even suspect that behind the big English and Italian names they are actually hiding Russian manufacturers. This article is about the most important “pseudo” foreign brands.
Why do some Russian brands pretend to be foreign?
Here we are dealing with the conviction of the majority of Russians that foreign clothes and shoes (not counting China and Turkey) are always more fashionable and more best quality than domestic. This belief is not groundless. On the other hand, domestic producers, who know about the “special love” of Russians for everything foreign, take advantage of this. This is especially true for new brands formed after the 1990s.
First of all, brands take names that “sound” like Italian or American. There is nothing wrong with this fact in itself, and this is the case even in recognized fashion meccas, such as Italy. In particular, the Henry Cotton’s brand sounds English, is aimed at lovers of “English style”, but was founded in Italy in 1978. However, there is a big difference - they do not hide this fact. It’s just that the name is consonant with the style of the clothes they produce.
By the way, someone who would certainly benefit from rebranding is our Bolshevichka factory. It just sounds funny: “A businessman in a Bolshevik suit.” However, this is purely their business, at least they are not misleading anyone.
Three categories of Russian brands that pretend to be foreign
All brands that “pretend” to be foreign can be divided into three categories.
The first category includes those brands that do not hide their Russian origin and have only the name itself in a “foreign” language. It's like our Timati black star - no one doubts his origin.
The first category includes INCITY is a Russian fashion brand created in 2005. This is a chain of fashionable women's clothing stores owned by OJSC "Fashion Continent". Having taken a foreign name (which, by the way, does not clearly indicate the place of origin of the brand), this brand from the very beginning positions itself as Russian and does not experience any discomfort in connection with this. As well as English language, having become de facto international, the name in English is both a tribute to fashion, a trend and simply a marketing ploy.
Fabio Paoloni
Under the brand Fabio Paoloni released men's clothing: classic suits, shirts, outerwear. The logo itself contains the word Milano, giving an unambiguous hint of its noble origin. That is, this is a direct misrepresentation. Only Runet is filled with information about the Italian clothing brand Fabio Paoloni. There is not a single hint of it in the Italian segment of the Internet. Where are the clothes made and by whom? Fabio Paoloni one can only guess - on the official website there is no information at all about their origin.
BGN
As stated on the official website “The history of the BGN brand began in Paris. In 1999, following the first BGN gallery, located in the very center of Paris, the first store appeared in the Saint-Gemain des Près district, then in 2004 in the Le Marais quarter. In 2000, the first BGN store opened in Russia, then in Ukraine and Turkey. Every year the number of stores is constantly growing". However, there is not a single mention of this brand in the French segment of the Internet, so draw your own conclusion.
And in conclusion, I will say that if the quality and style of clothes and shoes are at high level, then there is no need to hide behind a “foreign” brand, and if not, then this is not only a deception of consumers, but also damage to the business reputation of those countries that pseudo-Italian and pseudo-American companies hide behind.
Stylist-shopper
Olesya Maranova
Last year's economic surprise forced many of us to reconsider the contents of our wardrobes - after all, things from Europe and the States have become seriously expensive. And if Yanix and Big Russian Boss, for sure, still sell only luxury Western brands, then today it makes sense for more practical readers to pay attention to local streetwear brands.
We asked some of them to create a wardrobe for you for the season, the total cost of which will not exceed 10,000 rubles.
We are waiting for your comments about which of them coped with this better.
ANTEATER
What you need to know about them:The clothing brand, founded by skaters, often collaborates with companies known far beyond Russia - for example, Saucony.
What they write about themselves:
“The Anteater brand respects the heritage of street culture, the contribution of various graffiti artists, musicians, athletes and designers to the development of this segment.”
Anorak - 2199 rubles, sweatshirt - 2399 rubles, T-shirt - 1699 rubles, T-shirt - 899 rubles, backpack - 1999 rubles, socks - 599 rubles.
ZIQ & YONI
What you need to know about them:One of the creative minds of the Moscow brand (and its face) is the rap artist Nel. This winter he brought in Guf for his next collection - the collaboration was called “420”. Ziq & Yoni also stands out for its love of visuals: all of their lookbooks and photo shoots are shot very artistically.
What they write about themselves:
"Since its founding, the Ziq & Yoni brand has been distinguished by its own take on street fashion. Not limited to a specific subculture, the Ziq & Yoni brand brings together a variety of local movements, street sports and music under its ethos."
Keychain - 200 rubles, long sleeve - 2200 rubles, Panama hat - 1390 rubles, anorak - 4200 rubles, shoe bag - 990 rubles, TRPL BLACK cover - 400 rubles, TRPL BLACK x GUF hat - 495 rubles.
SWORD
What you need to know about them:A young St. Petersburg brand that managed to make friends, for example, with the Anacondaz group. They experiment with prints and pay a lot of attention to details - like wooden buttons on hats.
What they write about themselves:
“Creating a new clothing brand, we set ourselves the task of showing the life of the streets from a different point of view, from a new side. “SWORD” is the embodiment of the multifaceted culture of the city, a reflection of its continuous movement and development. In every item, be it jackets, T-shirts or backpacks, we are trying to embody our attitude to life: light and fast!"
T-shirt - 900 rubles, sweatshirt - 2100 rubles, trousers - 2700 rubles, wallet (Gosha Orekhov) - 700 rubles.
SPUTNIK 1985
What you need to know about them:The style of this brand refers to punk music, counterculture and our Soviet and post-Soviet past. Looking at these things, the easiest way to guess is in which country it was made. Their sweatshirts with the image of the shot White House (Moscow, not Washington) and the inscription “Wasted Youth” were a hit in Moscow two or three years ago. The small brand continues to adhere to the chosen course and is happy to equip its prints with lines from the Civil Defense and inscriptions of a nostalgic-slogan nature.
What they write about themselves:
“As a child, in the USSR, we received such clothes from Europe and the USA as humanitarian aid, now we make them ourselves. Practical, simple things and classic shape, which are comfortable on the street. As teenagers, we climbed onto someone else's territory, and, of course, no one thought about what it looked like, making our way across the roofs of garages and greenhouses for grapes and other joys of youth. We haven't stopped crawling on rooftops, but now we're paying more attention to our appearance."
Anorak - 2500 rubles, War Is Hell sweatshirt - 1950 rubles, Sputnik1985 T-shirt - 950 rubles, Swan Lake T-shirt - 950 rubles, backpack - 1950 rubles.
SYNDICATE
What you need to know about them:A popular Ukrainian brand that manages to sell its clothes outside the country (and not only to Russia, but, for example, to Europe). They don’t forget their roots: Ukrainian folk motifs often creep into Syndicate’s clothes.
What they write about themselves:
"Syndicate draws inspiration from Ukrainian folklore, Scandinavian minimalism and American heritage as a fusion of multiple cultures. Collaborating with renowned artists, illustrators and designers allows Syndicate to interpret street style in a unique manner."
Shorts - 3730 rubles, T-shirt - 2490 rubles, sweatshirt - 3450 rubles.
CODE RED
What you need to know about them:A brand born under the wing of the magazine of the same name about graffiti and street art. Appropriate clothing: discreet, comfortable, adapted to Russian streets and temperatures.
What they write about themselves:
“In 2015, the CODE RED brand turned 10 years old. During this time, we have never deviated from our main ideological guideline - to produce honest and high-quality streetwear only in Russia.” 
Pants - 2600 rubles, Panama - 1700 rubles, bag for small items - 900 rubles, T-shirt - 1200 rubles, vest - 5500 rubles, backpack - 2500 rubles.
With the advent of the iPhone, manufacturers mobile phones began to lose customers, revenue and former greatness. Chinese technology giants decided to take advantage of the situation and began buying up well-known Western unprofitable companies, to increase their shares in foreign markets, playing on nostalgia. The Secret looks back at Western phone brands that have fallen into Asian hands.
Nokia
Finnish Nokia has gone from a small manufacturer of boots and toilet paper to a tech giant. In 2007, the company occupied more than 50% of the total mobile phone market. Today she is not even in the top ten. In 2013, the American Microsoft bought the brand for $7 billion, and then virtually completely destroyed it. In 2015, unprofitable Nokia Devices and Services was closed and employees were laid off.
Previously, Microsoft began releasing tablets and new models of Nokia phones and tried to revive the brand. But it was not possible to surpass Apple gadgets technologically.
Last year the brand partially returned to the Finns. It was acquired by the Finnish startup HMD Global Oy and FIH Mobile from China for only $350 million. Now they are making remakes of the iconic Nokia 3310 model and devices for monitoring weight and blood pressure.
Motorola
Motorola's popularity peaked in 2005 and 2006, when it sold more than 50 million of its ultra-thin and lightweight Razr flip phones. In 2007, the company's revenue from the sale of mobile phones amounted to about $18 billion. After Apple's telephone debut, Motorola's advantages in the eyes of users faded, and the company was acquired by Google. The corporation had no intention of returning Motorola's lost positions. In the spring of 2012, Google greatly overpaid, paying $13 billion for an unprofitable brand for the sake of patents.
Google failed to develop its own direction based on Motorola’s inventions, and in January 2014 it resold the depleted portfolio to Lenovo. The latter paid more than $1 billion for Motorola. Another $1.5 billion was spread over quarterly payments over three years. Thus, the brand will finally become Chinese only by the end of this year.
The merger was painful. Lenovo has cut at least 2,000 jobs in the US. And Motorola's telephone business, which occupied third place in the list of leading smart manufacturers in 2014, dropped to eighth place. In the near future, Lenovo plans to release nine models under the Moto brand.
Philips
The huge Dutch consumer electronics corporation Philips has long been taken into small pieces. The inventor of cassettes, CDs, DVDs, Blu-ray discs now independently produces only razors, light bulbs and medical equipment.
Since 2007, Philips' mobile division has been owned by CEC (China Electronics Corporation). The company abandoned it, unable to withstand pressure from Asian players. Even before the deal was closed, the Dutch annually reduced funding for developments in the field mobile communications. On the eve of the sale, in the first quarter of 2007, profits fell from 100 million euros to 55 million compared to the same period in 2006. Now Philips continues to make mobile devices and, in addition, produces futuristic-looking landline phone models, such as the Philips Mira.
BlackBerry
Before the release of the first iPhone, Canadian BlackBerry was the leader among smartphones. The popularity of Apple and Samsung, failures in the operation of sold phones led the company to multi-billion dollar losses and the disposal of unsold goods. In the third quarter of 2013, the loss was $4.4 billion, and revenue decreased by 56%.
To compete with the emerging strong competitors, BlackBerry released touch models, abandoning the main feature - the PC keyboard under the screen. Users did not like the inconvenient interface, and most of the products were returned to stores.
BlackBerry tried to sell itself to the Chinese twice. The first time a deal with Lenovo Group was banned by Canadian authorities: smartphones that were reliable and protected by a special code from surveillance and wiretapping were national pride. They were used by the top officials of some states, for example, British Queen Elizabeth II, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.
Having received a government refusal, BlackBerry tried to save the company on its own: they developed a dozen new product lines and fired about 40% of the staff. But the situation was completely hopeless. And in December last year, BlackBerry absorbed one of the world's largest manufacturers of televisions, air conditioners, washing machines and refrigerators - the Chinese TCL.
In the Western model, there are several types of brands.
Related brands are product names that contain the name of the manufacturing company. For example, the Heinz company produces “Heinz Tomato Ketchup”, Wrigley - chewing gum Wrigley's Spearmint, Nestle - Nestle Classic chocolate.
As an option for related brands, an “umbrella” brand is used. In this case, the emphasis is often on promoting the corporate brand and consolidating it in the minds of the consumer as a guarantee of quality. Advertising for a company's products displays its logo. This is done, for example, by Danone (regardless of whether they advertise “Magic” yogurt or Danissimo curd) or Schwarzkopf & Henkel Cosmetics (Schauma shampoo or Palette hair dye). In the early 90s, at the end of commercials for various Procter & Gamble products, its golden logo and titles appeared: “P&G products.” An umbrella brand supports a company's products while allowing it to maintain its own identity.
Individual brands are independent names of products. A classic example of this approach to branding is Unilever. All types of its products have their own names - Rama margarine, Lipton tea, the Flowers of Russia cosmetic line, etc., and most consumers do not even suspect that such a variety of products belong to one company.
Some companies call individual product lines brands. For example, Johnson & Johnson Health Care Products sells a series of children's hygiene products under the Johnson's Baby brand, and a hair and skin care line for adults under the pH5.5 brand.
Sometimes manufacturers share similar products from different price categories in this way. In particular, the L’Oreal company, under the brand of the same name, sells cosmetical tools, aimed at women who have achieved success in life and attach importance to their image. And cosmetics under the Maybelline brand, also owned by L’Oreal, are positioned in a cheaper price niche and are aimed at young girls.
Largest number brands are found in the so-called “fast consumer goods companies” (FCG companies). Transnational giants like Procter&Gamble or Unilever have several dozen of them.
In the Western understanding, a brand is an independent “combat unit” with its own established positive qualities and a circle of buyers. Accordingly advertising campaign(especially for fast consumer goods manufacturers) can be based on one theme for years: “Blend-a-Med - better protection there is no cure for tooth decay”, “M&M’s - milk chocolate, melts in your mouth, not in your hands.”
Thus, from year to year, customer loyalty to the brand is formed, the level of product recognition increases, allowing the buyer to distinguish products under a certain brand from many others.
Working with brands in Japan.
In Japan, the system of working with brands is completely different. Historically, after the active development of the market in the 50-60s, when price was the main factor in choosing a product, Japanese buyers began to be sensitive to the quality of products. And it was guaranteed primarily by large manufacturing companies that invested money in scientific developments. The Western brand system, when the buyer often did not know which company produced a particular product, was completely unsuitable for Japan in the 60s, because for most Japanese, quality was associated with the size of the company. Thus, Japan has developed its own unique brand management system.
The company name (Sony, Panasonic), already well known to the buyer and guaranteeing the quality of the product, is like an “umbrella” for sub-brands that separate product lines (Sony Walkman - players, Sony Trinitron - TVs). Thus, initially, historically in Japan, brands carry much less meaning for consumers than the name of the company. Accordingly, Japanese companies are much more likely to place their corporate logo in television commercials and print advertisements.
According to research by one of the world's largest Japanese advertising agencies, Dentsu, 82% of commercials shown in prime time on Japanese television include the manufacturer's logo. The share of companies that place their logo in print advertising is even higher - 83.6%.
The main value for Japanese companies is a high corporate image, and not the image of individual brands. Therefore, their attitude towards brands is fundamentally different from the Western one.