Brand Guide: what every company needs to fight counterfeiters

If there is one thing that we can all agree on about the trade of counterfeit and pirated goods, it is that it continues to increase at an alarming rate. Such goods can cause significant financial losses for Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) holders and legitimate businesses. Moreover, it can undermine a company’s critical competitive advantage in innovation and pose significant risks to consumer health and safety with unsafe copycat products. How can a company battle this epidemic of fraudulence by counterfeiters? One simple step towards this ongoing fight is to create a brand guide.

What is a brand guide?

It is an inexpensive yet very effective tool to help protect your brand from counterfeit and pirating activity. 

The brand guide is assembled internally by the company’s legal department (intellectual property group) and marketing. This assists customs authorities in properly distinguishing authentic from fake goods.

These guides can be distributed during customs training sessions and workshops.

These are overviews of all IPRs. It can provide general information about the product and its related packaging. It also provides very detailed points on what to look for when examining goods crossing a border. The guide leads the reader through every detail and design element of the product and packaging. It provides a side by side comparison to a non-authentic version. It is pertinent to include information about logo placement and internal and external labels as this is also useful for the authorities. All information regarding the methods and routes of transportation can be added as helpful supplemental information.

With the assistance of specialized experts with access to a network of customs authorities, guides are to be disseminated to all stakeholders who assist in protecting IPR abroad. These include local customs authorities, enforcement agencies and border officials. If desirable markets include countries with language and cultural differences, take extra steps to adapt the guide to be effective and country-specific. Seek the advice of a local counterfeit expert.

The guides are often made in the form of a booklet or sometimes a flash drive. Some extra tools, such as a polarized lens or a UV lamp, can be included.

Why create a brand guide?

Taking every measure possible to protect your IPRs is not only going to provide a company with long term cost savings in battling infringers and pirates. It also protects your brand equity and goodwill from lower-quality copycats. On a simple strategic level, developing a brand guide requires a deep analysis of your product and packaging. This may, in some cases, also lead you to discover additional ways to protect your brand. The creation of the brand guide also helps identify the most important elements to protect through various IPRs.

How does it work once in the field?

Once a Customs Application for Action (AFA) has been filed in the EU and/or its Member States, it is of the utmost importance to also educate and make the authorities aware of your IPRs and products. The main purpose of the AFA is to request customs to detain goods found to be suspected of infringing one’s IP rights. While the AFA is essential to have on file proactively, it is not enough! The customs authorities will need to know much more about your brand or copyright to select and stop shipments. That is where the guide is key. Moreover, it is important to know that customs authorities can pre-select shipments in their database. The more information they have on hand the better as they can predetermine if select shipments need to be verified.

Is it risky to document your brand’s key elements?

A brand guide clearly outlines what a custom agent should look for in counterfeit and pirated goods. The information included in a brand guide can contain sensitive information. However, the pros outweigh the cons in their creation. The guides will not only be used and distributed because of the training sessions and workshops with authorities but also will provide a ‘feedback loop’ from custom authorities. This feedback reveals what the counterfeiters and pirates are doing to try and overcome seizures and where the products are coming from. Furthermore, all authorities are committed to not divulging this information to third parties. The bottom line is that counterfeiters are here to stay. IPR owners must take every action possible to protect their IPRs. In other words, if you do not have a guide, it is time to take action and develop one.

For any questions you may have concerning brand guides contact brandprotection@gevers.eu.