21-24_Viewpoints.qxp_Grid 02/12/2024 20:23 Page 1
VIEWPOINTS
Copying Crisis Top: Emotional Rescue acknowledges the copying issue on its front cover advert on this edition of PG. Inset: The amount of plagiarism in our industry just has to stop.
Jo Wilson, founder of Dandelion Stationery “It’s very, very sad to see this happening – it’s just so disheartening.” Your suffering: “We were copied quite a few years ago by another small company in Derbyshire, literally just down the Above: Jo Wilson was able to provide road from us – we sent a Cease McDaniels Law with lots of examples of copied Dandelion designs on Temu for and Desist letter and it stopped. them to take action. More recently we have found hundreds of our cards for sale on Temu – these designs have been lifted from images online, directly copied and resold. We have gone through the process to report these issues to Temu, and the designs do get taken down – but only to pop up 24 hours later with another seller. We were lucky enough to be given some free initial help from a solicitor, but to be honest this was no more effective than us reporting the issue ourselves, as those designs reported by the solicitor also appeared back on sale within 48 hours.” Any signs of hope? “At the moment it doesn’t feel like there is light at the end of the tunnel. It is an incredibly time-consuming issue to be trawling through Temu almost daily, reporting 50+ designs at a time, see them get taken down, and then do the same thing a day later because the designs have reappeared. It is soul destroying. There seems to be simply no morals in the way Temu operates and simply no regulation.” Right: Jo Wilson enjoying happy times with Card Centre’s John Barratt (left) and Andrew Reid at PG Live in June.
The extent of the blatant copying of so many card publishers’ designs on the Temu online platform is truly shocking. Despite legal pressure from McDaniels Law and Thortful, and with the BBC and Government also alerted to the issue, the widespread design theft rages on. However, Temu is not the only guilty party on the copying front. PG confronts the sour taste of plagiarism in our greeting card sector.
Dean Morris, founder of Dean Morris Cards “Copying in the card sector is definitely more prevalent than it was even ten years ago. Is this because we’re all posting on social media now and the wonderful products our industry produces have large audiences and anybody thinks they can do the same? In the greeting card industry there are always going to be established themes and even phrases that are fair game for anyone to use because they are so ubiquitous. Show me a publisher that hasn’t done a card with ‘old enough to Top: Dean Morris’ smile belies his know better, young enough to xxx’ contempt for copiers. Above left: A fake card Dean Morris What is becoming more commonplace created to exercise some Temu demons. Above right: Just one example of a Temu though is simply copying the exact ripped off Dean Morris card. design of the card (but always in a much less considered way) or as is the case with Temu, just copying and pasting our designs onto theirs. There’s a special place in hell for people that do that.” Your suffering: “I have had my designs copied several times, from outfits in the UK and on Temu and Shein. If it’s a one off and especially if their interpretation of my design is so embarrassingly bad, I will do my best to take appropriate action to stop them. Sometimes it works, but sometimes I simply don’t have the time, energy or the need for that much negativity in my life. Many publishers are very small businesses and we simply don’t have the people or resources to counteract all these. This is especially the case with Temu and Shein where often as you stop one copy another will pop up straight after.” Any signs of hope? “Sadly, I don’t think there is. I’d be very surprised if Temu and Shein really care. They’ll just deny responsibility claiming they are unaware of what Hello GUIGUI (clearly a fan of Dean Morris Cards) in Haikou is doing.” PROGRESSIVE GREETINGS WORLDWIDE 21