Rep fashion: the growing counterfeit streetwear community

Fashion is an undemocratic system, it’s present because some people can wear what others can’t afford and it is this disparity that propels the trend cycles, famous brands, and popular sought-after items that are hard to get makes the fashion industry exciting.

For a long time, the difference between streetwear and high was very noticeable

Designers from Paris and Italy used to create clothing for an audience that wanted luxury tailoring, while the other brands at grassroots levels made cool and realistic clothes for younger and hip audiences.

The advent of artistic directors such as Vetements’ Demna Gvasalia and Off White’s Virgil Abloh who were culturally more artistic triggered the uprising of a new genre touted as “luxury” streetwear for the fashion shows, with their designer sweatpants and hoodies.

Although fashion journalists around the world applauded the innovation by the designers, the consumers of original fashion suffered due to the meteoric rise of the streetwear trend.

Nowadays, if you want to buy the latest hoodies or sweatpants from a Palace collection or Supreme drop, you’ll need extremely quick hands or a very deep pocket, because of the sheer number of people waiting to get their hands on the latest trends.

At the same time, with the coming of online shopping, people use bots and servers to get their hands on the latest pieces.

The problem with this system is that somebody will always lose

Therefore, people now vary of spending their hard-earned dollars on resells and originals that are very expensive, and are now turning to the very rapidly growing market of cheaper replicas. This wave of owning cheap replicas made fashion more accessible to people.

So is this questionable legally? Yes. But people love the alternatives they have for high-end, unattainable clothing.

For example, a replica hoodie with a Supreme box logo that resembles the original in almost all aspects will cost you significantly less than the retail price.

Supreme is not the only victim of the counterfeiters. Inch to inch remakes of brands like Fear of God, Off-white, BAPE, and Yeezy items can easily be bought from warehouses in China and are shipped to almost all the places around the world.

So the question is what is responsible for this rapid increase in replica fashion and who should be responsible for this?

Effects of counterfeit fashion on young consumers

Although the millennials get a bad rep for being more prone to overspending and contracting debts, the GenZ is interested in striking a better deal and spending less.

Research conducted on the new era of consumers shows that their shopping choices are influenced by the content they view online. In the year 2021, more than 45% percent of the consumers are GenZ and have played an important role in pushing the replica industry’s popularity among the masses.

Online channels and E-commerce offer plenty of choices, now, it’s easy to see why the new generation goes for fake products. Spending more time with a screen than any other generation finding the replica of their favorite clothes is not a challenge.

Some social media pages, groups, videos, and websites make the process of finding a replica easier. This is the reason why reselling apps like Depop are gaining popularity among people.

Instant messaging apps change the way clients communicate with counterfeiters. Directly communicating with the seller increases the overall customer experience and is a good way for the supplier to promote their goods.

The stigma associated with buying counterfeit products is very low among the younger generation because the price is the most important deciding factor. The original is too expensive.

In surveys conducted among younger audiences, more than 95% of the respondents stated that they would buy the fake product if it was cheaper. The trend has now changed from style to flaunting an affordable style, and now there are plenty of options to buy vogue products without going broke.

These researchers also show that if the younger consumer is satisfied, they are more likely to influence their family and friends to purchase the fake one, and now since the quality of fakes is also increasing, more and more people are choosing counterfeit products.

In surveys conducted among people who purchase from counterfeit factories shed light on the consumer rationale behind the purchases. One particular respondent said he didn’t feel any shame because it just looked very good.

FashionRep and China Haul

FashionRep is a subreddit that is made to meet the needs of the growing counterfeit streetwear market. This forum is a judgement -free zone, where people can share their mutual love for high-quality counterfeit clothing.

The members can be supportive and friendly. They mutually help each other in finding the right seller and websites to buy goods. Extensive comparisons in areas like details, finishes, stitches, and logos between the originals and replica are also conducted, and also share budgeting tips.

The reason for this meteoric rise is due to the 3 important factors like Pricing, demand, and availability. Fashion rep browsers also believe that bots and resellers are the major problems. Moderators of the FashioReps have witnessed an increase in traffic on their board and believe that the popular idea of “reps diluting exclusivity” is a myth.

There is also China Haul, which takes Reddit replica finds and lists them. It makes it even easier to browse reps categorized in brands and price.

The most popular rep stores

• 159sir
• 3125tiger
• cookoff
• Feiyu8698
• Gman club
• Han Solo
• king shark
• kk homme
• Ly factory
• nina
• pirit power
• reondistrict
• robber studio
• sup online store
• teenage club
• top stoney
• top acney
• topmoncler
• FasUCUT
• umkao
• UNHS
• union kingdom
• vêtements shop

Producers and Sellers also play a key role

For communities like FashionReps to continue, there should be providers and sellers to give them. There are many Chinese factories in China that produce extremely similar replicas and are one of the major distribution and manufacturing channels.

The demand for replica products is increasing because of the common inaccessibility of the products and at the same time the desire to have them.However, there is an acute shortage of raw materials to meet the needs of the consumers.

So to conclude, the main reason why the obsession with the streetwear culture was because streetwear was popularized, and the idea of unattainability spread by the top brands make everyone want to own it, but in reality, very few can do that. It is to fill this gap, the counterfeit market emerged and is now growing exponentially.