Effects of Counterfeit Products on Luxury Brands

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Stage 1 Research Ethics Application Form
Section 1: Details of the Researcher and their Research
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Researcher details
First name Insert first name
Family name Insert surname
School/Faculty Faculty of Business & Law – School of Management (MET)
Students (including staff proposing
research on a course/programme)
Your SID Insert student identification number
Your course/programme title Masters of Business Administration
Name of your First Supervisor (for
PGR) or Supervisor (for UG and
Insert name of Supervisor
Research details
Title of your research project
N.B. For UG/PGT students, this is
not the title of your research
module
An investigation on the effects of counterfeit products on luxury
brands. A case study on Louis Vuitton.
Name and institutional affiliation of
any research collaborators
n/a

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Date of application Insert date
Start date of proposed research Insert date
Brief Project Summary (up to
700 words) Please summarise your
research in non-specialist language.
Please describe where relevant:
Methodology (please
describe what you plan to
do as opposed to providing
a background in your
chosen methodology)
Theoretical approaches
Research questions
Details of participant
population (recruitment,
inclusion and exclusion
criteria
Main purpose of the research is to achieve the objective of the
research i.e. An investigation on the effects of counterfeit products
on luxury brands.
Problem Statement - To determine the effects of
counterfeit products on luxury brands and potential solutions to
improve brand performance.
Counterfeiting is affecting the markets of luxury brands like
Louis Vuitton which is a luxury brand for products like bags for
males and females and it was founded in 1854 in Paris. It is the
illegal activity to counterfeit which is impacting profits of the large
companies. The counterfeits are attracting customers who purchase
the products for recognition and they want to express their class so
that they are accepted and get popular. The counterfeits of Louis
Vuitton are making the luxury products affordable to customers and
it is affecting the brand image.
The brand is getting affected because customers feel that the
quality of the products is decreased and it is available to anyone.
Their target segment is upper class customers who can afford
luxury products and purchase from the brands who have higher
prices and the best quality (Mothersbaugh and Hawkins, 2016). It is
affecting Louis Vuitton volume growth because they are investing
in increasing their popularity and wants to reduce the accessibility
of products to make it prestige and important for customers who are
purchasing it.
The customer relations with Louis Vuitton are affected
because customers are not getting attention and it is difficult to
make the difference between the original and counterfeit products.
The problem with counterfeit is they are reducing the prices to
increase sale, they are damaging the name of the brand, impacting
the long term relationship with customers (Bang, Joshi and Singh,
2016) the branding are spending time and money and making
strategies to increase the sales which is getting affected.
There are many solutions to counterfeit because they are
impacting Louis Vuitton and they should make customers get the
knowledge of the difference between original products and
counterfeits. They should give the global visibility to customers by
operating through online channels in many countries through their
official sites. It will increase the sales of products of Louis Vuitton
and they will control the marketing strategies. The demand and
supply can be monitored and the they can maximize profits
(Alqahtani and Gupta, 2017).
They should make the changes in products and services of
Louis Vuitton and make different strategies to increase the sales of
products which will make it difficult and costly for counterfeits.
The brand will be effective in understanding the needs of customer
better than counterfeits so they should make strategies which
cannot be achieved by counterfeits. The customers can be made
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informed and they should understand the risks on buying from the
stores which are not selling original products (Saif, 2015). The
brand can give prize to customers who will inform them the sellers
and informs the benefits of original brands. The customers should
be given benefits with their products like membership cards, gifts,
etc. which will help them in increasing trust and maintaining long
term relationship with customers which will help in increasing
profits of the organisation.
A case study on Louis Vuitton. In the Introduction section of the
research information highlights the background about the topic of
the study and also reason for selecting the same topic to conduct
the study. To achieve the objective of research Literature review
has been done. Literature review used to describe the point of view
of different author regarding the topic of the research. After that
study highlights the methodology in which researcher has taken
help of Qualitative research. Inductive approach and interpretivism
philosophy to find out the outcome of the research. For conducting
the research, the researcher will make use of the secondary data.
The major reason underlying this fact is that the secondary research
includes the analysis of the published data and sources and these
have been already used in some other researches as well. This
methodology has helped the researcher in achieving the objective
of the research in the better and efficient way. To find out the
outcome of the study, researcher has evaluated the outcome of the
survey and linked it with the Secondary data to find out the solution
of the question, to determine the effects of counterfeit products on
luxury brands and potential solutions to improve brand
performance. Looking at the outcome of the research it can be said
that objective of the research had been achieved significantly.
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Please explain the potential value
of your research to society and/or
the economy and its potential to
improve knowledge and
understanding.
This research will bring the variety of the value for the society, as
with the help of this research society will able to find out the
solution of the trending issue in the society. Loius Vuitton
management in the market will find it easy to make the decision in
the organization, as outcome of the research will help the Loius in
enhancing the level of the planning which generally used to take
place in the organization in a long run. This research has also
helped the researcher in improving the level of knowledge about
the topic of the study and the way study can be carried out. This
will ultimately help the researcher at the time of conducting any
such type of the research for same or the other client in the future.
This study will also prove very crucial for the other researcher in
the market as well. It was identified that these research will form a
suitable basis for them and on the basis of the same they can
conduct future research in the coming future. This research will
also contribute very positively toward the formation of the policy in
the organization. This will help organization in forming different
policy in the efficient way.
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