We’ve seen fake Apple stores, but now a fake Ikea store has been spotted in China’s southwestern city, Kunming.
Five fake Apple stores were recently discovered in Kunming, and now a four storey Ikea copycat store has sprung up, calling itself 11 Furniture.
The store is almost exactly the same as Ikea, with the same blue and yellow colour scheme, furniture displays and cafeteria. Swedish meatballs are however not on the menu, with Chinese-style braised minced pork and eggs taking precedence.
The Stockholm furniture giant said today that it would look into the alleged counterfeit store.
Fake Apple store discovered by blogger in China
A statement from the company said: “Inter Ikea Systems … the owner of the Ikea concept, sees it as very important to protect the intellectual property rights."
Camilla Meiby, an Ikea spokesperson, said that the store was very similar to a “real” Ikea. “I don't know about the furniture it sells but the concept in itself was very much alike.”
This represents a new era of piracy in China, that’s a step further from mass produced fake designer handbags, DVDs and sports clothing. Now, entire brands and retail concepts are being pirated.
Retail analyst with Booz & Co, Adam Xu, said: “This is a new phenomenon. Typically there are a lot of fake products, now we see more fakes in the service aspect in terms of [faking] the retail formats.”
There are nine Ikea stores in China and customers have noticed differences between 11 Furniture and real thing.
Kunming resident Xiao Lee said: “I thought of shipping their products from the real Ikea store by cargo, but I thought that would be too troublesome so I came here.
“At the real Ikea, the layout is much neater and the decorations are laid out properly, you really can't compare them.”
