jkerouac

Gumshoe's Intuition:

Spotting Counterfeits

At Port of Antwerp

Low-Tech Belgian Inspector

Has Many Good Catches;

He Knows Smell of Chanel

By JOHN W. MILLER

December 14, 2006; Page A1

ANTWERP, Belgium -- From his perch at the North Sea port of Antwerp, Chris De Buysscher can look at thousands of 40-foot container units and pick out those most likely to contain fake Nikes, Marlboros or Dior jackets.

When he's off work, the 51-year-old Belgian can spot a knockoff Louis Vuitton bag from across a crowded, smoke-filled room.

Mr. De Buysscher is widely regarded among his peers as the best counterfeit-goods inspector in the world. "He's a genius, plain and simple," says Christophe Zimmermann, director of the anticounterfeiting unit at the World Customs Organization, an intergovernmental voluntary association that coordinates among the world's 170 customs agencies.

The global boom in counterfeit goods has Mr. De Buysscher very busy. In the past two years, tiny Belgium has seized about 40 million counterfeit items, the most taken by any nation in the European Union. And about 90% of the Belgian seizures came from Mr. De Buysscher's three-person team policing the 22 miles of Antwerp docks.

Mr. De Buysscher is the main attraction of a WCO training program. He has made presentations in the Philippines, Morocco, Senegal, China, Croatia, Hungary and Algeria. Next year, he plans trips to Japan and Mexico. "In the morning, we give theoretical classes," says Mr. Zimmermann. "In the afternoon, Chris shows what he can do."

His skills are a low-tech blend of old-fashioned gumshoe detective work and intuition. On a recent trip to Algeria, Mr. De Buysscher singled out a shipping container from China for checking at the port of Oran. It was supposed to contain shoes -- and it did -- fake Nikes.

On the road, he and Mr. Zimmermann spend evenings and nights out, indulging in their favorite spectator sport: spotting counterfeit goods in restaurants and bars. What was fake in Algeria? "Absolutely everything," says Mr. De Buysscher. "People in Africa want Dolce & Gabbana, too."

Antwerp recruited Mr. De Buysscher to its new counterfeit-goods team a dozen years ago. Almost everything in international commerce is shipped in 20-foot to 40-foot units, containers that can be easily transferred within ports, then mounted on ship, truck or train. The challenge is to find out which ones hide counterfeits. The first years were hard. Mr. De Buysscher seized only 15 to 20 containers. This year, he's at 106 -- and counting.

At a time when ports are hiring mathematicians to do sophisticated risk analysis and installing programs and X-ray machines to keep up with the tsunami of knockoffs, Mr. De Buysscher is old school. He relentlessly checks thousands of bills of lading for subtle slip-ups. The problem with computers, he says, is that counterfeiters are always a step ahead. "They're working on giving me a computer program to work with," he says. "I don't need it." In other ports, computers do this work. Operators plug in data such as origin, type of good and shipping lane, and use an algorithm to calculate the likelihood that a box will contain counterfeit goods. Customs officers don't necessarily read the bills of lading with their own eyes.

SUSPICIOUS TRADE

Every day, Antwerp customs agent Chris De Buysscher carefully checks hundreds of bills of handling. He looks for telltale clues -- like misspellings, unknown recipients or "prepaid freight," a common smugglers's gambit -- to determine whether a container box is worth opening or not. See sample bills.1 His office and home are museums displaying choice counterfeit junk. It's a hobby many customs agents have. Recent catches include a Frosted Flakes mug, fake vodka labels and a Chinese Angelina Jolie doll from one of her "Tomb Raider" movies.

Part of his expertise comes from knowing brand-name goods. He visits outlet malls to study the products of Nike and Oscar de la Renta. He knows how things are packed in certain countries. Boxes from India, for instance, usually have red rims. "If one of those says 'Made in USA,' there's a problem," he says.

He's also up on fashion and can recognize 10 perfumes by nose alone, he says. "Chanel, Dior and Yves Saint Laurent smells are trademarked, just like the bottles they're in."

A container billed as dark tea from Ningbo, China, that had passed through Singapore recently raised several flags. "Boats from China usually go through Hong Kong," he says. "Also, everybody knows the Indians make dark tea and the Chinese make green tea." Inside were nine million fake Marlboros.

Roughly half the container boxes that Mr. De Buysscher opens contain fakes. "An astonishing ratio," says Mr. Zimmermann. An inspector needs to have a high batting average because there are so many boxes coming through and nobody could check them all. The port of Antwerp usually takes in more than 15,000 containers a day. Customs officials have the resources to check less than 0.5% of them. Opening and unloading a container can cost up to $3,000 in labor and other costs.

Fatalistic customs officials admit that despite their efforts, a lot of counterfeit goods get through. "We're overwhelmed," says Mr. De Buysscher. Playing the odds, Antwerp anticounterfeit agents don't bother to check boats coming from North America.

The need for Mr. De Buysscher's skills is growing. There are 400 million container boxes in the world, and the number is growing by 9% a year. The growth of the $500 billion counterfeit goods industry is one of the biggest economic challenges facing European and American companies as they relocate production to Asia. "This is nothing short of an economic crisis," says EU trade commissioner Peter Mandelson.

China, the source of almost two-thirds of all counterfeit goods seized in the EU, has agreed to crack down on counterfeiters. But WCO officials say progress is slow. Pirates are branching out beyond shirts and CDs to cargo such as auto parts and prescription drugs. "Losing the battle against counterfeit goods could cost human lives," says Michel Danet, secretary-general of the WCO.

One afternoon recently, Mr. De Buysscher read the paperwork for a box on the 2,500-container ship Wan Hai 312 that was labeled "women's coat." Several elements raised a bushy eyebrow. First, all freight was prepaid, a common smugglers' move to get goods through a port quickly. The bill of lading didn't include a brand name, nor did it contain an official port of origin number in the top right-hand corner.

He ordered the box impounded. The next day, he received a panicked fax from the importer, a Chinese man in Paris. "There has been a mistake, please ship back to China," he wrote.

Mr. De Buysscher didn't do that. When he opened the box, he took out a jacket and read the label. It said "Ice-Dior." He pulled the fake fur off the hood. "Dior wouldn't make this," he sniffed.

Mr. De Buysscher called Daniel De Jaeger, a Brussels lawyer who handles hundreds of cases a year for Dior. Mr. De Jaeger filed a complaint with Belgian customs to prevent delivery of the shipment. Dior pays to destroy counterfeit goods, at a cost of between $6,600 and $13,200 a year. "We can't go to China to catch counterfeiters," says Mr. De Jaeger, "so we have to get them when they cross our borders."

To modify the day and date, I first set the time to about 4:30. This has been advised in a number of threads previously. After I set the day and date, I then reset the time. Try this. I hope this works for you, or that there is another relatively simple fix.

RT,

The Memovox is a quartz, correct? I love the watch but don't think I want a quartz, at least one with a second hand.

I have a very attractive grey dial two-tone Seiko quartz with an alarm, but the alarm stopped working within a year. Actually I haven't worn it in ab. five years. It's smaller (diameter and thickness) and lighter than any of my reps, so today it feels cheap in comparison to my reps. I love the Memovox, but can probably do without the alarm, and would really prefer an automatic or manual.

By the way, in answer to the original question, I started out ambivalent about the Inge, as well as Pams, but the Inge and my 192 are two of my very favorites. I wouldn't call them impulse purchases, exactly, but my strong attraction definitely built slowly -- before I had them in hand, mind you. As soon as I received each of them, I knew they were the real deal.

I strive to wear one watch for the entire work-week, but sometimes I'll swtich off mid-week. On the weekend I'll switch off daily, or a couple of times daily.

I'm in. The only problem that I see (sic) is that there are one hell of a lot more people with bodies that I care not to see than ones as in the sample pictures. How can we be sure that this isn't a classic case of bait and switch?

Thanks, guys. Excellent suggestions.

The Mikimoto Web site had a couple of pendants that would be fantastic, but at $2k or so. A quick search shows that several of the ADs that I planned to visit carry the Mikimoto product lines, so they are certain to have additional options to complicate my search.

There are also at least two stores here that might buy and customize their own pearl necklaces, as Craytonic suggests.

It would take some convincing/serious education to get me to increase the pearl budget that high, but I have the next two weeks to complete my search.

The other option is to hold off until we are in the South Seas ourselves!

Thanks again, gentlemen, and best wishes for your holidays.

I would be in as well. Thank you very much for your work on this.

I'd like to buy my wife a pearl pendant necklace for Christmas. Needless to say, she has a variety of necklaces for special occasions and every day, including a very expensive traditional pearl strand that used to belong to my mother. But she doesn't have a black pearl pendant, and I think this is a look that would work well for her both during the week in the office, and for special occasions.

A local high-end AD featured a very nice black pearl pendant in their Christmas catalog, and I plan to visit them and a couple of others over the next week to see what they have in person.

But I also decided to check out the on-line dealers. Blue Nile is one of the best known on-line jewelry dealers, so I started with them. Then I did a search and checked out a few dealers that popped up in the search results. I then went to Amazon and found a place called americanpearl.com. They seem to have the broadest selection and prices. In particular, I thought Blue Nile seemed to offer better value for the dollar than the AD, but AmericanPearl.com seemed to have better value (and selection) for the dollar than Blue Nile.

Has anyone here dealt with American Pearl?

Are there any other dealers that you would recommend? And do you have any other suggestions?

By the way, these are the leading contenders in my search:

http://www.americanpearl.com/ro66004732262.html

http://www.americanpearl.com/ro66004852262.html

She's a looker, no doubt. I have some questions about the dial details. But either way, I'll keep my reliable Eta-based version and pass on this Asian-based chrono version. If that Lello Ingy datewheel ever comes to be, all the better.

Same here. There are enough stunning chronos that already tempt me. The ETA Ingenieur in my collection won't be bumped by the chrono.

Display is nice-- terrific even. But doesn't a generic watch box do the trick for this? Why is a box that looks like the authentic Rollie or Omega box hold a fascination?

(Truth in advertising: the only display box I own is an "authentic" RWG I commemorative box... and it is a very nice box.)

Pardon my ignorance, but why do people desire and pay good money to own a genuine (or faux genuine)box and papers for their reps?

In some cases it seems to me that people intend to palm their reps off as genuines.

But if that is not the case, then what is the motivation? You can't wear the box, let alone the papers. And even if I were showing a watch off, it would not involve the box or any papers.

So please enlighten me.

I was thinking about buying this rep from Trusty as a well deserved christmas present to myself. The

watch has a working GMT hand rather embarassingly I don't actually know what a working GMT hand does

can anyone help me out here?

Also has anyone bought this watch and has an opinion on it. Thanks for any help.

GMT feature allows you to track a second time zone -- GMT hands usually circle the dial once every 24 hours. I live on the US West coast so I set the GMT hand on my Seamaster to indicate what time it is by my brother in England. I've also used it when travelling as an instant reminder of what time it is back in the states.

As someone else over there said, if this baby receives the Thomasng seal of approval, I'll be among the people lining up to put their money down.

If you have a different computer (your wife's perhaps?) try that.

Another thing that happens sometimes, particularly on corporate servers, is that something called the DNS tables get corrupted. These are essentially address books that link an http address to the numerical IP address.

To try and fix this, open a command prompt window and type:

ipconfig /flushdns

click Enter (that is, on the keyboard)

Then type:

ipconfig /renewdns

click Enter again.

See if that helps

Can we nominate this as the "Feel Good About Your Fellow Forum Members Post of the Month"????

I've earned my W and excel at the I, but still have a long way to go to earn the S.

And I thought this thread was going to reexamine some Beatles conspiracy theories:

Notice that Paul isn't wearing any boots. And could the name Carl be an homage to Carl Perkins? Coincidence? I think not.

Have faith. Tracking service is not always reliable. Fortunately our dealers are.

My wife doesn't call me "Grinch Boy" for nothing.

She even bought me a button that reads "Just say Bah!"

But I suppose if I down enough Christmas libations I can bring myself to get into the holiday spirit.

Merry Christmas, Admin, and thanks for all of your work. I just purchased five lottery tickets...before even looking to see what the prizes might be. The PO Chrono could really put me in the holiday mood!!

One warning, though. If the decorations stay up past Jan. 1 you are going to have some very concerned members.

Also, as long as I am on the subject of low-hanging fruit (great reps that could be created based on existing models), let's not forget these variations on the IWC Portugese that should be relatively easy to deliver:

I have heard a lot of interest in any of these.

It's often interesting to see what pops up in the "Similar Topics" section below RWG threads. In this particular case the top item is "Inge Wrist Shots." Am I getting old, or are those Inge pics a lot hotter than Britney uncovered?

This is probably a boring (although achievable) option when so many less common choices are being offered -- a really good rep of the white dial Seamaster. People who have seen this watch at their AD know that the picture doesn't do the textured white on white dial justice. And the lume is white, not the puky green that reps of this watch are plagued with.

And please, no more Rolexes.

I'm surprised there has been no mention of JLC in this thread.

Here are two candidates:

Hundreds of years ago there were only a fraction as many people on earth as there are today. Yet wealth was concentrated in far fewer hands.

Today there are billions more people on earth, yet there is wealth not just for the aristocracy and upper class, but for the masses of the middle class as well. And in many places it could be argued that the lower class have as much or more wealth than the bourgeoisie of previous ages. Plus, I would argue that in the past only a handful of countries participated in wealth. Today, many more countries have large middle classes as well.

I seem to recall from a thread a few months ago that there are quite a few economics degree types on the board. I wish they would chime in to lend their knowledge to this little debate.

You can't 'create wealth'. It's a myth.

Just curious, do you not think the introduction of the personal computer -- or the automobile or airplane or watch -- created wealth? How about inventions that increased agricultural output or reduced disease?