Another brand has taken a swing at Shein over intellectual property concerns.
Brandy Melville‘s intellectual property servicer, Bastiat USA, has filed a lawsuit against Shein, alleging copyright infringement. The company states that Shein has infringed on one design copyright and four photograph copyrights.
“Shein did not simply copy a single design. Shein did not just copy multiple product designs. Instead, Shein copied multiple Brandy melville product designs and then displayed authentic Brandy Melville products and photographs on the Shein website,” Bastiat contends in the complaint.
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The company alleges that Shein “infringed the Eye Fabric Design by incorporating, or permitting others to incorporate, a substantially similar design into its products.” The complaint does not immediately make it clear whether the allegedly infringing product was sold directly by Shein or by a seller on its marketplace, but it does allege that “the marketplace is littered with gray market goods.”
Bastiat also surfaces Shein’s legal record; the company has seen intellectual property-related complaints from a slew of retailers and brands, including Dr. Martens, H&M, Ralph Lauren and others. Brandy Melville said Shein’s on-demand manufacturing process, which the e-tailer has said incorporates trend-focused data to create small batches of products, relies heavily on the work of others.
“What Shein really means by ‘data-driven approach’ and providing ‘offerings that resonate immediately’ is that it finds popular designs from popular designers and slavishly copies them, without regard to minor impediments such as intellectual property laws,” counsel for Bastiat said in the complaint. “Indeed, with billions in revenue pouring in each year, IP theft is simply a cost of doing business for Shein.”
Beyond its alleged infringement of the Eye Fabric Design, Bastiat states that Shein or its sellers used copyrighted product imagery to pedal copycat versions of Brandy Melville products.
“Not content just to copy Brandy Melville designs, Shein and its third-party sellers in the marketplace also markets the designs using the exact same photographs and images as those that appear on the brand’s website and social media and are marketed to consumers,” Bastiat wrote in the complaint.
While Bastiat does not indicate that any of these four products are copyrighted for design, the company attached the copyrights for the photography, which it contends Shein replicated or outright pulled from the Brandy Melville site. The products Shein allegedly sold by using these photographs were “marketed and sold at prices below those charged for Brandy Melville products,” which may have incentivized value-seeking consumers to purchase them.
Brandy Melville stated that, in allegedly infringing on its copyrights, Shein has negatively impacted the company’s reputation with customers because “the customer did not receive the authentic Brandy Melville good depicted. Instead, the customer received a cheaper, lower-quality Shein knockoff—i.e. a bait-and-switch.”
The brand has accused the fast-fashion e-tailer of copyright infringement, false designation of origin, unfair competition and contributory copyright infringement. Contributory infringement occurs when a person or entity had reason to know of infringement occurring and either facilitated it or overlooked it.
Brandy Melville has likely included this accusation because some of the copyright infringement issues spawn from listings created by third-party marketplace sellers on Shein. The Singapore-headquartered company does not manufacture or list marketplace items for sale itself.
Bastiat has asked a judge to preliminarily and permanently enjoin from Shein and its sellers from infringing its copyrights going forward. It also seeks an order “requiring the destruction of all of [Shein’s] infringing products and all marketing, advertising or promotional materials depicting [Shein’s] infringing products.” The company also seeks monetary damages; it estimates that the loss of profits it endured because of Shein’s alleged infringement exceeds $1 million, and it seeks “three times its actual damages or three times [Shein’s] profits, whichever is greater.”
Shein did not immediately return Sourcing Journal’s request for comment on the lawsuit.
