We've had increasing issues with scams lately, so we wanted to make sure our customers know where to find authentic Re-Mix, and what to do if you spot something that doesn't seem right to you.
In the past couple of months, we've had a website pretend to be us (they even linked to our social media and contact phone number from their fake website), we've seen people selling made-to-order shoes on Ebay using our photos, and we've had a company use our photos to buy ads on Facebook and Instagram and market to our customers, but have the shoes supposedly available at a price that's 90% off retail. In one of these cases, the seller took the image down when we contacted them. In the other two, it would mean launching an international legal battle we cannot afford, so we just have to hope our customers are savvy enough to recognize a scam, until the offenders get shut down, which does seem to happen eventually.
Here are some things to know:
1) carp-shop shoes are sold on this website (carp-shop.cz), at our brick and mortar store in Los Angeles, at a few special events, in Europe via http://remixshoes.eu, and in a handful of boutiques and shops around the world. The shops that stock our shoes only carry a few styles, so if you see a website that claims to sell everything we have at carp-shop.cz, that's a red flag. If you ever want to verify that a company is selling authentic carp-shop shoes, send us a message and we will be happy to confirm. You can also use tools like https://www.scamadviser.com/.
2) Others are allowed to copy our shoes. It's unfortunate, and we wish they would be more ethical and that our customers wouldn't support them, but there is not a lot of legal protection in fashion.
3) Other companies cannot use our photos, name, logo, copy, etc. without our permission. So if you see that they are doing so, the best thing you can do is report them. For example, if they are using our photos in a Facebook ad, you can report the ad as a scam or violation of intellectual property.
Usually, it's helpful if a lot of people make reports -- flagging a photo, advertisement, Facebook page, etc., or reporting a url to a website that reports on scam websites. If we report it, it only has so much effect, but if 100 people do, it will get taken down a lot faster!
If there's ever a questions, feel free to contact us and ask. We really do not want anyone to be ripped off.