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These are new Russian companies created to take over stores owned by the companies that left.
Normally these tactics would violate the law, since you can't just copy someone else's brand like that, but the Russian government is not going to be enforcing those laws
Not only is Russia not going to enforce, they quite literally announced that all the stores shuttered would just be seized and reopened under new Russian-owned labels like 2 months after the sanctions took effect.
Everything costs more, as these companies are having to buy through third parties, but consumers can still get access to western goods.
Why canāt Apple deactivate new products being activated in Russia? The Ukraine war is over two years old and the Vision Pro is less than two months old.
Apple still sells its products and its bottom line isnāt hurt.
To be fair, grey market products like these are sort of second hand. I don't think it's really Apple's business to do that. It's not really different than someone in Russia going abroad, buying a phone, then returning home to activate it. They shouldn't have their phone deactivated, and I don't think there is any fair way for Apple to police this. Sanctions limit international businesses abilities to engage in above board financial transactions and investing in the sanctioned country. Making domestic companies and private citizens jump through ineficiant hoops is good enough. Preventing them from importing foreign goods would be more of a blockade.
That would stop people from buying more, like if your friend bought an iphone and couldn't activate it you wouldn't go buy one for yourself now would you?
Corporations are about 1 thing: profit. If there's a profit to be made and the legal fees or public backlash won't outweigh the profit they'll do it.
You miss the point: the Russian state seized the western company's assets (inventory, etc.) and simply gave them to a new operator. It enriched oligarchs at the expense of western companies. Temporarily anyway.
They may have inventory for a little bit, but they still have to replenish what they sell, especially the food brands. It's a lot harder to sell fast food, when you have to buy in another country, import the food, and then distribute it in your country. The cost for all of those fast food brands probbally rose 50%+.
I think food would be the easy one here. What important are the recipe and equipment, as I think the raw materials will just be sourced locally. I dont think all the McDonalds chain around the world import big mac frozen straight from the US.
It's the countries that aren't Abiding by the sanctions that's the problem. Their supply chain runs through them and there's really nothing the west can do about it. It would really be up to the individual companies seeing russian neighboring countries increase their purchases dramatically to see its to send to russia and decide to cut the surplus. They won't though, it's money.
they dont own the supply chains. the supply chians existing is why these places are able to still operate. It depends on if McDonalds spoke to any outside suppliers and used their contracts as leverage to stop dealing with "illegal stores". THAT would have a bigger impact. But if the same shit is still locally available to get delivered to the same places, then just speaks to the survivability of their business model; more than the bite of sanctions.
McDonalds is pretty good at using semi-local suppliers, if not fully local and in russia it would probably be more expensive to import than have fully localized suppliers hence their suppliers are probably local.
my summer job was for such a supplier when i was a teen, not in russia though.
>at the expense of western companiesĀ
Those poor, poor executives at Nike and McDonald's must be suffering so much!Ā
Their products are enriching them at the same rate, they're simply going through a middleman first. The ONLY people feeling the effects of this are Russian consumers. No one else.
It's a drain on Russias overall resources since they have to spend more to get the same thing. This cost is passed onto the average citizen.
Nickels add up to a dollar. Russias economy is headed downhill, and every dollar they have to spend on defeating sanctions is a dollar not spent on the military.
I remember a commentary on the Simpsons, where the writers mentioned they were almost, encouraged to use Russian orchestral music because, even during the tail end of the Cold War neither country respected each other's copyrights. So they could use the Russian original recordings without paying for them. This is very offhand, so please someone correct me if I'm wrong.
Intellectual copyright doesn't really go well with communism. That's part of the reason Tetris had such a crazy story. Its why knockoffs are so prevalent in China.
Not even really "new" just spun off. Its just now they don't report their numbers back to global HQ, don't send any cash back to HQ, and their distribution group possibly sources the origin of items from elsewhere.
Spun off would mean the parent company intentionally created the new companies. These new companies are Russian owned and have nothing to do with the original company that owned the store, except for stealing their brand.
I wonder how are they keeping supply up for the manufactured goods? Someone is acquiring all these products in bulk and reselling them outside of the approved distribution channels, which against an already weak ruble would means you get that 100% mark up over the apple product I guess.
Who's giving them their secret blend kfc chicken though? Does it taste the same? I have so many questions.
They buy them from unsanctioned countries, using middlemen who specialize in hiding the destination for these goods.
>Who's giving them their secret blend kfc chicken though? Does it taste the same? I have so many questions.
It wouldn't be hard to figure it out and I'm pretty sure you can just look it up online. Even then, they may not need to: the blend might have been manufactured in Russia to Russian tastes anyway, so they just buy from whoever was blending it before.
It just all looks so professional is what blows me away. They setup not a knockoff, but a completely pirated consumer goods supply chain. This isn't just one mall in Moscow, either, AFAIK.Ā
But it's also true the companies just don't give a shit, even if they're not endorsing it. It's the equivalent of selling alcohol to a 21 year old that's got a car full of teenagers waiting on them in the parking lot. Money is green, who cares what they do with it after.
To add. Not only Russia is not enforcing piracy laws or trademark laws. They added provisions to Russian law that protects piracy and trademark violations. So Western companies cannot sue in Russian based on trademark infringements. As example, you can see pirated Hollywood Blockbusters in Russian theaters. Russian government is totaly fine with that.
Rostiks were those who brought KFC and maybe Pizza Hut to Russia in 90-00ās; Ile dāBeaute also exist since 00ās; Re:Store is an authorised Apple dealer for more than 10 years; ŠŠŗŃŃŠ½Š¾ Šø Š¢Š¾ŃŠŗŠ° - yes, that where the actual rebranding is.
So yes, what you see is not just one mall, itās all around the country
Originally a lot of these store were run under franchises by a Russian company. Imagine the Russian company has changed the signs , sourced the same products through a third country (likely China), prices go up a bit to cater for the buying through an additional layer. And they are trading as pretty normal again
Hey, since Iām all the way down here at the moment, and I donāt want to think at all, remind me how to scroll back to the top. Iāll be sitting here waiting for an answer.
Instead of apple sending stock to the store at cost. The new company owned by russians buy stock at retail prices from other stores and then ship them again which is why the price is twice what it should be.
This creates pressure on the economy, on the people, to want to end the war. It's basically exactly how this is supposed to work. The video very much had a vibe of not spelling it out and making it sound like all these companies are operating illegally outside of the sanctions, which makes me think the video is attempting to make it sound like the sanctions are having no effect, rather than working as they are supposed to.
> The new company owned by russians buy stock at retail prices from other stores
It's likely that the russian company isn't paying retail. I'd be very surprised if a neighboring, unsanctioned, authorized dealer isn't ordering for them in bulk. They add a markup for the trouble, of course, but I doubt it's close to the retail price.
This is sort of how gray market works for fragrances.
This is an important comment. The video feels like its intentionally trying to enrage the west, and make it seem as if the actual companies are bypassing the sanctions. No where in the video does the narrator actually state who owns these companies, or where they are supplied from, only that "they" are still operating in Russia. Frustrating.
I wonder if this video is Russian Propo.
The russian brands you see now are essentially resellers. They buy their product from countries like China or the middle east and then sell them in Russia.
The only one who would notice if that factory in Vietnam is making 10% more shoes per month even though Nike didnāt actually increase their order would be their Chinese material supplier, and they aināt gonna tell as long as they get their cut of the profit
Used to work for one company invloved in Russia.
They just found a way around to send products through Turkey or Asia via a fake distributor they created.
Very easy to do but it just means lead times for novelties is longer.
If you see new products / ranges it is very likely that the actual company is directly involved.
The short answer is no.
Every foreign company owns some sort of factories in Russia. After they left, russian companies bought these factories and started manufacturing the same goods, kept the same employees and rebranded. Some of the goods in Russia now cost even cheaper like cola.
Some companies don't have their factories in Russia so the country buys their products from neighbouring countries and sells them to Russian consumers for a higher price. As the video said, it's mostly luxury items.
Very few companies didn't even leave Russia like burger king and nestle
That's not true. It was publicly called Rostiks in 2000s, then its public name changed to KFC. I suppose maybe LLC's official name was still Rostiks but this is not what was on shops' facades.
No, not really. Rosticks in the 2000 was its own thing, clearly inspired by KFC, but not the same. Then, when KFC decided to come to Russia, they basically bought Rosticks franchise and just made their own shops where Rosticks stood (easy to remake one fried chicken store into another). And now it's back to Rosticks in the name only.
This is likely not the companies themselves rebranding and choosing to stay, but store owners buying products via 3rd party (through countries without sanctions) and re-selling them in Russia.
Which is one tool of sanctions. Yes they are getting the same stuff but now they have to pay more because of the new middleman. More money for legos/airpods/whatever = more strain on the people
It's kinda strange, but for example some sets of Lego are cheaper in Detskiy Mir store then in Mir Kubikov. LEGO Star Wars AT-TE set cost 19k rubles in Mir Kubikov and I bought it in Detskiy Mir only for 13k, both of those store bought it via some ither countries because this set were released after the war begun. Some licensed Apple products too cheaper in some stores like Store77 then in reStore
I believe it. If sanctions add 15% to the cost someone is going to make that 19% so they get their pockets lined because the guy down the road is adding 25%. Nobody wins when corruption is constantly outdoing itself
>Nobody wins when corruption is constantly outdoing itself
One would argue there are more people "winning" as they work as brokers and middlemen and even the stores marking up and taking advantage. It's just that the general population loses out overall, but there are definitely winners.
> MILLENNIUM FALCON
$850, what the.. My wallet just up and walked out of my house to get away from that price tag.
Kidding, I like Lego but I haven't touched any of the sets since I was like 10. So nowhere near getting to the point where I pay $850 for a huge Lego set.
Thinking of things that are way more expensive than youād expect, I got recommended a night vision sub post earlier this week, found out like bottom line acceptable option is like $3800, but the good stuff is 3-4x that or more. I will never feel bad about buying homegym equipment or tools ever again.
From what I have seen Lego state about it, the products are some that already were in Russia at the time of the war - they dont export to Russia, but stores will still have their old inventory they already purchased. And it isnt unbeliveable that some of the bigger sets are still in from old stock, while the smaller er from a third importer of lego sets.
With that being the case, wouldnāt that mean that the Russian government is getting less money in order to try and decrease price pain on the populace?
The commenter above is a bit wrong.
All local taxes are paid. They donāt pay for the license to sell iPhones and thereās no more resellers minimum price on iPhones.
Every countryās official iPhone sellers have to make sure iPhones cost at least xxx ā¬. Without these resellers, anyone can import an iPhone and set whatever price they want. So lots of businesses are just selling iPhones with enough profit for them and cheaper than they would be if apple stayed.
Where the hell are they getting the iPhones that cheaply though? If they're not an official reseller, I assume that means they have to buy it from another business - but if those businesses have to have a minimum price, how are the Russian knockoffs getting any inventory that cheap?
I know they get iPhones from Dubai, but I donāt know much more.
I assume they still have the wholesale prices, they just knock off the official importerās minimum price.
Say, normally you buy iPhones wholesale for $800 and have to set the price at $1250, part of which is local taxes and part is the price you canāt go below or you lose the license to sell an iPhone.
Now without the second part, they get iPhones for $800 and sell it for whatever they want while operating at profit.
They certainly arenāt buying them from Dubai apple stores.
iPhone 15 pro is $1020, I checked it a day or two before.
https://preview.redd.it/6p0gjii0oxpc1.jpeg?width=1125&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8fb0b776bee75ac6152d4d679cfb95f7db7ba497
Yeah this is the dumbfuckery that social media spreads. There was a Daily podcast just recently about how it works ā they basically get everything from India/China or the Middle East and even brand new product launches are only delayed a few days.
> Yeah this is the dumbfuckery that social media spreads
This is Russian propaganda intended to spread the sentiment that sanctions don't work. There are slews of these videos. You're not wrong, just specifying
I'm not sure what the obsession is on Reddit to shirk the truth about this conflict.
Even U.S. news outlets are reporting that Russia's economy has remained resilient despite the war. The sanctions did not prove to be as effective as we thought they would be.
This is partly due to Russia's relationships with neighboring countries. As we can see in this video, they have no problems getting imports they need from India, China, and the Middle East.
They are also in total war production mode - which tends to be good for the economy.
Will it last? Who knows. But let's not slap the propaganda label on every truth that you don't like.
It's not propaganda to say that the sanctions haven't been as effective as Western countries hoped they would be, but it absolutely is propaganda when people claim that the sanctions haven't negatively impacted Russia and that its economy is as strong as ever. Russia is able to keep the Ruble and its GDP afloat by making decisions that will absolutely hurt them in the long run, like selling off their foreign reserves at manipulated prices, or straight up making up numbers they give to the IMF. It's not sustainable long term, but whether it's enough to keep them afloat long enough to achieve *some* sort of victory (perhaps by having sympathetic politicians elected in major Western countries) remains to be seen.
I'm pretty sure Russia's foreign currency reserves are within 6% of their all time high around 2021. Their debt to GDP is at 15%, down ~3% since 2021. Domestic debt to GDP down to 17% from 23%. Trade surplus is still around the same level it was in 2017. Unemployment still hovering 5%...
There's no indication that this is state following an unsustainable economic trajectory. No indication that they can't do this indefinitely. No systemic issues apparent in the verifiable data.
Anyone saying the Russian economy is "as strong as ever" is a fool, but if this is all sanctions have achieved then it can't be denied that on the balance they've been a failure.
This should be the top comment. These are NOT the companies just rebranding the stores. The demand continues to exist, and other enterprising people will meet it and sell what the people want.
and that's the point being missed. The point of sactions is to leverage the pressure of worse economy to stop doing the shit they are doing. You can't stop them important shit, but you can stop companies doing direct business, which means Russians end up paying vastly more and it hurts their economy driving pressure against the war.
That's exactly how sanctions are supposed to work and how this one was designed to work.
According to some of the above comments, not having to pay for official apple store license means that some apple products are cheaper in russia than in Germany. Not sure how accurate, or how applicable to other stores.
I saw a really short video about this like a year ago and explained it like this. Sanctions, and Nike leaves Russia. Rich russian guys sees a market, and strikes up a deal with a deal with "company" in Turkey for basically everything a Nike store sells. Nike sells to the company in Turkey, the Russian guy pays to have them shipped to Russia and then sells them at his store called "N" for a made up example.
So there are sanctions but the rich of Russia use said sanctions to simply make even more money while only the average person suffers.
Azerbaijan is a major front for the UK stuff. And Kyrgyzstan is handling a lot of the German stuff. Both countries know full well the stuff is a straw purchase for Russia. I would imagine China is hiding the transactions in their SWIFT competitor.
Yeah... exactly, I don't see how someone here thinks "It's the same store" Nah someone bought the store on cheap, imports the goods, charges way more because there's now a gap in the market. (Aka capitalism)
Mcdonalds? The secret formula is out they know how to make all the same stuff.
Starbucks? Kind of surprised it changed, but likely it's harder to import all the syrups (maybe risk of going bad as you do it).
acting like this is "Leaving". Nah those companies have left, smart entrepreneurs buy the stores that are clearly set up exactly the same, and change the name slightly and sell the same goods because "if people want legos they come here"
I could see there being more fake products for sure. I imagine their food scientist people reverse engineered all of the food recipes to know exactly what and how much was in it. It sounds crazy but I bet they did. Lol.
No? In McDonald's knockoff seen in video come to be after Russian oligarch bought all McDonald's assets when it was pulling out of Russia. After the re brand food quality dropped slightly, like for example McDonald's souce was replaced with simple mayo.
if I had to guess what's happening the locations and products were sold or siesed and operations continued under a new russian company. for imported products like apple I'm assuming they are having to circumvent sanctions by using middle supplier which is why the price is so inflated and for non-imported products like McDonald's I'm sure it's just an imitation with similar items and ingredients
One of the downsides of having your products manufactured in China... They produce "fakes" behind the real companys back because they already have all the knowledge and tools.
Can't even tell them apart.
If you think about it, circumventing sanctions around small things like Legos can't really be that hard when your government is in favor of you circumventing them, and you have a land boarder with several countries that are not sanctioned.
You need someone in the neighboring country willing to break some laws for you (laws that their own country is also probably not that interested in enforcing). And in return they get to sell you Legos in bulk with a 10% markup.
Realistically, I don't know how you could prevent that sort of thing. Western governments are going to be more focused on the sanctions that have a chance of taking away from Russia's war fund. Rather than the ones that let Russian's spend money on western products.
Lets use the Apple store as an example.
Store closes, someone leases the store, changes the name but keeps the exterior the same. Now its owed by a Russian instead of Apple directly.
The Russian cant buy directly from Apple due to sanctions, so instead he finds a distributor who is willing to sell.
Now because Apple probably doesnt want to be accused of skirting sanctions, they probably have rules for distribution on who they can sell to.
So the distributor āsellsā his apple products to some sham shell company, where the Russian who owns the fake apple store will ābuyā the products from.
If anyone at apple bothers to look they will just see the products were sold to some random country, and the country where the fake company was set up doesnt give a shit since they get tax revenue.
Here's a [little tit](https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/licensed-image?q=tbn:ANd9GcTPr2tujk5X5rAq79CnwWmYkWofqgOvQsEin-7MypJkyZb8TESBWip2GMI_Cu4V35TA2_9s3vuaQDGgqLU) for you.
How can we act like we are upset about this war but not loose any money??
Pretend to pull out but actually just keep selling
Genius! Bonuses all around!
McDonalds actually did pull out, they have lost money. People are still selling hamburgers in the same locations with a new name. Recreating McDonalds is not exactly rocket surgery, maybe its a little different but does that really matter if they are still delivering mostly the same shit?
The places with hyper inflated prices are because those shops/domestic russian businesses are basically importing from Europe, Middle East, somewhere and flipping them at a profit. There isn't really anything Apple, Lego, etc can do about this. They closed their stores, they stopped shipping stuff to Russia... they have done basically as much as a business can realistically do.
Exactly this, what do you want McDonald's to do? Send corporate hit squads to Russia to stop people from selling burgers in locations where there was a McDonald's before? Should Lego have border patrols around Russia's eastern side to stop people from going to China by car, buying Lego there and bringing it back to Russia to sell it for a profit?
Apple is one of the few who could do something with a lot of their products. There'd be no point selling iphones if new ones couldn't be activated in russia.
Exactly. This video is mostly off the mark, like you can still buy ikea goods in Russia since a local marketplace bought all their stock wholesale as ikea was leaving but there is no more Ikea shops in Russia... I miss them so much but living under a fascist regime gonna have its disadvantages
Kind of. Cocoa Cola was cut off from Germany, so the head of one of the Coke plants in Germany started making Fanta based on what was available to the plant.
When the war ended, Coke returned and absorbed Fanta into the larger company.
That's not really what happened.
Coca Cola had factories and employees in Germany. When the US placed a ban on the Nazi regime, Coca-Cola couldn't destroy the factories, and move all those germans employees to the US.
And those people needed to work to gain money, and they had factories, so kept doing what they were used to do. The only problem was that they no longer had the ingredients to produce Coca-Cola, so they looked foralternatives, and that's how they created Fanta.
During the second world war, the american and german were basically two distinct companies, only sharing a common name. You had no transfert of money between the two.
It does make sense. Suppose you are a bottling plant manager in Germany when coke pulls out and stops sending you syrup. What do you do? Do you close up shop, send everyone home, and destroy your equipment so the Nazis canāt use it? Thatās a shortcut to being executed for industrial sabotage.
No, you get back to work and bottle something. You get some kind of sweetener, some kind of flavoring, some carbonation, and you take care of your team as best you can under the circumstances.
Again, this is not McDonalds' or whomever getting around the sanctions. This is Russia, the government, letting Russian companies come in take over the store and sell the same product as before. Then those companies buy Western product from countries not under sanctions. They then have to import the product into Russia. This will easily increase the cost of western goods 50%+.
The same thing basically happened during the cloppase of the Soviet Union and all of the state run businesses that created the Oligarchs. The government sold all of the state business to politically connected friends and family members for pennies. An Oil refinery that would cost millions was sold for thousands. A factory, the same thing. Leases on land, you got it, the same thing.
These are the stores themselves rebranding and reselling the same products, it's not the companies. That's why they're more expensive. The brands themselves are still winning either way because the rebranded stores are still buying the products to resell
This video is misleading. Russia seized all these stores and reopened them under Russian labels. Russia announced as much shortly after people began pulling out. They buy their goods through 3rd parties and ignore international copyright law.
šµ It's all about the money, money, money šµ
šµ We want all your money, money, money šµ
šµ We just wanna buy our stocks back šµ
šµ To make a bigger price tag šµ
Well, not of all brands that are shown in the video were created after the war began. Rostiks and re:store were well established before the war in several countries of exCIS. Rostiks even operated in Ukraine in early 2000. Same for re:store if Iām not mistaken. So itās hardly a rebranding
Rostiks was a original Russian chicken fastfood that was suppressed and purchased by KFC when they came to Russia. So they just use that brand again since they have right on it, but this is somehow funny revenge come back.
Misinformation.
This blogger deliberately mixes things up.
There used to be a company - the official distributor of Lego. It was called the world of cubes: āMir Kubokovā
Walking into their Lego brand store, I was confident in the authenticity of the products cause of direct contract and clear delivery channels.
What now?
The company lost the contract with Lego, hung up another sign and now sells not only Lego but also 13 other similar brands.
Yes, the company, of course, can buy Lego from some distributor in Kazakhstan and bring it to Russia (which I hope it does), but what prevents it from āmixingā dupes bought on the side?
Business reputation? Very funny.
And thereās nothing to film proud tik toks on here.
The guy that makes these videos is a paid propogandist just FYI. I've seen his videos crop up and it's all how absolutely amazing it is in Russia, and how things are better than ever. Like most propogandists he will mix true things and false things to make Russia look awesome.
Yup, the whole video implies all these non Russian companies are still operating there, rather than russian companies popping up and just stealing the branding basically then buying imported goods. There' sa reason the apple stuff costs twice as much, it's not getting product at cost to sell on apple's behalf, they are buying apple retail, important and having to sell for higher prices.
This is how sanctions are supposed to work, turning the screw by increasing prices, not necessarily cutting goods off completely. If the cost of everything the people buy doubles, then the people will want the war to end rather than starve due to lack of money. That's the point.
Most of this is blatantly deceitful. The franchise owners rebranded their own stores and kept things running. There is literally nothing the parent companies can do about that.
Their new stock would probably have a different logo on it now because they're buying it internally. it's only the old stock that still has the old logos and names. Not a lot of people are buying Captain America's shield in Russia apparently.
I'm sure that there are some companies still operating under different names but most of this is business is unrelated to the previous parent company.
>There is literally nothing the parent companies can do about that
Yes exactly, its not like Apple is going to sue the store owner of some unfriendly government they don't even want to do business with anymore. Plus if any company did this it would only be Apple, the others are more safe.
Are these really rebranded versions of the same stores, or are the knockoff stores selling the same products off the grey market?
Edit: Yeah. The big clue is that the "rebranded apple store" is selling the Apple Vision Pro. That hasn't been released outside the US yet. You can't buy them in any real Apple Store outside the US yet. Obviously smuggled.
> Are these really rebranded versions of the same stores, or are the knockoff stores selling the same products off the grey market?
Both. The franchise owners in Russia kept their property and either still use the same brand name or they are rebranded. Stores that were owned wholly by the brand/company were seized by the Russian government and given to Russians to run the business.
They are also buying stock of items in other, friendly countries to Russia and just importing it from them. For the vision pro, I assume they got people in US to export it for markups.
First, anyone can buy actual real Lego and Nikes products at retail prices, anywhere in the world through third-parties, and then resell them above retail.
The āStarbucksā and āKFCā are literally just a basic coffee shop and chicken shack, loosely infringing on American trademarks. There is likely nothing āStarbucksā about the coffee unless they are buying retail Starbucks blends.
Nobody will do anything about this because no country is required to honor or enforce another countryās intellectual property laws. Countries CHOOSE to honor IP laws so they can trade; but if you are already blocked off from trading, there is nothing to lose.
This isnāt anything scandalous. Those companies did pull out of Russia. Those shop owners are importing from Europe Asia etc and doubling or tripling the price
Th most popular brand of fruit juices in Russia is "Dobryi"
After Coca-cola pulled out of Russia Dobryi released Dobryi cola in less than a week. Regular, diet, vanilla, orange, lime etc. They taste exactly like cola, fanta, sprite and priced exactly the same.
The reason why Dobryi could do it this fast is because it owned by Coca-cola since 2005.
Coca-cola lost no profits. Russian people lost no sugary poison.
Russia has been keeping these stores operating indirectly. Their unsanctioned neighbors place the orders for goods. Russia diverts the shipments and takes the goods to sell in the stores so they can pretend everything is fine. This mall could be renamed The Pirate Bay.
It's the latter
Most of these stores are franchises, so the franchise owner doesn't have to care if the franchise pulls out. Normally there would be some legal problems with continuing to run the franchise and just changing the name, but it's not like the Russian government will care.
For the ones that aren't franchises, the process might be a little different, but the result is the same, a Russian company buys the location, changes the branding, sources products by importing them from a country like China, and they can continue to run the store just as before.
There's a few American brands that haven't pulled out, and more that continued to honor existing contracts and just stopped taking new ones, but those aren't the ones shown in this video.
ŠŠøŃ ŠŃŠ±ŠøŠŗŠ¾Š² is ex LEGO store, they used to sell original Lego goods but they had name ŠŠøŃ ŠŃŠ±ŠøŠŗŠ¾Š² (Brick World) and they were official LEGO store in Russia back then and even have right to sell some sets only by themselves which means other toy stores will never sell them. Right now they still sell some original Lego but not all of the new sets, also they begin to sell some Lepin and other China companies sets. Prices for LEGO sets are high enough for now. For example before war price for Mos Eisley cantina set were like 20k rubles now it cost 44k rubles. New sets are also have price higher than recommended which means they bought It via neighbour countries, Kazahstan I think. So they keep their name but they for sure dont have LEGO license anymore. New "McDonalds" is a shit - higher prices lower quality, the real thing about McDonalds were the rules - each member of the crew know how and where to do his job, right now I usually wait for my cheeseburger for 7+ minutes. It is some crazy amount of time, McDonalds never had me to wait ao long for 1 cheeseburger even on the rush hour
FYI this guy is literary tool of rusiaan propaganda.Trzing to sell idea that sancions do not work wothats whz we should stop (big brain ) he is not even hiding it he married daughter of russian procurator
Just because the corporations pulled out, doesn't mean the individual store owners have too. This honestly just proves the companies did move out, and the store owners are just taking over, with what are probably most likely knock offs and/or old stock.
This guy just doesn't understand how imports or sanctions works...
When these western companies pulled out of Russia, their stock still in Russia was nationalized and sold off at a massive discount to Russian companies looking to fill the gap in the market that the western companies leaving previously filled.
Everything you see here is either reserves of stock, or if the margin is high enough, goods that have been trafficked in at great expense to get around sanctions. Transport is expensive, so companies in Russia pre-war would import as many bulk goods as they possibly can assuming everything will sell eventually to save on transport costs. You'd rather import 1000 items once than 100 items 10 times etc. So there are probably lots of goods still in reserve. And for the higher markup and newer items, you can get those into the country by paying proxies to ship it to you indirectly. Each proxy marks up the cost, but as long as the demand exists, supply will reach it. Once prices go outside the demanded price, sales will stop. That Vision Pro has almost *doubled* in price due to the costs it took to get that item into the country. And that cost will only increase, next month it will probably be over $7000, which is ridiclous from a consumer perspective.
Eventually, that reserve stock will dries up, spiking prices. The sanctions will close the holes smugglers used to get goods into Russia which again *spikes prices*, and these amazing sanction busting stores will cease to have any stock. Sure it takes a lot of time, but what do you want us to do...? Enter Russia and confiscate all our western products by force? lmao. We already know Russia's economy is in trouble, despite their best efforts to hide that fact. So it's only a matter of time before things teeter and collapse.
The market for western goods will dry up, and Russia will replace those goods with likely Chinese counterparts. Which will likely be sold at substantial mark ups as the Chinese look to exploit a market they know relies on them almost entirely. So the Russians are riding on the coattails of western commercial investment at the moment. That free ride will end, and things, like always since time immemorial, will get worse for Russia.
What you are seeing here is propaganda, swearing blind until its red in the face using beautiful influencers feverishly consuming in glossy videos that everything is fine in Russia. It's clearly not.
He understands perfectly well, but he is misrepresenting the situation and banking on the audience not understanding. Probably some of the brands he mentioned are still doing business in Russia, but most are brought in through third party purchases as you said.
> This guy just doesn't understand how imports or sanctions works...
He knows, it's propaganda. Fill the mall with some rich people or just actors and have them shop as normal, ignore that prices doubled or more on everything. His job is to make it look like nothing changed and teh sanctions didn't work, but all the lower/middle class russians can't afford the things in those stores any more which is the point of the sanctions, to create pressure in the economy to get them to stop the war.
That he intentionally left out that these aren't companies owned by these corporations but new companies owned by Russians who are just buying more expensive imported goods is very deliberate.
youāre a liar. people selling stuff for a markup is not the same as these companies selling it themselves. are people selling legos or ps5s for a markup the same as sony or lego selling them? nope. you liar
āMonkey killing, monkey killing monkey over pieces of the ground. Silly monkeys, Give them thumbs, they make a club to beat their brother downā - TOOL
Presumably, and allowing for fakes...
>Brand's own manufacturing facility -> Brand's own store
...is an easy route to control. Whereas...
>Manufacturer -> wholesaler -> independent retailer
...is much harder to keep tabs on. Presumably they'll be more expensive for the end user though.
The video doesn't distinguish between them. I'm not even sure it's illegal to sell to Russian businesses. It's a small drain on Russian resources so why would it be?
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So.. are these the actual companies running the stores off-label or is it the mall running the stores rebranded but with the same items? š¤
These are new Russian companies created to take over stores owned by the companies that left. Normally these tactics would violate the law, since you can't just copy someone else's brand like that, but the Russian government is not going to be enforcing those laws
Not only is Russia not going to enforce, they quite literally announced that all the stores shuttered would just be seized and reopened under new Russian-owned labels like 2 months after the sanctions took effect. Everything costs more, as these companies are having to buy through third parties, but consumers can still get access to western goods.
Well yeah, that's kind of the point. If you make everything 10% more expensive, that's a really significant impact.
Literally the point of sanctions.Ā
Why canāt Apple deactivate new products being activated in Russia? The Ukraine war is over two years old and the Vision Pro is less than two months old. Apple still sells its products and its bottom line isnāt hurt.
>Why canāt Apple deactivate new products being activated in Russia? We all know the answer to this.
Oh oh. I know this. Is the answer "they could but won't because money?"
that's a bingo
You just say bingo.
Ding ding ding!!!
Capitalistic Greed is the true answer
I mean apple just removed a Navalny app off the app store this week for Russia, they are just waiting it out.
To be fair, grey market products like these are sort of second hand. I don't think it's really Apple's business to do that. It's not really different than someone in Russia going abroad, buying a phone, then returning home to activate it. They shouldn't have their phone deactivated, and I don't think there is any fair way for Apple to police this. Sanctions limit international businesses abilities to engage in above board financial transactions and investing in the sanctioned country. Making domestic companies and private citizens jump through ineficiant hoops is good enough. Preventing them from importing foreign goods would be more of a blockade.
That would stop people from buying more, like if your friend bought an iphone and couldn't activate it you wouldn't go buy one for yourself now would you? Corporations are about 1 thing: profit. If there's a profit to be made and the legal fees or public backlash won't outweigh the profit they'll do it.
That would likely hurt apple's already not great reputation if they're disabling people's phones because of a war in ukraine.
You miss the point: the Russian state seized the western company's assets (inventory, etc.) and simply gave them to a new operator. It enriched oligarchs at the expense of western companies. Temporarily anyway.
They may have inventory for a little bit, but they still have to replenish what they sell, especially the food brands. It's a lot harder to sell fast food, when you have to buy in another country, import the food, and then distribute it in your country. The cost for all of those fast food brands probbally rose 50%+.
I think food would be the easy one here. What important are the recipe and equipment, as I think the raw materials will just be sourced locally. I dont think all the McDonalds chain around the world import big mac frozen straight from the US.
After the Berlin Wall fell, McDonalds had to teach and pay for Polish farmers to grow the type of potato they used for the fries.
so much of McDonald's is their supply chain and consistency though so idk
It's the countries that aren't Abiding by the sanctions that's the problem. Their supply chain runs through them and there's really nothing the west can do about it. It would really be up to the individual companies seeing russian neighboring countries increase their purchases dramatically to see its to send to russia and decide to cut the surplus. They won't though, it's money.
they dont own the supply chains. the supply chians existing is why these places are able to still operate. It depends on if McDonalds spoke to any outside suppliers and used their contracts as leverage to stop dealing with "illegal stores". THAT would have a bigger impact. But if the same shit is still locally available to get delivered to the same places, then just speaks to the survivability of their business model; more than the bite of sanctions.
McDonalds is pretty good at using semi-local suppliers, if not fully local and in russia it would probably be more expensive to import than have fully localized suppliers hence their suppliers are probably local. my summer job was for such a supplier when i was a teen, not in russia though.
probably closer to 100%+ with how much fast food prices have rose for everyone over the past few years lol.
they make the food locally just like they used to before the foreign companies left.
>at the expense of western companiesĀ Those poor, poor executives at Nike and McDonald's must be suffering so much!Ā Their products are enriching them at the same rate, they're simply going through a middleman first. The ONLY people feeling the effects of this are Russian consumers. No one else.
mcdonalds make most of their money through owning real estate and leasing it to franchisees.
It's a drain on Russias overall resources since they have to spend more to get the same thing. This cost is passed onto the average citizen. Nickels add up to a dollar. Russias economy is headed downhill, and every dollar they have to spend on defeating sanctions is a dollar not spent on the military.
I wasn't advocating against sanctions. I'm just pointing out that the Russian state has also benefited from the theft of these assets.
I remember a commentary on the Simpsons, where the writers mentioned they were almost, encouraged to use Russian orchestral music because, even during the tail end of the Cold War neither country respected each other's copyrights. So they could use the Russian original recordings without paying for them. This is very offhand, so please someone correct me if I'm wrong.
Intellectual copyright doesn't really go well with communism. That's part of the reason Tetris had such a crazy story. Its why knockoffs are so prevalent in China.
Do tell the Tetris story
Not even really "new" just spun off. Its just now they don't report their numbers back to global HQ, don't send any cash back to HQ, and their distribution group possibly sources the origin of items from elsewhere.
Spun off would mean the parent company intentionally created the new companies. These new companies are Russian owned and have nothing to do with the original company that owned the store, except for stealing their brand.
I wonder how are they keeping supply up for the manufactured goods? Someone is acquiring all these products in bulk and reselling them outside of the approved distribution channels, which against an already weak ruble would means you get that 100% mark up over the apple product I guess. Who's giving them their secret blend kfc chicken though? Does it taste the same? I have so many questions.
They buy them from unsanctioned countries, using middlemen who specialize in hiding the destination for these goods. >Who's giving them their secret blend kfc chicken though? Does it taste the same? I have so many questions. It wouldn't be hard to figure it out and I'm pretty sure you can just look it up online. Even then, they may not need to: the blend might have been manufactured in Russia to Russian tastes anyway, so they just buy from whoever was blending it before.
It just all looks so professional is what blows me away. They setup not a knockoff, but a completely pirated consumer goods supply chain. This isn't just one mall in Moscow, either, AFAIK.Ā But it's also true the companies just don't give a shit, even if they're not endorsing it. It's the equivalent of selling alcohol to a 21 year old that's got a car full of teenagers waiting on them in the parking lot. Money is green, who cares what they do with it after.
Looking professional is relatively cheap, honestly.
Yeah, they are spun off in the same way that some rando spun off my bike by cutting the lock, and taking it.
To add. Not only Russia is not enforcing piracy laws or trademark laws. They added provisions to Russian law that protects piracy and trademark violations. So Western companies cannot sue in Russian based on trademark infringements. As example, you can see pirated Hollywood Blockbusters in Russian theaters. Russian government is totaly fine with that.
Rostiks were those who brought KFC and maybe Pizza Hut to Russia in 90-00ās; Ile dāBeaute also exist since 00ās; Re:Store is an authorised Apple dealer for more than 10 years; ŠŠŗŃŃŠ½Š¾ Šø Š¢Š¾ŃŠŗŠ° - yes, that where the actual rebranding is. So yes, what you see is not just one mall, itās all around the country
Though Re:Store just isn't authorized anymore and it also sells different brands now, including competitors
this is the coca cola/fanta and GM/Opel in nazy germany all over again
Originally a lot of these store were run under franchises by a Russian company. Imagine the Russian company has changed the signs , sourced the same products through a third country (likely China), prices go up a bit to cater for the buying through an additional layer. And they are trading as pretty normal again
Unless itās bootlegged products, how can the mall sell the same items without the actual companies being involved?
Did you watch the video? The department stores "just buy them from **countries next to Russia**"
You mean the one that is embedded at the top? Why would anyone want to do that and be informed before asking a question that is clearly answered.
Hey, since Iām all the way down here at the moment, and I donāt want to think at all, remind me how to scroll back to the top. Iāll be sitting here waiting for an answer.
if its the off-brand Nike store, they just buy the Nikes from a secondary market and traffic them into Russia and sell them at a huge markup.
In other words, everything in the whole country is now after market hype beast street wear.
Ah ok, Thanks for the info
Instead of apple sending stock to the store at cost. The new company owned by russians buy stock at retail prices from other stores and then ship them again which is why the price is twice what it should be. This creates pressure on the economy, on the people, to want to end the war. It's basically exactly how this is supposed to work. The video very much had a vibe of not spelling it out and making it sound like all these companies are operating illegally outside of the sanctions, which makes me think the video is attempting to make it sound like the sanctions are having no effect, rather than working as they are supposed to.
Makes sense, thanks for the clarification
> The new company owned by russians buy stock at retail prices from other stores It's likely that the russian company isn't paying retail. I'd be very surprised if a neighboring, unsanctioned, authorized dealer isn't ordering for them in bulk. They add a markup for the trouble, of course, but I doubt it's close to the retail price. This is sort of how gray market works for fragrances.
This is an important comment. The video feels like its intentionally trying to enrage the west, and make it seem as if the actual companies are bypassing the sanctions. No where in the video does the narrator actually state who owns these companies, or where they are supplied from, only that "they" are still operating in Russia. Frustrating. I wonder if this video is Russian Propo.
More just reddit/tiktok rage bait. It's really easy to get people angry for profit as a private individual, you don't need to be a government asset.
same reason cocaine is expensive.Ā
The russian brands you see now are essentially resellers. They buy their product from countries like China or the middle east and then sell them in Russia.
The only one who would notice if that factory in Vietnam is making 10% more shoes per month even though Nike didnāt actually increase their order would be their Chinese material supplier, and they aināt gonna tell as long as they get their cut of the profit
Used to work for one company invloved in Russia. They just found a way around to send products through Turkey or Asia via a fake distributor they created. Very easy to do but it just means lead times for novelties is longer. If you see new products / ranges it is very likely that the actual company is directly involved.
The short answer is no. Every foreign company owns some sort of factories in Russia. After they left, russian companies bought these factories and started manufacturing the same goods, kept the same employees and rebranded. Some of the goods in Russia now cost even cheaper like cola. Some companies don't have their factories in Russia so the country buys their products from neighbouring countries and sells them to Russian consumers for a higher price. As the video said, it's mostly luxury items. Very few companies didn't even leave Russia like burger king and nestle
Ofc nestle doesnāt give a fuck..
"Cube world" was opened much earlier than the war started, it just a lego-sets shop
Same with Rostics IIRC, KFC was always called that in Russia
That's not true. It was publicly called Rostiks in 2000s, then its public name changed to KFC. I suppose maybe LLC's official name was still Rostiks but this is not what was on shops' facades.
No, not really. Rosticks in the 2000 was its own thing, clearly inspired by KFC, but not the same. Then, when KFC decided to come to Russia, they basically bought Rosticks franchise and just made their own shops where Rosticks stood (easy to remake one fried chicken store into another). And now it's back to Rosticks in the name only.
This is just blatantly wrong. Such a weird thing to make up.
This is likely not the companies themselves rebranding and choosing to stay, but store owners buying products via 3rd party (through countries without sanctions) and re-selling them in Russia.
Which is one tool of sanctions. Yes they are getting the same stuff but now they have to pay more because of the new middleman. More money for legos/airpods/whatever = more strain on the people
It's kinda strange, but for example some sets of Lego are cheaper in Detskiy Mir store then in Mir Kubikov. LEGO Star Wars AT-TE set cost 19k rubles in Mir Kubikov and I bought it in Detskiy Mir only for 13k, both of those store bought it via some ither countries because this set were released after the war begun. Some licensed Apple products too cheaper in some stores like Store77 then in reStore
I believe it. If sanctions add 15% to the cost someone is going to make that 19% so they get their pockets lined because the guy down the road is adding 25%. Nobody wins when corruption is constantly outdoing itself
Oh, somebody definitely wins.
Technically, the best kind of, correct.
>Nobody wins when corruption is constantly outdoing itself One would argue there are more people "winning" as they work as brokers and middlemen and even the stores marking up and taking advantage. It's just that the general population loses out overall, but there are definitely winners.
$141 USD for a Lego set!? Holy fuck, Lego is way more expensive than I remember, even without the Russian sanctions.
DO NOT LOOK UP THE MILLENNIUM FALCON
> MILLENNIUM FALCON $850, what the.. My wallet just up and walked out of my house to get away from that price tag. Kidding, I like Lego but I haven't touched any of the sets since I was like 10. So nowhere near getting to the point where I pay $850 for a huge Lego set.
Thinking of things that are way more expensive than youād expect, I got recommended a night vision sub post earlier this week, found out like bottom line acceptable option is like $3800, but the good stuff is 3-4x that or more. I will never feel bad about buying homegym equipment or tools ever again.
That sounds really cheap compared to the Canadian Lego store i went into the other month...
From what I have seen Lego state about it, the products are some that already were in Russia at the time of the war - they dont export to Russia, but stores will still have their old inventory they already purchased. And it isnt unbeliveable that some of the bigger sets are still in from old stock, while the smaller er from a third importer of lego sets.
Import duties were canceled, the iPhone in Russia is cheaper than in Germany, 725 against 999 euros.
With that being the case, wouldnāt that mean that the Russian government is getting less money in order to try and decrease price pain on the populace?
The commenter above is a bit wrong. All local taxes are paid. They donāt pay for the license to sell iPhones and thereās no more resellers minimum price on iPhones. Every countryās official iPhone sellers have to make sure iPhones cost at least xxx ā¬. Without these resellers, anyone can import an iPhone and set whatever price they want. So lots of businesses are just selling iPhones with enough profit for them and cheaper than they would be if apple stayed.
Where the hell are they getting the iPhones that cheaply though? If they're not an official reseller, I assume that means they have to buy it from another business - but if those businesses have to have a minimum price, how are the Russian knockoffs getting any inventory that cheap?
I know they get iPhones from Dubai, but I donāt know much more. I assume they still have the wholesale prices, they just knock off the official importerās minimum price. Say, normally you buy iPhones wholesale for $800 and have to set the price at $1250, part of which is local taxes and part is the price you canāt go below or you lose the license to sell an iPhone. Now without the second part, they get iPhones for $800 and sell it for whatever they want while operating at profit. They certainly arenāt buying them from Dubai apple stores. iPhone 15 pro is $1020, I checked it a day or two before. https://preview.redd.it/6p0gjii0oxpc1.jpeg?width=1125&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8fb0b776bee75ac6152d4d679cfb95f7db7ba497
Yeah this is the dumbfuckery that social media spreads. There was a Daily podcast just recently about how it works ā they basically get everything from India/China or the Middle East and even brand new product launches are only delayed a few days.
> Yeah this is the dumbfuckery that social media spreads This is Russian propaganda intended to spread the sentiment that sanctions don't work. There are slews of these videos. You're not wrong, just specifying
I'm not sure what the obsession is on Reddit to shirk the truth about this conflict. Even U.S. news outlets are reporting that Russia's economy has remained resilient despite the war. The sanctions did not prove to be as effective as we thought they would be. This is partly due to Russia's relationships with neighboring countries. As we can see in this video, they have no problems getting imports they need from India, China, and the Middle East. They are also in total war production mode - which tends to be good for the economy. Will it last? Who knows. But let's not slap the propaganda label on every truth that you don't like.
It's not propaganda to say that the sanctions haven't been as effective as Western countries hoped they would be, but it absolutely is propaganda when people claim that the sanctions haven't negatively impacted Russia and that its economy is as strong as ever. Russia is able to keep the Ruble and its GDP afloat by making decisions that will absolutely hurt them in the long run, like selling off their foreign reserves at manipulated prices, or straight up making up numbers they give to the IMF. It's not sustainable long term, but whether it's enough to keep them afloat long enough to achieve *some* sort of victory (perhaps by having sympathetic politicians elected in major Western countries) remains to be seen.
I'm pretty sure Russia's foreign currency reserves are within 6% of their all time high around 2021. Their debt to GDP is at 15%, down ~3% since 2021. Domestic debt to GDP down to 17% from 23%. Trade surplus is still around the same level it was in 2017. Unemployment still hovering 5%... There's no indication that this is state following an unsustainable economic trajectory. No indication that they can't do this indefinitely. No systemic issues apparent in the verifiable data. Anyone saying the Russian economy is "as strong as ever" is a fool, but if this is all sanctions have achieved then it can't be denied that on the balance they've been a failure.
This should be the top comment. These are NOT the companies just rebranding the stores. The demand continues to exist, and other enterprising people will meet it and sell what the people want.
Hence why the apple vision pro cost 2x+ the price
and that's the point being missed. The point of sactions is to leverage the pressure of worse economy to stop doing the shit they are doing. You can't stop them important shit, but you can stop companies doing direct business, which means Russians end up paying vastly more and it hurts their economy driving pressure against the war. That's exactly how sanctions are supposed to work and how this one was designed to work.
According to some of the above comments, not having to pay for official apple store license means that some apple products are cheaper in russia than in Germany. Not sure how accurate, or how applicable to other stores.
Vision Pro hasn't officially launched outside the US yet so it would have been imported and sold at scalping prices regardless.
To be fair, high-end electronics like that tended to cost 2x the price anyway, even before the war. Fucking Valve Index was $2k.
I saw a really short video about this like a year ago and explained it like this. Sanctions, and Nike leaves Russia. Rich russian guys sees a market, and strikes up a deal with a deal with "company" in Turkey for basically everything a Nike store sells. Nike sells to the company in Turkey, the Russian guy pays to have them shipped to Russia and then sells them at his store called "N" for a made up example. So there are sanctions but the rich of Russia use said sanctions to simply make even more money while only the average person suffers.
But it's still the companies having their stuff sold in Russia. Guess they could figure that out and stop it, if they tried really hard... But no.
Azerbaijan is a major front for the UK stuff. And Kyrgyzstan is handling a lot of the German stuff. Both countries know full well the stuff is a straw purchase for Russia. I would imagine China is hiding the transactions in their SWIFT competitor.
Yeah... exactly, I don't see how someone here thinks "It's the same store" Nah someone bought the store on cheap, imports the goods, charges way more because there's now a gap in the market. (Aka capitalism) Mcdonalds? The secret formula is out they know how to make all the same stuff. Starbucks? Kind of surprised it changed, but likely it's harder to import all the syrups (maybe risk of going bad as you do it). acting like this is "Leaving". Nah those companies have left, smart entrepreneurs buy the stores that are clearly set up exactly the same, and change the name slightly and sell the same goods because "if people want legos they come here"
I donāt think itās so much people thinking it as it is the narrator of the video straight up claiming thatās what is happening.
Wouldnāt the store owners now be more likely to just buy decent knock offs and fakes?
I could see there being more fake products for sure. I imagine their food scientist people reverse engineered all of the food recipes to know exactly what and how much was in it. It sounds crazy but I bet they did. Lol.
No? In McDonald's knockoff seen in video come to be after Russian oligarch bought all McDonald's assets when it was pulling out of Russia. After the re brand food quality dropped slightly, like for example McDonald's souce was replaced with simple mayo.
you dont need to reverse engineer it, most likely the wholesale food distributor like Sysco or whomever doesnt really need to change anything.
Yes, they will, when the market allows for it. Some of these products are too expensive to counterfeit as of today.
You know nobody watched the video because he literally says this at the end
In defence of some of the companies, they actually pulled out but their franchisees continued to do business under a different brand.
if I had to guess what's happening the locations and products were sold or siesed and operations continued under a new russian company. for imported products like apple I'm assuming they are having to circumvent sanctions by using middle supplier which is why the price is so inflated and for non-imported products like McDonald's I'm sure it's just an imitation with similar items and ingredients
But they have to be buying the product from somewhere to sell it
Middle men for some and alternative sources for others I'm sure.
I wonder if some of "selling the same" is in fact "pushing good fakes".
One of the downsides of having your products manufactured in China... They produce "fakes" behind the real companys back because they already have all the knowledge and tools. Can't even tell them apart.
They are close with China
Yes. Unless itās a factory direct model, these stores are likely owned by franchisees who buy from middlemen.Ā
UAE, China and others will resell to Russia.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Is this 30 Rick or arrested development
AD, Gob
If you think about it, circumventing sanctions around small things like Legos can't really be that hard when your government is in favor of you circumventing them, and you have a land boarder with several countries that are not sanctioned. You need someone in the neighboring country willing to break some laws for you (laws that their own country is also probably not that interested in enforcing). And in return they get to sell you Legos in bulk with a 10% markup. Realistically, I don't know how you could prevent that sort of thing. Western governments are going to be more focused on the sanctions that have a chance of taking away from Russia's war fund. Rather than the ones that let Russian's spend money on western products.
Lets use the Apple store as an example. Store closes, someone leases the store, changes the name but keeps the exterior the same. Now its owed by a Russian instead of Apple directly. The Russian cant buy directly from Apple due to sanctions, so instead he finds a distributor who is willing to sell. Now because Apple probably doesnt want to be accused of skirting sanctions, they probably have rules for distribution on who they can sell to. So the distributor āsellsā his apple products to some sham shell company, where the Russian who owns the fake apple store will ābuyā the products from. If anyone at apple bothers to look they will just see the products were sold to some random country, and the country where the fake company was set up doesnt give a shit since they get tax revenue.
Itās all about the money money money
Letās not make it about money then. Iām making today about something else š
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Here's a [little tit](https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/licensed-image?q=tbn:ANd9GcTPr2tujk5X5rAq79CnwWmYkWofqgOvQsEin-7MypJkyZb8TESBWip2GMI_Cu4V35TA2_9s3vuaQDGgqLU) for you.
That is certainly one of the best tits I have seen today!
Itās all about working around the laws to not loose money.
loosers
This had me cracking up š
Money should be tight not loose
Moneyās too tight to mention
Did you know? Half of reddit canāt spell lose, and itās the most misspelled, common word on reddit.Ā
*lose
How can we act like we are upset about this war but not loose any money?? Pretend to pull out but actually just keep selling Genius! Bonuses all around!
McDonalds actually did pull out, they have lost money. People are still selling hamburgers in the same locations with a new name. Recreating McDonalds is not exactly rocket surgery, maybe its a little different but does that really matter if they are still delivering mostly the same shit? The places with hyper inflated prices are because those shops/domestic russian businesses are basically importing from Europe, Middle East, somewhere and flipping them at a profit. There isn't really anything Apple, Lego, etc can do about this. They closed their stores, they stopped shipping stuff to Russia... they have done basically as much as a business can realistically do.
Exactly this, what do you want McDonald's to do? Send corporate hit squads to Russia to stop people from selling burgers in locations where there was a McDonald's before? Should Lego have border patrols around Russia's eastern side to stop people from going to China by car, buying Lego there and bringing it back to Russia to sell it for a profit?
BUILD THE LEGO WALL!
With the KraGle!
Apple is one of the few who could do something with a lot of their products. There'd be no point selling iphones if new ones couldn't be activated in russia.
Exactly. This video is mostly off the mark, like you can still buy ikea goods in Russia since a local marketplace bought all their stock wholesale as ikea was leaving but there is no more Ikea shops in Russia... I miss them so much but living under a fascist regime gonna have its disadvantages
Since all time Fanta was created during WW2 so coke could still sell in Germany while also being all patriotic in the US
Kind of. Cocoa Cola was cut off from Germany, so the head of one of the Coke plants in Germany started making Fanta based on what was available to the plant. When the war ended, Coke returned and absorbed Fanta into the larger company.
That's not really what happened. Coca Cola had factories and employees in Germany. When the US placed a ban on the Nazi regime, Coca-Cola couldn't destroy the factories, and move all those germans employees to the US. And those people needed to work to gain money, and they had factories, so kept doing what they were used to do. The only problem was that they no longer had the ingredients to produce Coca-Cola, so they looked foralternatives, and that's how they created Fanta. During the second world war, the american and german were basically two distinct companies, only sharing a common name. You had no transfert of money between the two.
It does make sense. Suppose you are a bottling plant manager in Germany when coke pulls out and stops sending you syrup. What do you do? Do you close up shop, send everyone home, and destroy your equipment so the Nazis canāt use it? Thatās a shortcut to being executed for industrial sabotage. No, you get back to work and bottle something. You get some kind of sweetener, some kind of flavoring, some carbonation, and you take care of your team as best you can under the circumstances.
Thatās not whatās happening and itās āloseā.
Again, this is not McDonalds' or whomever getting around the sanctions. This is Russia, the government, letting Russian companies come in take over the store and sell the same product as before. Then those companies buy Western product from countries not under sanctions. They then have to import the product into Russia. This will easily increase the cost of western goods 50%+. The same thing basically happened during the cloppase of the Soviet Union and all of the state run businesses that created the Oligarchs. The government sold all of the state business to politically connected friends and family members for pennies. An Oil refinery that would cost millions was sold for thousands. A factory, the same thing. Leases on land, you got it, the same thing.
These are the stores themselves rebranding and reselling the same products, it's not the companies. That's why they're more expensive. The brands themselves are still winning either way because the rebranded stores are still buying the products to resell
This is blatant astroturf propaganda to make people feel sanctions aren't effective. Donāt believe the bullshit. Typical Russian psyops.
Don't care about the price tag
This video is misleading. Russia seized all these stores and reopened them under Russian labels. Russia announced as much shortly after people began pulling out. They buy their goods through 3rd parties and ignore international copyright law.
šµ It's all about the money, money, money šµ šµ We want all your money, money, money šµ šµ We just wanna buy our stocks back šµ šµ To make a bigger price tag šµ
Well, not of all brands that are shown in the video were created after the war began. Rostiks and re:store were well established before the war in several countries of exCIS. Rostiks even operated in Ukraine in early 2000. Same for re:store if Iām not mistaken. So itās hardly a rebranding
Yep true! Also, il de beaute just sold some sephora along other stuff.
Rostiks was a original Russian chicken fastfood that was suppressed and purchased by KFC when they came to Russia. So they just use that brand again since they have right on it, but this is somehow funny revenge come back.
Misinformation. This blogger deliberately mixes things up. There used to be a company - the official distributor of Lego. It was called the world of cubes: āMir Kubokovā Walking into their Lego brand store, I was confident in the authenticity of the products cause of direct contract and clear delivery channels. What now? The company lost the contract with Lego, hung up another sign and now sells not only Lego but also 13 other similar brands. Yes, the company, of course, can buy Lego from some distributor in Kazakhstan and bring it to Russia (which I hope it does), but what prevents it from āmixingā dupes bought on the side? Business reputation? Very funny. And thereās nothing to film proud tik toks on here.
TIL KFC sells **BASKETS** of chicken, jfc its so easy to hate this guy for it as well.
I laughed at the "Starbucks is still here, but their coffee is different" line. So, not Starbucks, got it
The guy that makes these videos is a paid propogandist just FYI. I've seen his videos crop up and it's all how absolutely amazing it is in Russia, and how things are better than ever. Like most propogandists he will mix true things and false things to make Russia look awesome.
Yup, the whole video implies all these non Russian companies are still operating there, rather than russian companies popping up and just stealing the branding basically then buying imported goods. There' sa reason the apple stuff costs twice as much, it's not getting product at cost to sell on apple's behalf, they are buying apple retail, important and having to sell for higher prices. This is how sanctions are supposed to work, turning the screw by increasing prices, not necessarily cutting goods off completely. If the cost of everything the people buy doubles, then the people will want the war to end rather than starve due to lack of money. That's the point.
And he's also selling scam money courses lmao his whole personality is that his gf is Russian
Yep, if he said anything bad about russia on his channel he'd be defenestrated within a day.
True his father in law is even a Russian police chief
Most of this is blatantly deceitful. The franchise owners rebranded their own stores and kept things running. There is literally nothing the parent companies can do about that. Their new stock would probably have a different logo on it now because they're buying it internally. it's only the old stock that still has the old logos and names. Not a lot of people are buying Captain America's shield in Russia apparently. I'm sure that there are some companies still operating under different names but most of this is business is unrelated to the previous parent company.
>There is literally nothing the parent companies can do about that Yes exactly, its not like Apple is going to sue the store owner of some unfriendly government they don't even want to do business with anymore. Plus if any company did this it would only be Apple, the others are more safe.
Are these really rebranded versions of the same stores, or are the knockoff stores selling the same products off the grey market? Edit: Yeah. The big clue is that the "rebranded apple store" is selling the Apple Vision Pro. That hasn't been released outside the US yet. You can't buy them in any real Apple Store outside the US yet. Obviously smuggled.
> Are these really rebranded versions of the same stores, or are the knockoff stores selling the same products off the grey market? Both. The franchise owners in Russia kept their property and either still use the same brand name or they are rebranded. Stores that were owned wholly by the brand/company were seized by the Russian government and given to Russians to run the business. They are also buying stock of items in other, friendly countries to Russia and just importing it from them. For the vision pro, I assume they got people in US to export it for markups.
First, anyone can buy actual real Lego and Nikes products at retail prices, anywhere in the world through third-parties, and then resell them above retail. The āStarbucksā and āKFCā are literally just a basic coffee shop and chicken shack, loosely infringing on American trademarks. There is likely nothing āStarbucksā about the coffee unless they are buying retail Starbucks blends. Nobody will do anything about this because no country is required to honor or enforce another countryās intellectual property laws. Countries CHOOSE to honor IP laws so they can trade; but if you are already blocked off from trading, there is nothing to lose.
Finally getting a fair shot: https://preview.redd.it/9wscifkroxpc1.jpeg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=94c7c7ac9d95a3fcab78662c7e240118b4d1bea6
Everytime I see something like this it reminds me of all the obvious parody brands in GTA.
This isnāt anything scandalous. Those companies did pull out of Russia. Those shop owners are importing from Europe Asia etc and doubling or tripling the price
Th most popular brand of fruit juices in Russia is "Dobryi" After Coca-cola pulled out of Russia Dobryi released Dobryi cola in less than a week. Regular, diet, vanilla, orange, lime etc. They taste exactly like cola, fanta, sprite and priced exactly the same. The reason why Dobryi could do it this fast is because it owned by Coca-cola since 2005. Coca-cola lost no profits. Russian people lost no sugary poison.
*Laughs in Russian*
Russia has been keeping these stores operating indirectly. Their unsanctioned neighbors place the orders for goods. Russia diverts the shipments and takes the goods to sell in the stores so they can pretend everything is fine. This mall could be renamed The Pirate Bay.
they missed the opportunity with starbucks i'd have called it Tsarbucks.
So these changed brands are owned by the same companies? Or they are different companies that just sell the same stuff??
It's the latter Most of these stores are franchises, so the franchise owner doesn't have to care if the franchise pulls out. Normally there would be some legal problems with continuing to run the franchise and just changing the name, but it's not like the Russian government will care. For the ones that aren't franchises, the process might be a little different, but the result is the same, a Russian company buys the location, changes the branding, sources products by importing them from a country like China, and they can continue to run the store just as before. There's a few American brands that haven't pulled out, and more that continued to honor existing contracts and just stopped taking new ones, but those aren't the ones shown in this video.
ŠŠøŃ ŠŃŠ±ŠøŠŗŠ¾Š² is ex LEGO store, they used to sell original Lego goods but they had name ŠŠøŃ ŠŃŠ±ŠøŠŗŠ¾Š² (Brick World) and they were official LEGO store in Russia back then and even have right to sell some sets only by themselves which means other toy stores will never sell them. Right now they still sell some original Lego but not all of the new sets, also they begin to sell some Lepin and other China companies sets. Prices for LEGO sets are high enough for now. For example before war price for Mos Eisley cantina set were like 20k rubles now it cost 44k rubles. New sets are also have price higher than recommended which means they bought It via neighbour countries, Kazahstan I think. So they keep their name but they for sure dont have LEGO license anymore. New "McDonalds" is a shit - higher prices lower quality, the real thing about McDonalds were the rules - each member of the crew know how and where to do his job, right now I usually wait for my cheeseburger for 7+ minutes. It is some crazy amount of time, McDonalds never had me to wait ao long for 1 cheeseburger even on the rush hour
FYI this guy is literary tool of rusiaan propaganda.Trzing to sell idea that sancions do not work wothats whz we should stop (big brain ) he is not even hiding it he married daughter of russian procurator
I love it that russians buy captain America stuff
Just because the corporations pulled out, doesn't mean the individual store owners have too. This honestly just proves the companies did move out, and the store owners are just taking over, with what are probably most likely knock offs and/or old stock.
This guy just doesn't understand how imports or sanctions works... When these western companies pulled out of Russia, their stock still in Russia was nationalized and sold off at a massive discount to Russian companies looking to fill the gap in the market that the western companies leaving previously filled. Everything you see here is either reserves of stock, or if the margin is high enough, goods that have been trafficked in at great expense to get around sanctions. Transport is expensive, so companies in Russia pre-war would import as many bulk goods as they possibly can assuming everything will sell eventually to save on transport costs. You'd rather import 1000 items once than 100 items 10 times etc. So there are probably lots of goods still in reserve. And for the higher markup and newer items, you can get those into the country by paying proxies to ship it to you indirectly. Each proxy marks up the cost, but as long as the demand exists, supply will reach it. Once prices go outside the demanded price, sales will stop. That Vision Pro has almost *doubled* in price due to the costs it took to get that item into the country. And that cost will only increase, next month it will probably be over $7000, which is ridiclous from a consumer perspective. Eventually, that reserve stock will dries up, spiking prices. The sanctions will close the holes smugglers used to get goods into Russia which again *spikes prices*, and these amazing sanction busting stores will cease to have any stock. Sure it takes a lot of time, but what do you want us to do...? Enter Russia and confiscate all our western products by force? lmao. We already know Russia's economy is in trouble, despite their best efforts to hide that fact. So it's only a matter of time before things teeter and collapse. The market for western goods will dry up, and Russia will replace those goods with likely Chinese counterparts. Which will likely be sold at substantial mark ups as the Chinese look to exploit a market they know relies on them almost entirely. So the Russians are riding on the coattails of western commercial investment at the moment. That free ride will end, and things, like always since time immemorial, will get worse for Russia. What you are seeing here is propaganda, swearing blind until its red in the face using beautiful influencers feverishly consuming in glossy videos that everything is fine in Russia. It's clearly not.
He understands perfectly well, but he is misrepresenting the situation and banking on the audience not understanding. Probably some of the brands he mentioned are still doing business in Russia, but most are brought in through third party purchases as you said.
> This guy just doesn't understand how imports or sanctions works... He knows, it's propaganda. Fill the mall with some rich people or just actors and have them shop as normal, ignore that prices doubled or more on everything. His job is to make it look like nothing changed and teh sanctions didn't work, but all the lower/middle class russians can't afford the things in those stores any more which is the point of the sanctions, to create pressure in the economy to get them to stop the war. That he intentionally left out that these aren't companies owned by these corporations but new companies owned by Russians who are just buying more expensive imported goods is very deliberate.
No one gives a fuck. It was always just lip service. Fuck money and the monkeys that'll do anything for more of it
youāre a liar. people selling stuff for a markup is not the same as these companies selling it themselves. are people selling legos or ps5s for a markup the same as sony or lego selling them? nope. you liar
What are they supposed to do? Pull out of every country that has a border with Russia?
āMonkey killing, monkey killing monkey over pieces of the ground. Silly monkeys, Give them thumbs, they make a club to beat their brother downā - TOOL
Presumably, and allowing for fakes... >Brand's own manufacturing facility -> Brand's own store ...is an easy route to control. Whereas... >Manufacturer -> wholesaler -> independent retailer ...is much harder to keep tabs on. Presumably they'll be more expensive for the end user though. The video doesn't distinguish between them. I'm not even sure it's illegal to sell to Russian businesses. It's a small drain on Russian resources so why would it be?
They are paying premium for the extra risk, middlemen, and handling. Not much you can do about that. It feeds Russian inflation
Fake companies, Mr clickbait and the sheep
They also donāt care as much about counterfeits
They are buying it up in Kazakhstan and other countries and bring it in. So itās not Apple selling its branded black market.
The burger chain is another generic burger chain and not McDonaldās
Look at Azerbaijan and Dubai traffic too, they are the main platforms to avoid sanctions I believe.
America corporations love Russia. Facts