“They’re independent business entities regulated by themselves,” he said.
This lack of oversight, say many, could result in the sale of counterfeit items such as sunglasses, sneakers and pro football jerseys.
On Jan. 11, the Monroe Police Department seized more than 2,100 counterfeit pro football jerseys after raids were conducted at Traders World Market on Union Road.
Monroe police were assisted by a private investigator from the National Football League in raiding four booths at the flea market.
Police said felony trademark counterfeit charges are being sought through the Lebanon Municipal Court on four vendors.
Since May 2008, Monroe police have arrested more than 20 counterfeiters, predominately at the flea market in Warren County.
“Like any businesses, you can have good operators and you can have not so good operators,” Blakewood said. “(They) may not have been paying as close attention as they should have to what vendors were doing or selling.”
The fashion industry has launched a high-profile campaign asking consumers to stop purchasing fake designer goods.
But some shoppers believe that buying a “Gucci” purse knockoff at one-quarter the price doesn’t harm anyone. In fact, Felicia Bell of Dayton thinks the flea market prices are too high.
“I know some people like it, but I don’t even look at it here,” she said while shopping at the Treasure Aisles flea market in Monroe. “I know I can buy these same bags in New York for $20 when they sell them for $100 around here.”
Counterfeiters bad for business, flea markets say
“I come here to get out of the house and get some DVDs and dog food,” said Felicia Bell of Dayton as she shopped at Treasure Aisles flea market on Garver Road in Monroe on Saturday, Jan. 23.
She’s far from alone. Monroe has become a Mecca of inexpensive merchandise, boasting two of Ohio’s largest flea markets flanking Interstate 75.
But in addition to 25 cent bags of Iams, some shoppers are drawn to counterfeit fare.
Raids in early January netted more than 2,100 counterfeit pro sports jerseys from Traders World Markets in Warren County, where dozens of vendors have been charged in recent years with selling fake items.
Jay Frick, the manager of Traders World, said his flea market tries to prevent counterfeit items from being sold at the Union Road market, which opened in 1984. In the booth rental agreement, there is a provision that says vendors are not to sell or display copies or counterfeit merchandise.
He said it was a total surprise to him that the sports jerseys confiscated in January could be counterfeit.
“We have the police here every weekend to help us monitor everything. It’s always been wide open here for people to see, and that was just an absolute surprise,” Frick said.
He said an investigator from the National Football League assisting Monroe police in the raid told him that it is hard to tell the difference between counterfeit jerseys and the real thing.
“He said that it would be hard for him to tell the difference, and he knows what to look for,” Frick said. “I would have never had a clue. I just thought it was the real thing.”
Nevertheless, Frick said he tries to keep an eye on what vendors are selling at the flea market that attracts 16,000 to 20,000 shoppers each weekend.
“We try to be on top of everything we can. This was a new one on us, these jerseys,” he said.
“Nobody ever sent us any printed piece of paper that said watch out for this.”
Mark Blakewood, executive director of the National Flea Market Association, said there is no oversight of flea markets because they are self-regulated.
“It’s kind of like the wild west days. You’ve got some that do a good job (watching for counterfeit items), and you’ve got some that are trying to make ends meet because they inherited an empty warehouse or strip mall, and they opened a flea market,” he said.
“Until somebody is in it for the long haul and good for the industry, you’re going to have a little bit of that type of operation.”
Counterfeit merchandise not only hurts competition, but also the overall image of flea-market vendors, said Ron Hensley of Fairfield and Jeff Dawson of Hamilton. They own a stall at Treasure Aisles where they sell Airsoft guns and T-shirts.
“It makes everybody look bad,” Dawson said. “We are not all crooks.”
Both said they feel the flea market looks out for fake items and enforces sales rules, like not selling Airsoft guns to minors. Making sure his competitors are held to the same standards is important, Hensley said. He depends on his sales to support himself.
“I got laid off. There isn’t a lot of work out there,” he said. “This pretty much helps pay for groceries.”
Greg Dove, president of Levin Service Co., which owns Treasure Aisles (which was formerly known as Turtle Creek Flea Market) on Garver Road and Caesar Creek Markets in Wilmington, said the company is a member of NFMA and strives to live under its ethics and policies.
“One of them is not selling knockoff or counterfeit items. The association, as a group, has worked with some of the agencies — (such as) the film industry — to prevent that,” he said.
“As an organization, we police ourselves. If we see somebody selling copies of CDs or movies or things that are obviously copies, we tell them to either remove that merchandise or we’re going to confiscate it.”
Dove said Treasure Aisles’ policy is: “the selling of counterfeit merchandise is not permitted at the market. This includes counterfeit merchandise of any kind. Selling illegal items is bad for the market and any vendor caught selling such merchandise may be subject to eviction. Please, be extremely cautious when purchasing stock.”
He said the flea market, which opened in 1992, has four to five hundred vendors outside and a couple of hundreds more inside in the summer, so it is hard to police items.
“Something is going to sneak through,” Dove said.
“As a policy, we try to keep it out, we police it and it’s clearly written in our rules. We take a lot of effort because we know that is a mark on the industry, and we’re trying very hard to upgrade our image, and it’s hard to do when we keep getting lumped in with scofflaws.”
As the only vendor of used men’s uniforms inside Treasure Aisles, Wanda Keefe said she doesn’t have much competition. But with the economy, sales are tough enough. It bothers her to hear about vendors selling counterfeit items because it makes it that much more difficult to do business.
“You do have people selling licensed stuff and then people come in with knockoffs. It’s bad for business,” she said. “I am sure they try to police it. I just don’t know what they can do to really prevent it.”
Don Boldt, the general manager of Caesar Creek Markets and Treasurer Aisles, said he thinks the sale of counterfeit items at flea markets is a “massive problem countrywide.”
“I think attacking people or local vendors is not going to stem the tide. I think the biggest problem is at our ports where this merchandise is being brought in in containers, and the containers aren’t being checked, and the stuff hits the streets,” he said.
“At the local level all we can do is try to stamp it down as best we can.”
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