Buyers of ultra-expensive sofas in China are up in arms over the alleged faking of the imported status of their furniture, local media reported yesterday.
Da Vinci, a Singaporean-owned store that has outlets all over China, sells silk-covered sofas, gilded beds and ornate coffee tables for tens of thousands of US dollars.
The firm is accused by Shanghai authorities of falsifying the location in which some of its furniture is made, Chinese state media said.
The investigations into Da Vinci came after China’s national broadcaster CCTV reported on Sunday that some of the furniture labeled as made overseas was in fact manufactured in China’s Guangdong Province, and what the company said was rare wood was in some cases part polymer and other chemicals.
“I am considering returning all furniture and asking for compensation from Da Vinci,” a customer surnamed Ding told the China Daily.
Ding said he had spent nearly 3 million yuan (US$464,570) on furniture from the store.
China, the second-largest economy in the world, is home to 189 billionaires and just under 1 million millionaires. The newly minted are known to book out high-end department stores like Saks Fifth Avenue for private shopping excursions in the US.
The Shanghai Entry-Exit Inspection and Quarantine Bureau, which examined the company’s customs records, said about 10 percent of the products sold as “imported” by Da Vinci were made in China, the Shanghai Daily reported yesterday.
The newspaper said the company marked up the prices of some of its China-made furniture after sending the goods to a free-trade zone in Shanghai, then sending them to its warehouse, labeling them as imported.
The Shanghai Administration for Industry and Commerce said it was probing claims Da Vinci misled consumers about where its products were made and that it would fine the company if it was found guilty.
“We will order Da Vinci to stop selling the relevant products and fine the company if detailed testing reports, which will be released very soon, confirm the initial findings,” spokesman Xu Shang said.
The official investigation had already discovered products on sale for many times their true value, Xu said, including a 92,800 yuan bedstand sold as solid wood, but actually made of fiberboard.
Da Vinci denied the allegations and said all its stated “made in Italy” furniture was imported. The firm declined to comment further.
Da Vinci also has branches in Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia and Indonesia.
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