Consumer Protection and Defense Inspectors of the State of Rio (Procon-RJ) seized around 30 tons of counterfeit washing powder this Thursday (1st), at the Rio Supply Center (Ceasa), in Irajá. The previous day, 20 tons of counterfeit washing powder were also collected. In two days, almost 50 tons of the product were removed from circulation.
Inspectors arrived at Rio’s main supply center after verifying a complaint of the sale of adulterated products in a supermarket in Belford Roxo, Baixada Fluminense. The owner of the store presented an invoice and explained that he had purchased the product from a Ceasa distributor.
At Ceasa, inspectors found tons of washing powder in the storage area of the supply center. At another distributor, the representative said that he had already separated the washing powder so that it would not be sold.
Procon had already received information from the manufacturing industry that the original washing powder was being counterfeited. Two months ago, the manufacturer offered training to Procon inspectors so that they could more easily identify counterfeit products sold on the market.
Identification
With the training, the inspectors learned to identify characteristics such as the absence of a watermark on the product box, which can only be verified using a black light, and the ease of opening the washing powder boxes, which are glued together manually after the counterfeit. In the real case, the application is done using applicator combs on the production line.
The previous day (31), inspectors from the State Secretariat for Consumer Protection (Sedcon) – in a joint action with agents from the Department for the Repression of Crimes Against Intellectual Property – seized 20 tons of counterfeit washing powder.
At the Megabox Supermarket in Olaria, in the northern part of Rio, 18 tons of the product were removed from the shelves. Another two tons were also seized from small supermarkets in Baixada Fluminense.
The president of Procon-RJ, Cássio Coelho, said that “the consumer is often unaware of the fake origin of the product, being attracted by cheaper prices or by its similar appearance to the original. The consumer who buys a counterfeit product loses money, as it does not have the same quality and durability as the original”, he assessed.
