The Far East: A Sort of Tribute

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From Manila to Bangkok these days, anyone who needs a tube of toothpaste has his choice of a baker's dozen of red-and-white packaged brands with remarkably similar names: Coalgate, Goalgate, Goldkey, Goldcat and Goldrat. The fact that all these ring like the name of the world's bestselling toothpaste—Colgate—is no coincidence. With the indulgent tolerance of Asian governments, most notably in Formosa, hustling commercial pirates are cashing in all over the Far East by duplicating U.S. consumer products—at least on the outside.

The look-alike brands, which usually sell for less than half the price of the U.S. original, cover a wide spectrum. They include Yalf locks, N & N chocolates, Del Mundo catsup, Pang's (Pond's) cold cream, Sehnring (Schering) drugs, and no fewer than five imitations—Hotex, Potex, Katex, Mytex and Nestex—of another familiar U.S. product.

The piracy costs U.S. companies several millions a year in lost sales, but some U.S. businessmen in the Far East consider it a backhanded tribute to the competitive strength of U.S. goods. Confesses one Formosan drug maker: "If our product does not look like the U.S. original, we cannot sell it."