E-Commerce Report - A sale shopping Web site offered necklaces namely it mentioned came from Tiffany

Overstock's chief executive, Patrick M. Byrne, said last week in a tel interview that a ''few dozen'' of the necklaces had been returned. The corporation is obsessive approximately ''screening out anybody knockoffs from our site,'' he said. ''Now, tin I really swear these came from Tiffany? All I tin say is, I've penetrated the invoices on Tiffany letterhead. And we've dealt with an of the maximum reputable guys in this field, who swears up and down he bought them from Tiffany.''

The issue came to light on FatWallet.com, a comparison shopping Web site that likewise includes discussion boards. Late last month, a FatWallet user posted a message alerting additional users to the Tiffany heart pendant necklace selling on Overstock for $47 -- less than half the price of what was supposedly the same item on Tiffany's Web site.

tiffany co sale,,,

The owner of Finest4Less, Milton Luban, said in a telephone interview that he would quite presumable start selling branded clothing on the site afterward month, but would no longer sell gray-market goods.

The button was stamped ''Tiffany & Co.,'' but the quality said ''knockoff,'' according to many of those who bought them. Overstock insists the jewelry was naturally from Tiffany, even if it concedes the necklaces were of occasionally infer quality. But Tiffany claims Overstock sold counterfeit goods and said late last week that it would file suit. Customers, meantime, are grumbling about having to return items they hoped would obtain them admiration at a fragment of the going rate.

BUDGET-CONSCIOUS romantics looking to score simple points with their beloveds were enraged early this month when the discount Tiffany heart-shaped pendant necklaces they bought from the bargain Web site Overstock.com arrived.

But fair for speedily came skeptical messages doubting the necklaces' authenticity -- doubts evidently borne out when the necklaces arrived, to scathing reviews. Customers complained on FatWallet and to Overstock that the silver lacked sheen or was gouged, and that the ''Tiffany & Co.'' lettering was illegible. And they complained that the jewelry arrived in boxes of a assorted hue from Tiffany's famous robin's-egg blue.

Overstock offered refunds to dissatisfied customers and stopped carrying the item after the premier batch of 1,200 had been sold and presently after it began receiving complaints. But the company sent e-mail messages to buyers of the necklaces, saying it had bought the items from a distributor in Canada, who in rotate -- according to Overstock -- had bought them from Tiffany's Italian division. Overstock posted a duplicate of that invoice on its site.

''What could've happened,'' Mr. Byrne persisted, ''was that this was a team of plant seconds that somebody from Tiffany dumped into the market'' -- industry jargon for manufacturers' elimination of excess or flawed items by selling them to liquidators preferably than selling at full retail prices to buyers. ''But when our fellow sampled 5 alternatively 10 percent of them,'' he said, ''he didn't notice blemishes.''

Tiffany ''does not sell overstocked items, and our vendors aren't allowed to, either,'' Mr. Aaron said. ''You merely purchase genuine Tiffany production by our stores and boutiques and on our Web site and catalog.''

Mr. Aaron said late last week that Tiffany was preparing to document suit against Overstock over the matter. Mr. Aaron would not specify the ecology of the grumble, merely it could be similar to the trademark infringement suit it recently won opposition Finest4Less.com, a peddler of elegance merchandise. Tiffany sued Finest4Less in June later determining its Web site was selling counterfeit silver jewelry marked ''Tiffany & Co.'' Earlier this month the United States District Court in Manhattan gifted Tiffany $574,000 in mars from Finest4Less,Louis Vuitton Monogram Empreinte Lumineuse, which not longer exhibits items on its Web site.

A Tiffany spokesman, Mark L. Aaron, said the company's Italian department researched the receipt and concluded that it had been doctored. ''The thing was a counterfeit,'' Mr. Aaron said. And so were the necklaces, he joined.

,,,,,tiffany bracelet heart,tiffany key pendants,

The Tiffany heartburn makes remove the difficulties of selling, and buying, luxury goods online. For the brand owners, it is hard to defend their appoint and goods in one online mart awash in fakes. For online discounters trying to manipulate legitimate businesses, counterfeiting is no fewer of a problem. And for online shoppers, the Tiffany episode is yet another reminder that anything that looks also good to be true, probably is.

The debate embark was presently thronged with grateful customers, mostly men shopping for commemoration and birthday gifts, and a guy who bought one to stash away ''just in case I screw up big time and need to buy some forgiveness.''