The Orlando Gift Shop "Disney" Pins
Anyone who has spent time driving around the tourist areas in Orlando will have seen Gift Shop after Gift Shop - most with ridiculously large fruit, people, hats or other paraphernalia adorning the roofs of their buildings, so as to attract your attention.
Inside each is an Aladdin's Cave of Disney and Universal Studio souvenirs, each promising to be authentic and a third of the price that you'll pay in the parks. Unfortunately, they are mostly authentically fake - and when it comes to Disney pins: 100% fake.
At first glance, the pins will look and feel like the real thing, but they will be scrappers - pins made from the original Disney moulds (US: molds) that have been discarded and stolen.
They have recently been copying more and more Disneyland Paris, Shanghai and Hong Kong pins, so any pins originating from those parks found on pin boards in WDW will very likely not be authentic.
The problem, though, is the price. These fake pins are usually around $5 each, while the average Open Edition Disney pin now costs about $16 (£12/€14) including tax - more than triple the price. Disney has, in effect, created the perfect conditions for this trade to thrive, because people who do not know better think they are getting a bargain and an affordable way into pin collecting.
Why doesn't Disney do anything about them?
That's a good question, considering they are on the Disney's doorstep - but you also have to wonder why all the red-line-topped baggies of fakes on eBay and Amazon aren't pulled either.
The uncomfortable truth may be that fake pins are good for business. They give newcomers a cheap way to start trading, get them addicted to the hunt and then guide them towards Disney’s own pins once they're home and the collecting bug has bitten. If so, Disney may see the counterfeit trade as more useful than harmful - at least until collectors complain too loudly.
Disney could, in theory, send takedown notices or trade mark infringement complaints to platforms such as eBay, Amazon and Vinted (UK/Europe) to remove counterfeit pins, but it appears that it chooses not to. As an ordinary buyer, you could complain about a listing that you know is selling a fake pin, but without Disney having a standing intellectual property claim, no platform would do anything about it.
If you do buy a fake pin and then complain, you might well get a refund and the seller might have a strike or complaint recorded against their account - but who has the time or money to do that with every fake listing, when it should be down to Disney? (And especially when Vinted requires you to post a fake item back at your own expense before a refund is issued - but that's another rabbit hole altogether!)
A Fake Pins Solution
As I've said elsewhere, the US parks need to take a leaf out of Disneyland Paris' book.
Leave the pin boards to the scrappers & fakes and for guests who legitimately just want to trade them just for fun.
But for Cast Member lanyards, pin pads and at least 2 mega boards per park, there should be a trained Pin Master guarding the board and who only trades Limited Edition for Limited Edition, Limited Release for Limited Release, genuine Open Editions for others, etc. And every pin should be inspected for authenticity before being accepted to trade.