Teens are using the popular social media app TikTok to show each other how to find fake luxury products, called “dupes,” according to a report by CNBC.
One woman, named Holly Yazdi, put up a video on how to fake a Cartier ring that cost $1,650, for under $20. The post has 230,000 likes.
“Safe cartier ring replica from amazon!!” the caption for the video reads. “Doesn’t oxidize and true to size.”
The video is 11 seconds long and got 1 million views overnight.
“I have an expensive taste for an empty wallet, and after posting these videos I realize others do too,” she said in an email to CNBC. “Now with the attention my videos have gained, I receive messages and comments with suggestions of what people want to see. Obviously, I’m not going to get something I wouldn’t use myself, but my viewers have exposed me to a lot of things I really do want to get.”
Finding dupes is a huge genre on TikTok, as many teens want to have brands like Chanel, Gucci, Lululemon and Louis Vuitton, but can’t necessarily afford it.
Many videos show how to style clothes by painting and ironing on logos.
Jason Dorsey, a Gen Z speaker and president of the Center for Generational Kinetics said teens who grew up around the recession probably learned to be more cost-conscious, and this has shaped how they interact with the world. They’re also the most photographed of any generation before them.
“That’s important because if you’re spending a lot of money to buy your wardrobe, you run out of outfits quickly,” Dorsey said. “You need to buy them inexpensively to have a lot of outfits to wear.”
“They want to get things at a really good deal, or they want to buy things that are going to last a long time,” he also said.
