阿根廷超级山寨大卖场模式出口美国？

    意识到机会的来临，一些有事业心的当地人开始买地填池、搭建仓库、雇佣保安，然后把摊位租出去。20年后，La Salada成了一头巨兽。即便不是世界最大，它也是拉丁美洲这类购物市场中最大的。它有3万个零售点，在每个月的12个集市日中，每天流动的商品总值预计高达3亿比索（以官方汇率约合5000万美元）。这里的消费者和店老板来自于阿根廷的每个角落，通常要乘长达12个小时的大巴。看一下商品的价格便容易明白为什么人们愿意跋山涉水来这里——运动鞋卖50-60比索（约合10美元），T恤只卖15比索（不到3美元）。而CD和DVD只要几分钱。

    据卡斯蒂略称，价格低的原因很简单：没有中间商。这3万个摊位中，大多数摊位的衣服自产自销，小本经营。通过中间商交易时，他们只能分到最终售价的一部分利润；而直接出售时，他们能把售价翻一番，而且价格对消费者来说仍然极低。卡斯蒂略称，大约有100万人直接或间接地靠La Salada的摊位生活。

    当然，La Salada有许多批评者。从音乐公司行会组织到欧盟和美国的贸易代表，每个人都把La Salada视为世界最大的假冒产品供应地之一。匆匆一瞥，就能发现至少一半的在售产品是名牌仿制品——如耐克（Nike），阿迪达斯（Adidas）等——而且还有许多摊位卖盗版电影、音乐和软件。

    尽管很难辩解出售拷贝的DVD不是盗窃，但其他需要生产的产品似乎处在法律的灰色地带，至少在卡斯蒂略的眼里是这样的。他说，还没有一家服装品牌找他投诉过。“从来没有人来说，‘老兄，我们怎么解决这事？’”

    卡斯蒂略辩称那些品牌是集市的受益者：冒牌产品给它们做了免费宣传。而且，反正买假货的人根本就没钱去买真品，这种说法受到一项欧盟出资做的研究报告的支持。（虽然这些衣服的质量并非上乘，但也不差。）

    “一个花10比索买了一件耐克T恤的人，是不会花500比索去购物中心买一件的真货的，”卡斯蒂略说。“因为如果那样的话，他们就没钱吃饭了。”

    《外交事务》（Foreign Affairs）杂志最近的一篇名为《假装你可以，直到成功》（Fake It Till You Make It）的文章支持了卡斯蒂略对卖假名牌泰然处之的态度。在文章中，《山寨经济：模仿激发创新之谜》（The Knockoff Economy: How Imitation Sparks Innovation）一书的作者争辩说，假冒产品在发展中国家的中产阶级中培育了未来的消费者资源。

    对卡斯蒂略来说，La Salada是一场受欺骗的小厂商和消费者对中间商和零售商的胜利，也是发展中国家的人民保护自己不受大型经济利益集团侵害的例子。

    至于偷税漏税和造假的指控？那不过是担心失去高利润的经销商搬弄出来转移注意力的事。

    “人们可能会说我们卖得便宜是因为我们不交税，是因为我们假冒名牌。这么说真是站着说话不腰疼，”卡斯蒂略说。

    这个世界将很快就能看到La Salada模式是否已经做好了出口的准备。卡斯蒂略说，在阿根廷的门多萨商场将在1年内达到5000个摊位的规模，它离智利和智利的数百万消费者只有几英里远。而且阿根廷政府已经将La Salada的代表们纳入安哥拉、越南以及其他一些国家的贸易团，以向国外出口这一模式。尽管出口到迈阿密不容易，但在你周围的某个发展中国家，La Salada模式可能真的很快就要出现。（财富中文网）

    译者：默默 

    Sensing an opportunity, a few enterprising locals bought the land, filled the pools, put up simple warehouses, hired security, and rented out stalls. Twenty years later, La Salada is a gargantuan beast. The largest such mall in Latin America, if not the world, it has some 30,000 retail posts that together move merchandise worth an estimated 300 million pesos (about $50 million at the official exchange rate) on each of the 12 market days every month. Consumers and shop owners come from all over Argentina, often on 12-hour bus rides, which is easy to understand after seeing the prices. Sneakers go for 50-to-60 pesos (about $10) while t-shirts are 15 pesos (less than $3). And CDs and DVDs go for pennies.

    According to Castillo, the reason for the low prices is simple: no middlemen. Most of the 30,000 posts are filled by small businesses that make their own clothing. Instead of getting a fraction of the final price, as they did with middlemen, they can double their prices and still offer rock-bottom deals. Castillo claims that some 1 million people live off the stalls at La Salada, both directly and indirectly.

    Of course, La Salada has many detractors. Everyone from music company trade groups to the EU and the U.S. Trade Representative have pegged La Salada as one of the world's biggest counterfeit goods vendors. At a quick glance, at least half of the goods sold are name-brand knockoffs –-- Nike (NKE), Adidas, and the like -- and scores of stalls sell pirated movies, music, and software.

    While it's hard to argue that selling a copied DVD is not theft, the other goods -- which require manufacturing -- seem to fall in a legal gray area, at least in Castillo's eyes. He says that not one clothing brand has approached him with complaints. "No one ever came to say, 'Man, how can we fix this?'"

    Castillo argues that the brands benefit from the fair: The fake goods provide free publicity, and the people who buy them don't have the money to buy originals anyway, assertions supported by an EU-funded report. (While the clothing isn't top quality, it's not bad.)

    "A person who buys a t-shirt that says Nike for 10 pesos is not going to buy one for 500 in a shopping mall," Castillo says. "Because then he doesn't eat."

    Castillo's equanimity towards counterfeiting is backed by the recent Foreign Affairs article "Fake It Till You Make It," in which the authors of The Knockoff Economy: How Imitation Sparks Innovation argue that counterfeits create future customers among the developing world middle class.

    For Castillo, La Salada is a triumph over middlemen and retailers who gouge the small manufacturer and consumer, and an example of citizens of developing countries protecting themselves from large economic interests.

    And the accusations of tax evasion and counterfeiting? They're just diversions from resellers worried about losing high margins.

    "It's easy to say that here we sell cheaply because we don't pay taxes or we counterfeit brands, but come on," Castillo says.

    The world will soon see if the La Salada model is ready for export. The Mendoza mall in Argentina, which Castillo says will have 5,000 stalls within a year, is just miles from Chile and its millions of consumers. And the Argentine government has included representatives of La Salada on trade missions -- to Angola and Vietnam, among others -- to export the model abroad. While Miami will be a hard sell, a La Salada may indeed be coming soon to a developing country near you.