Precis

Fake fashion has become big business. From Gucci to Balenciaga to sports gear and handbags, replica designer brands are everywhere.

Social media platforms promote the look and facilitate the sales and if you don't have a fake, chances are you'll know someone who does.

But most people have no idea who is behind it.

International crime syndicates have established themselves in Manchester, making it the counterfeit capital of the UK with their goods flooding across Europe.

Their enterprises are implicated in everything from copyright infringement to human trafficking, money laundering and even terrorism.

Foreign Correspondent returns on February 29 with an investigation into the fake fashion business by reporter Naomi Selvaratnam.

Naomi's story takes us inside the shadowy world of the counterfeit industry.

With exclusive access to one of Europe's specialist police taskforces working to stamp out the trade, she traces the money trail and reveals the organised criminal networks running these global chains.

Naomi has also gained access to world leading authenticators to see how they spot the fakes.

And there's some tips for those viewers who may want to double check their purchases.

Episode teaser

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: It’s 5am in Manchester in the UK, and a team of investigators is preparing to strike.

Police Officer: "Police! Stay where you are!”

00:10

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: This police taskforce specialises in dealing with high level criminal operations. It’s not drugs or weapons they’re looking for, it’s clothes. Tonnes of fake designer wear with a street value  of more than 1.5 million dollars.  Fake fashion has become big business.

00:22

ELKE BIECHELE, RISIKOTEK CEO: All you have to do is put the logo and put some colours and then sell it. And with that you can achieve profit margins of like 40, 50, 60, a hundred times more than what you would be able to do otherwise.

00:45

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER: You can literally buy a fake product through a video by one click of a purchase.

00:58

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: Counterfeiting is one of the largest sources of criminal income worldwide and Europe's a major market.

01:06

ELKE BIECHELE, RISIKOTEK CEO: It’s big. The estimates are in the trillions, some estimate four and a half trillion, and the growth rates are exponential.

01:12

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: Counterfeiting is often a front for organised crime, funding everything from terrorism to human trafficking.

01:21

SUPERINTENDENT NEIL BLACKWOOD, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE: I've been around serious and organised crime and counter-terrorism for a long time. I've never seen any organised crime groups as developed as these groups are. The reward versus the risk, it's in counterfeiting. So if I were that way inclined, that would be the crime I'd get into.

01:29

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  In the UK, the

01:50

Super:
Naomi Selvaratnam

demand for fake fashion has never been greater. We’re taking you inside the shadowy world of the counterfeit fashion business. We’ll reveal the organised criminal networks running these groups, trace complex money trails and meet the police units fighting to stamp it out.

01:52

Luxury brand stores

Music

02:11

Title: FAKING IT

02:16

Manchester GVs

02:30

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER  I’m in Manchester,

03:02

Naomi outside Selfridges. Manchester GVs continue

once the epicentre of Britain’s manufacturing revolution.  It’s also a hot contender to take over London as the fashion capital of the UK.

03:04

Benny G spruiking on street

BENNY G: “Manchester, who wants to be in my video real quick?!“

03:20

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: Meet Benny G, one of the city’s biggest fashion TikTok creators.

03:22

Benny interviewing young man on street

BENNY G: “What’s one fashion trend you really want to end? Something you proper hatin’, like get that in the bin?”

MAN: “Skinny jeans.”

BENNY G: “Ooh! Spray on skinnies?”

MAN: “Yeah. Horrible.”

BENNY G: “When you can see the ball arcs and everything? Yeah, yeah, yeah.”

MAN: “Horrible.”

03:27

Young people on Manchester streets

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: If you want to know anything about style in this city, Benny’s the one to ask.

“So Benny, can you describe what Manchester's style is like?”

03:45

Naomi walks with Benny

BENNY G:  Well, Manchester fashion, it's me, you know, it's like you wear what you want, you do what you want, you say what you want. But we're all nice to each other and it's like a mix of vintage, high fashion, you know, we've got Selfridges there, my nana's favourite, we've got Louis Vuitton, Burberry. But in Manchester, as long as you do stuff with soul then we all appreciate each other, which I love. And guess what? In December Chanel are bringing their fashion show here, which I'm buzzing about. So big up to Chanel doing it in Manny.

03:53

Manchester GVs

Music

04:20

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: So, there's clearly a market for designer fashion here.

04:24

Benny interview

BENNY G:  Yeah. You can tell from all the shops there’s a big market for it.

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  And what about the people that can’t afford designer goods? 

BENNY G:  There’s a market for that as well.

04:26

Manchester, fashion conscious young people

Music

04:36

BENNY G:  Nearly every young person I know has a fake.

04:40

Benny interview

Some of the fakes are really good, you know , the knockoffs, when they do get knocked off the back of the truck and they are really real and taken off their labels, who some of the fakes knows? But then you've got the awful fake stuff like the Cucci,  where you've got the interlocked Cs like this instead of the interlocked Gs. And you see one of your mates with it and you're like, that doesn't even exist.

04:45

Shopfronts

It changed I reckon in the last 10 years with the rise of social media.

05:04

Benny interview

You've seen someone else buying a fake on social media and you're like, ‘oh, that actually looks really good. I can wear it to my school prom and I'm going to kiss six girls that night because of my Cucci shirt, my fake Gucci.’

05:13

Manchester fashion conscious young people

But are they going to question it? No, because you're already dressed well.

05:25

Music

05:32

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:   By night, Manchester is a thriving fashion hotspot. It’s hard to know what’s real and what’s not.

05:36

Sophie and Ella preparing to go out

Sophie Hinton and her friend Ella are getting ready to go out. Sophie’s an influencer with a large social media following. She knows what’s on trend. What are the popular things that people are sort of wearing out?

05:48

SOPHIE HINTON: That Prada nylon bag. Everyone had that at one point.

ELLA: Or the Chanel classic flap. Everyone seems to want that as well.

SOPHIE HINTON: Which I think is quite crazy because that’s probably one of the most expensive bags so that’s the least is it attainable.

06:04

Social media feed

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  Because you're both on social media, you both have a following, how much are you seeing of designer stuff online and how much does it build the pressure?

06:18

ELLA: It’s definitely everywhere.

SOPHIE: You can’t escape it, can you?

ELLA: No, and on social media

06:24

Designer bags

it’s different to real life, you can’t tell if it’s fake because you can’t touch it, you can’t feel it, it’s just a picture.

06:30

Naomi with Sophia and Ella looking at bag

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: Quality fakes are easy to get; they can be bought online and delivered within days… Is that a real designer bag, Ella?

ELLA: It’s not, no. (Laughs)

SOPHIE: Guilty.

ELLA: I actually bought it when I was 17 I think.

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: How'd you get it?

ELLA: It was online. I think I paid about 25 pounds for it in total.

SOPHIE: Bargain.

06:39

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: How's the quality of the fakes? Because to someone who is holding this and walking past you on the street, I would never be able to tell.

ELLA: Yeah, the quality of them is great.  It varies.

SOPHIE:  I think it depends what you pay. If you pay quite a bit, still a fraction of the price, then you can get real leather, it even has the tags on as if you bought it from the brand.

07:03

Designer brand shops

Music

07:25

Driving to Luxe Collective

07:36

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: As luxury fakes get more sophisticated, spotting them can be really hard. You need an expert eye.  I’m about an hour outside of Manchester and I've come to one of the newest fashion luxury resellers in the UK. These guys specialise in spotting counterfeits…

07:41

Naomi meets with Ben

Hi Ben, hi, how are you?

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER: I’m good thank you.

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  So, what is this?

07:59

Ben and Naomi in Luxe Collective photo studio

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER: So this is our photography studio. So basically all the products will come here in the morning and then we'll photograph them, we'll upload them and then they'll be put on the website that night. 

08:07

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  This is the headquarters of fashion reseller, Luxe Collective. Every year they buy millions of dollars' worth of pre-owned goods and sell them back into the market. And every one of them has to be verified as real before they’re on-sold.

08:17

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER:  If you’re only buying it to make people think it’s real then you’re not buying it for the right reasons in the first place right? I think it says more about the person.

08:33

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  Ben Gallagher is the 24-year old co-founder. He’s also an experienced authenticator… How do you learn how to spot a fake essentially?

08:42

Ben interview

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER:  Authentication is just an opinion. So, it's no sort of formal training when you're trying to learn how to authenticate goods. So, the only way to become an authenticator is just to see as much product as possible. You learn what's real. You learn what's fake, you learn if it comes from a different type of season and why the material is slightly different. And you start to learn what to look out for when you're looking for a fake.

08:54

Storage of designer goods

So this is basically where we keep all of our products. They come up here and we store them.

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  Where are these fakes coming from?

09:17

Ben interview

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER: So I think there's like three main regions in the world where they're all originating from and they’re mainly getting manufactured in places like  China and Hong Kong, and then a lot of distribution coming from Turkey as well.

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  And they basically feed into Europe and then end up in the UK.

09:32

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER:  Yeah, absolutely. I think China have a massive distribution centre. So they can ship things out really easily. But I think because Turkey’s on the border of like all these different areas in the world, it's very easy for them to come from Turkey. But China are the biggest manufacturers.

09:43

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  Every year, the team checks around 20,000 individual designer goods.

10:03

Man authenticating shoes

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER:  Some of them are really good. Like it takes like specialist authenticators to know that they are not a real product. So if you're walking down the street and you're wearing one, you wouldn't probably look twice at it.

10:10

Ben interview

I think in the fake world they label them as like B grade, A grade, AAA grade.

10:21

Woman examining goods

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  New technology like AI is struggling to detect the latest counterfeits: it’s still a physical examination that can really catch them out.

10:26

Ben and woman examine bag

Music

10:41

Ban and Naomi with bags

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  Ben takes me through the process of how to identify a fake.

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER:  So these are actually a Louis Vuitton bag and it's a special edition one. And this is an item that someone submitted to us, but it is not a genuine product, but we do luckily have the genuine version of it in. So it's really good when this happens because it means that we can look for the differences.

10:45

So let's have a little look at them.

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  So I'm assuming it's things like the stitching that we're looking at.

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER:    Yeah, the heat stamp, which is basically where the logo is, the materials, so like the colour of them, how shiny they are, how matte they are.

11:10

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: I would be useless at this. Apparently, it takes a good nose to spot a fake.

11:30

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER:   One important thing we'll do is like smell it, because the smell of the bag can really be like an off-putting thing for fakes. If you smell it, it smells of glue, it smells of like cheap materials, then it's often a fake. Whereas Louis Vuitton should have a nice, strong, nice smelling smell.

11:35

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  A nice smelling smell.

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER: Not nice. When I say nice, I mean like nice in the bag world.

11:53

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: Like I was going to say, it's really hard to discern.

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER: Let me smell that one. Yeah, so it's not a nice smelling smell-

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: No, it smells horrible.

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER:  So, like, this is this smell of Louis Vuitton. So we often say, like, it smells a bit like cheese. 

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  Yeah, Louis Vuitton stinks.

12:00

Ben sniffs bag

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER: Yeah. Honestly, like the inside of Louis Vuitton bags, I don't know whether it's the glue they use or, yeah, the type of stitching that they use. But it does smell of cheese quite a lot. 

12:18

Cheetham Hill GVs

Music

12:35

Naomi walking, Cheetham Hill

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  Many of the products that come from overseas end up in Manchester. Some arrive ready for sale, others come unbranded to avoid detection, and have their labels attached once they get here. In Manchester, fake fashion is so huge there’s a road that’s known as Counterfeit Street.  It’s in the suburb of Cheetham Hill.

12:51

Naomi walks with Neil Blackwood

It’s a place Detective Superintendent Neil Blackwood knows well.

13:17

So Neil, why do they call this Counterfeit Street?

DETECTIVE SUPERINTENDENT NEIL BLACKWOOD, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE: This area accounted for at least half the counterfeit supply across the UK. 

13:22

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: For the last year police have been tasked with smashing this criminal industry with a specialist unit called Operation Vulcan… 

13:32

Shuttered counterfeit stores

So all of these stores were selling fakes?

DETECTIVE SUPERINTENDENT NEIL BLACKWOOD, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE:  Yeah, absolutely. So shutters there, that one there, all that red brick above the top there, that was one enormous shop, almost like you’d find in a mall, really big. This, this property here, the grey one, is being refurbished now, which is great to see. But all this and all around the corner was counterfeit shops. Everything around that corner was counterfeit shops.

13:41

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  And people knew that this was the place to come to get fakes?

14:04

DETECTIVE SUPERINTENDENT NEIL BLACKWOOD, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE:   Yeah, absolutely. You'd see five, six hundred people on the streets at any one time looking for what they perceived to be that counterfeit bargain. So that was one of our real challenges to start with because it was so well-known. People were coming from far and wide to be here.

14:07

Shuttered counterfeit shops

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: Each year, it was estimated more than 700 million dollars' worth of fakes were sold from just this tiny patch.

14:22

Naomi walks with Neil Blackwood

What kinds of fakes could you get here? 

DETECTIVE SUPERINTENDENT NEIL BLACKWOOD, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE: Anything. I mean primarily it would be fashion, so clothing, footwear, but jewellery, watches, perfumes. Anything that the general public wants at that point.

14:31

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: And it's really quiet here now. What's going on? 

DETECTIVE SUPERINTENDENT NEIL BLACKWOOD, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE:  Well, we've hit it really hard.

14:47

Police raid on counterfeiting operation

POLICE OFFICER:  “Police! Police!”

14:54

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  This was one of the more than 100 raids that have been carried out in just a year. The goods they’ve seized were all destined for sale across Europe and the UK.

15:02

Naomi with Jen Kelly

One of Operation Vulcan’s leading officers is Detective Chief Inspector Jen Kelly. She’s showing me some of the goods her team’s seized.

15:22

Jen Kelly shows seized goods

DETECTIVE CHIEF INSPECTOR JEN KELLY, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE: I'd say this is about 5 to 10% of what we've seized. Overall, we've seized over 1000 tonnes of counterfeit goods in Cheetham Hill. We've repurposed 900 tonnes. So, this is a small proportion. Each cell here has, you know, floor to ceiling of counterfeit goods. Actually, you can see there's like a variety of products, perfumes, belts, luxury items, all counterfeit, destined for the streets. 

15:34

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  And where were the goods going to end up?

16:01

DETECTIVE CHIEF INSPECTOR JEN KELLY, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE:   They were destined for further afield, all across the UK and sometimes abroad as well.

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  Every single one of these rooms is just filled to the brim,

16:04

Naomi to camera

literally up to the ceiling with fake goods that have been seized. And this is just a tiny fraction of 1000 tonnes that the team seized. And that's just one team in the UK.

16:15

Operation Vulcan offices

Operation Vulcan isn’t just seizing the goods. In the course of their investigation, they’ve uncovered a complex criminal web.

16:28

Blackwood in office

DETECTIVE SUPERINTENDENT NEIL BLACKWOOD, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE:  So, we mapped 33 UK-based organised crime groups who were concerned in the supply of counterfeiting across Cheetham Hill.

16:39

Blackwood interview. Super:
Det. Supt. Neil Blackwood
GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE

A normal area in Manchester might have two or three organised crime groups concerned in money laundering, drug supply, whatever. This had 33 just involved in this tiny area.

16:47

Police ram door. Operation GVS

Because one, it was so lucrative, but two, they all cooperated, which again is quite unique to counterfeiting. I think the profits that were available made it really, really easy for them to thrive.

16:58

Police vans, sirens blaring

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: Police are surprised at the level of sophistication involved.

17:13

Aerial. Stacks of containers

DETECTIVE SUPERINTENDENT NEIL BLACKWOOD, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE: I’ve been around serious and organised crime and counterterrorism for a long time. I've never seen any organised crime groups developed as these groups are. To be able to move tonnes, we're talking metric tonnes of goods and sell them in such a way, it's unheard of.

17:20

Police saw open container

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: Investigators say those same networks are being used to commit other types of crime.

17:38

DETECTIVE SUPERINTENDENT NEIL BLACKWOOD, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE:   They're concerned in the supply of drugs, which was a real problem in Cheetham Hill.

17:46

Blackwood interview

So, the supply of prescription medication was killing people.

17:51

Police search for drugs, arrest drug dealer

So that was the epicentre for that supply in Manchester, and it was all connected to the shops and the organised crime groups.

17:56

Blackwood interview

So, they'd basically diversified. They'd seen a market and gone, okay, we can supply that as well.

18:12

Police open container

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  It’s estimated the counterfeiting industry costs the UK economy 16 billion dollars every year. Criminals are laundering their profits through legitimate businesses.

18:17

Elke at computer

Elke Biechele is an expert in following the money.  She's been doing it for more than 20 years for some of the world’s biggest banks.

18:32

Elke interview

ELKE BIECHELE, RISIKOTEK CEO: So this case is really interesting. He got raided and he paid an 11,500 pounds fine on a stock that has a street market value of 2.5 million. And when we looked closer, what was his annual return? It's like 6.9 million annual return.

18:43

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  She’s taking me through one of the Manchester cases which police uncovered.

19:01

ELKE BIECHELE, RISIKOTEK CEO:  So 6.9 million is a huge turnover. What does he do with this money and how does he park it? How does he integrate it back in society so that it looks legitimate?  So we get to this area here, which is legitimate looking businesses.

19:06

And then we find this one, which is a restaurant. And so then we follow this trail further, what does he do with the restaurants? And then we can find all these other restaurants here as well. Very cash rich restaurants where you can funnel lots of money through.

19:22

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: How often do you see that people who are involved in counterfeiting and money laundering have these types of businesses?

19:39

ELKE BIECHELE, RISIKOTEK CEO: When you have illicit gains, you need an explanation why you have them. And so you need to push them through companies that look legitimate. Restaurants. And there's even a luxury car dealership in there, and many other businesses that you push the money through, you declare it, you pay tax from it. But then these restaurants, when you visit them, they might mostly, not very busy, but they have huge annual returns. So then we know he is parking his money through those kinds of restaurants and then laundering it.

19:45

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  So after being found with two and a half million pounds worth of counterfeit goods, he was let off with an 11 and half thousand pound fine. That doesn't seem like very much.

20:19

ELKE BIECHELE, RISIKOTEK CEO:  Yeah, absolutely. The fines are a drop in the ocean.

20:28

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: The money from this crime usually travels far beyond the UK.

20:32

ELKE BIECHELE, RISIKOTEK CEO:  Once you send your goods and once you receive money, then it leaves that jurisdiction, it leaves that location and often enough it becomes just invisible. It's very, very hard to track it. It can go across the globe two times, three times, and it's very difficult to find it again.

20:39

Early morning. Operation Vulcan HQ

Music

20:57

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: It’s 4am on a Tuesday morning and Operation Vulcan's had a breakthrough. Weeks of surveillance have gone into this moment. They've uncovered a suspected counterfeiting operation right in the heart of Cheetham Hill.

21:04

Neil Blackwood addresses officers

DETECTIVE SUPERINTENDENT NEIL BLACKWOOD, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE: Morning, you lot.... It’s a big premises. You're going to get some designated posts, I want you to go to them . On the ground floor it’s fairly legit, sort of textile warehouse, the upstairs floors potentially have some sewing machines in them, potentially for counterfeiting goods. Yeah. Pull up at the carpark. Alright thanks you lot.

21:22

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  What do you know about the group that you’re targeting?

21:49

Neil Blackwood interview

DETECTIVE SUPERINTENDENT NEIL BLACKWOOD, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE: We’ve arrested one of them previously for trademark act offences so we know they’re trading in counterfeit goods. We know they’re associated with an organised crime group. They’ve got warnings for drugs and violence, so they’re not just going to be concerns in counterfeiting, they’re going to be associated with lots of other avenues and streams and criminality which they’ll exploit.

21:52

Operation Vulcan raid on warehouse

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  Operation Vulcan is on the move. Within minutes, they arrive at the warehouse. The team sets up. They get the signal, and strike.

22:12

POLICE OFFICER: “Police! police! Stay where you are!”

22:26

Music

22:30

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  Each floor of the warehouse is filled with hidden rooms.

22:44

Naomi joins Jen Kelly during raid

DETECTIVE CHIEF INSPECTOR JEN KELLY, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE: Every door will need to be opened and searched, because there’ll be lots of different criminality in the building. Just watch the glass here.

22:50

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  This room is filled with fakes. There’s also printing equipment, which the counterfeiters were using to attach the branding onto unlabelled products.

23:07

POLICE OFFICER:  I don’t think that Vans are made in Cheetham Hill, do you?

23:16

Naomi with Police Officer

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: Are you surprised by how much you’ve found?

POLICE OFFICER: I’m surprised by the sheer size of this. We knew the building was big but we didn’t think every single room would be linked to counterfeit criminality.

23:21

Naomi in officers with room full of embroidery machines

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: This is massive…This is a huge production hub. Police suspect they’re making both legitimate and fake goods.

23:33

Jen Kelly interview Super:
Det. Chief Insp. Jen Kelly
GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE

DETECTIVE CHIEF INSPECTOR JEN KELLY, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE: We knew that the things were being imported, but we’ve realised it was on a much larger scale. So blanks are being imported in, which isn’t criminal.  So if they’re intercepted they’re just blank caps. And then they’re being embroidered and counterfeited here in Cheetham Hill.

23:44

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: So you’ve got an entire counterfeit manufacturing hub downstairs.

23:59

DETECTIVE CHIEF INSPECTOR JEN KELLY, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE: This looks like it’s been running all night. There's three massive looms here as you can see. They were running as the officers came in through the door. There's people here working, I mean the conditions aren’t exactly great. They're working all night producing these, they’ll go far and wide, they’ll go nationally and internationally. We can also smell the really heavy smell of cannabis. We will be looking for a cannabis farm because experience tells us there will be one nearby.

24:03

Officers find smell-proof bags and scales

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  In one room, they find bags used to conceal drugs and scales.

24:32

DETECTIVE SUPERINTENDENT NEIL BLACKWOOD, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE: Remnants of cannabis on it. The bags are to stop dogs. So if you post it, no one is coming through this building to buy drugs, they’ll be posting it out.

24:40

Officers with counterfeit designer clothes

POLICE OFFICER:  Got some Louis Vuitton.

24:53

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  The team starts to collect evidence. It’s going to take days. Some of the rooms are packed to the ceiling with counterfeit designer-wear, 43 tonnes in total.

24:55

Naomi to camera

We’re talking Gucci, Prada, Fendi, everything you can imagine and printing equipment to put the designer labels onto the goods. They were being sold online and shipped all over the UK and the team reckons it was worth millions of dollars.

25:08

Fashion brand reps arrive

Just after dawn, representatives for the designer fashion brands arrive. They confirm that the items are fake.

25:22

BRAND REP: Did someone spot some Balenciaga?

POLICE OFFICER: Yep, downstairs there’s four rooms full.

BRAND REP: Oh, is there more?

25:31

Brand clothing labels

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: As the police search further, they find Nike clothing labels hidden in boxes.

POLICE OFFICER: I think they go inside of the jumpers, too.

25:38

Warehouse machinery

DETECTIVE SUPERINTENDENT NEIL BLACKWOOD, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE: They've used quite a bit of money to get this off the ground. You know, you've got laptops, you've got heating machines. They're not cheap. So the setup costs are quite significant.

25:52

Neil Blackwood interview in warehouse

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER:  And just how much money would a business like this be pulling in?

26:03

DETECTIVE SUPERINTENDENT NEIL BLACKWOOD, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE: Well, if you think one of the hoodies unbranded is probably 50 pence. When they sell it branded, it's probably 30, 40, 50 pounds. So, the mark-up is immense. They'll probably sell a few hundred a week. A lot of money. Straight off, a lot of money.

26:07

Naomi follows officer down stairs

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: Many people don’t realise where the profits sometimes end up.

26:24

Operation Vulcan officers on street

ELKE BIECHELE, RISIKOTEK CEO:  Some of the things counterfeiting is funding is in particular terrorism financing.

26:30

Manchester skyline

So we know Hezbollah has used it heavily, and first they sell counterfeits and counterfeit fashion and then they buy weapons from it to make bombs and

26:37

Elke interview. Super:
Elke Biechele
CEO, RISIKOTEK

buy guns and ammunition and so on. We've seen it with the IRA and we've seen it with many other terrorist organisations that use the sales of counterfeiting in order to buy weapons.

26:45

Archival. Charlie Hebdo attacks

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: In the deadly Charlie Hebdo attacks in France in 2015, the terrorists funded the attacks through the sale of fake shoes.

26:57

ELKE BIECHELE, RISIKOTEK CEO:   They sold counterfeits and then they had some 8,000 euros or so which funded them enough to buy all these weapons, and then they went out and just go on a killing spree.

27:09

Luxe Collective. Ben making TikTok video

Music

27:27

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: Back at Luxe Collective, the team’s never been busier. Ben’s churning out content on Tiktok about fakes.

27:35

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER: This is the rattle of bracelet two.

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: It’s one of the most popular topics for his more than 1.5 million followers.

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER: And this is how much bracelet two weighs.

27:42

So what I'll do now is basically edit it… In this box is a Van Cleef bracelet worth $2000 dollars and one worth $15. But before I tell you the difference, what I want to know is if you guys know?

27:52

NAOMI SELVARATNAM, REPORTER: He says people should think carefully about how they spend their money.

28:06

BEN GALLAGHER, LUXE COLLECTIVE CO-FOUNDER: I think I would say do more research,

28:12

Ben interview. Super:
Ben Gallagher
CO-FOUNDER, LUXE COLLECTIVE

because when you’re buying a fake it's not just money you're putting into the pockets of the person you're buying the fakes from. It's who are they giving their money to? It can be organised crime in different ways, such as drug trafficking, people trafficking. And I think there's got to be a lot of more of awareness that needs to be spread around who this is affecting.

28:16

Credits [see below]

28:40

Outpoint

29:14