The Italian marque also late last year launched a reward program for enthusiasts who rat out counterfeits
- Ferrari says in 2023, it destroyed over 400,000 pieces of knock-off Ferrari-branded merchandise
- Beyond eliminating faked watches and shoes, the marque also cut up several licenced movie replicas
- Last year, it launched a reward program for people who reported finding counterfeit items
According to an infographic released by the company early July, it took a literal hatchet to unlicensed products ranging from clothing and shoes to scooters and cars — the latter included scale models and full-sized examples. In fact, three vehicles met the business end of a crusher, including the cube shown at the top of this post, which the brand says was once a “counterfeit Ferrari 360.” Ouch.
Also seeing their demise amongst the cleanup of phoney goods were almost 100,000 pairs of eyeglasses, many of which were presumably fake Ray-Bans; and 1,092 balls (most of the soccer variety), marking the first time in a long while Ferrari has crushed anyone’s balls, if you look at its performance in F1 the last few years. Don’t think anyone can get away with peddling even simple fake Ferrari stickers — the Fezza police laid claim to taking 11,500 of those off the market, as well.
Clicking through the website for doing so revealed an option to anonymously rat out fraudsters, though it warns that choice could hinder the amount of action Ferrari is able to take—it seems Maranello would prefer to know the names of its informants. Interestingly, other companies are barred from reporting, as is anyone under 18 years of age. The initiative has “an indefinite duration” according to the official website, so don’t expect Ferrari to let up on the fake makers anytime soon.
An interesting aside to all this, unrelated to fraudulent merchandise but no less noteworthy, is the fact the marque also disposed of several licenced-by-Ferrari machines used by director Michael Mann in the making of his film chronicling the life of Enzo Ferrari. Gearheads who have seen the film may have admired those screen-star replicas as though they were real Ferrari vehicles but, from the very start of shooting, it was known these examples of movie magic would be destroyed soon after filming was finished. Some images from that endeavour are shown in this post, too.
Sign up for our newsletter Blind-Spot Monitor and follow our social channels on Instagram ,Facebook and X to stay up to date on the latest automotive news, reviews, car culture, and vehicle shopping advice.