Tesco vowed yesterday [Wednesday] to continue selling cut-price Levi Strauss jeans, and branded the UK’s High Court “daft” after it ruled that the supermarket behemoth is acting illegally in sourcing cheap imports of the designer jeans on the “grey market” outside the European Economic Area.
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Tesco director John Gildersleeve told Dow Jones that yesterday’s ruling, which follows a judgment last November from the European Court of Justice (ECJ), is “disappointing but changes nothing”.
“We’ll look at the judgment closely but after a long battle to promote free trade, and clear the way to allow imports of cheaper clothes from outside Europe, it seems we’ve run out of legal road,” he said.
The ECJ ruled that European retailers cannot sell trademarked goods from outside of Europe without the consent of the manufacturer.
Elsewhere in the grocery arena, Asda responded to the ruling by promising to up its in-store stocks of fragrances and watches sourced from the grey market.
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