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Popular Swarovski Design House Announces Plan to Reorganize after Internet Assault
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Added: 05/28/2004
Type: Summary
Viewed: 1151 time(s)
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Popular Swarovski Design House Announces Plan to Reorganize after Internet Assault
Americana Couture, the celebrity favored design house, featuring Swarovski crystal studded t-shirts and apparel has just announced plans for restructuring following a highly volatile and public internet assault on the company owners, managers and domain.
"Internet based businesses are exceptionally vulnerable, there are threats you would never face in traditional retail business." stated Mark Chisholm, Director of Public Relations.
The company was targeted by a disgruntled competitor; according to police reports filed in Pima County, Arizona. Americana Couture received thousands of fabricated negative public communications, through Usenet and Google, including defamatory posts, threats, and notices of "forged posts" linked to a computer savvy competitor in Baltimore County, Maryland.
Many public notices listed as demands for refunds or complaints were attributed to "disgruntled customers" whose names did not exist, or were not listed as customers according to records obtained from Americana Couture.
Representatives from Americana Couture filed police reports, and received verification that the individual that was linked to the harassment was a repeat offender previously arrested 9 times from the State of Maryland, for charges including counterfeiting, theft and harassment.
"Usenet, and Google can act as a weapon as much as they are valued as a resource" stated Chisholm. "We had several thousand pages including a 3 year history documenting successful business. Many press releases and customer testimonials vanished over the span of a week, and were replaced with negative and damaging posts from this individual under the guise of many different e-mail addresses and names. This would be the equivalent of an arsonist burning down your storefront, and attempting to continue normal operations from the rubble"
On May 12th all links to www.americanacouture.com, and thousands of pages from the site itself, were manually removed from the Google index. Police reports state the competitor allegedly took advantage of a bug in the Google system, which permitted unauthorized users to sign on as the site webmaster, and delete websites without the knowledge or permission of the host. Google released a public statement acknowledging the bug, and addressing it's efforts to fix and resolve any other businesses or sites effected. The statement claimed less than 10 sites were effected, (Including Microsoft and Adobe) However, www.webmasterworld.com has numerous threads on this topic claiming to have identified as many as hundreds of thousands of effected pages. Google is the largest search engine site in the world, many businesses are dependant upon it's search results for retail sales.
This was not the isolated incident, in April a letter circulated to over 1 million recipients claiming a free t-shirt was being offered by the company, and promoting a code that had been distributed without the company's permission. "The original code was a charity code, for a private event. We had over 55,000 visitors in one day alone, and thousands of order attempts that shut down e-mail and phone lines for close to ten days" Chisholm stated. "We manually had to work through each and every order to locate our customers, and identify and separate the fraudulent orders" Prior internet related instances dated back to the holidays which effected production, and ship scheduled.
"It has been extremely frustrating." Chisholm stated. "We are proud of our product, and have a deep respect for our clients. This experience has been difficult to overcome, and we have shared tremendous frustration with our clients over the delays and obstacles this harassment has caused all of us."
It is this type of vulnerability that has prompted Americana Couture to take swift action, by finishing all retail orders and restructuring for a wholesale only market.
"I believe that internet retail is dangerous in today's market - the more successful you become, the more you may well be marked as a target. The problem with internet sales primarily is, it is an anonymous market. Ripe for identity theft, you have no control over who you sell to. Wholesale will permit us to continue our relationship on a one on one basis, dealing with each customer in person, on the phone, and through showrooms across the country."
Despite the obstacles, the company is diligently working its way through the thousands of communications to locate all remaining retail orders, and secure it's wholesale market. Americana Couture maintains a database of close to 12,000 active customers, with over 3 millions unique visitors to the site. Their products have been featured in InStyle Magazine, Us Weekly, Entertainment Tonight, the Oscars, the Grammy's, the Screen Actors Guild Awards and many other events.
When asked how the future looked in the different direction of marketing and in light of the recent internet abuse, Chisholm commented "We are determined to move through this, and look forward to bringing to top quality product to the public through our wholesale distributors. We are grateful for the support, and assistance we have received through this unique, and difficult time."
Americana Couture will announce it's wholesale collection on July 1st, 2004.
For more information contact Americana Couture at www.americanacouture.com or support@americanacouture.com |
Article Pages: 1
Article Comments
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Poster: Defrauded
Added: -0/4-/2005
Nothing in this fake press release is true. I tried verifying their story about this "internet assault" and the accused "perp" who was supposedly arrested 9 times and none of it was true. Nothing could be backed up. Check out this link for more information: truly SHOCKING:
http://www.traderlist.com/AmericanaCouture.html
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Poster: another sucker-
Added: -0/3-/2005
Beware- this company is full of lies and run by crooks. They will be nice and charge you immediately for a shirt that they know will NEVER be shipped. It's a big scam. This company needs to be shut down. I am shocked that they are still up and running. Read all about them on the internet- They stole money from so many people including the deaf community- Low Lifes! Safaria Media and Americana Couture both owned by the same thieves BEWARE!
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Poster: M
Added: -0/3-/2005
Americana Couture is run by 2 theives! We ordered a wholesale order from them in November and 4 months later we are still getting excuses to why we don't have them. They are both facing jail time for their previous business. Search Mark and Maryann Chisholm on the web and you'll be amazed at what you find!!
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Poster: Birgit Morey
Added: -1/2-/2004
I placed an order 10/8 for a t-shirt for my daughter's birthday. As of today, 12/15, i have received nothing although 10/9 i was charged for my order. I have written numerous emails and called several telephone numbers only to receive one response from mark@aol stating he would see what he could do. All i want is my daughter to receive her birthday present. After all i paid for it. If anyone has any advice what to do, please please advise :)
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Poster: Mark the Gay
Added: -1/0-/2004
If you want to see what the Chisholms of Americana Couture are really all about, check out this site:
<a href="http://www.americanacouturenews.blogspot.com/">http://www.americanacouturenews.blogspot.com/
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Poster: Anon
Added: -1/0-/2004
We are going to sue you for publicly harassing Traderlist and making false claims about Traderlist and Pat Edgerton. There is a restraining order barring you from harassing Pat Egerton and her employees on the internet. A Federal lawsuit has been filed and an attorney has been retained. Cease immediately from this harassment and defamation of Traderlist and Pat Edgerton. THIS IS PROOF THAT YOU ARE CONTINUING YOUR PUBLIC HARASSMENT AND DEFAMATION.
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Poster: Judge Judy
Added: -1/0-/2004
"GUILTY!" They have proof of nothing. They also have no "Injunction" against Pat Edgerton or anyone else. Their lawsuit was thrown out of court. Pat Edgerton was never served, so their claims mean nothing. Would you please post the case numbers for these "Injunctions" so that we can all verify them with the court?
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Poster: Judge Judy
Added: -1/0-/2004
How are you going to sue Pat Edgerton and Traderlist from the big house? The Communications Decency Act protects us, just as it protects the big wigs like Google who are threatened on a daily basis with lawsuits resulting from so-called "libel" in their forums.
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Poster: Judge Judy
Added: -1/0-/2004
The First Amendment protects our right to freedom of expression from government interference. This includes protection extended to the providers of this site.
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Poster: Judge Judy
Added: -1/0-/2004
See: United States Federal Law, Section 230(c) of the "Communications Decency Act". Get to know this Act, Mark. And don't go quoting the Rosenthal/Barrett case either; which is under appeal and has no precedential value. Traderlist is on their way to getting their own server so you cannot further harass. When that happens, you will not have your rebuttals or your say.
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