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by Brendan Dunne
Just how ridiculous is Qiaodan Sports, the company that the Chinese government is allowing to get away with selling Air Jordans rip-offs?
NPR did some reporting on the sportswear company and the results are pretty amusing. It turns out that Qiaodan Sports owns not only the rights to the Chinese transliteration of Michael Jordan's name, but also the rights to a bunch more terms related to him – included the names of his sons.
Part of the reason why Jordan hasn't been able to fully protect his name in China is that he only registered the English version of his name when the Air Jordan line hit China in 1990. A couple years later, a small shoe company registered "Qiaodan" and the knocking-off began. By now, the company has about 6,000 Qiaodan stores across China and sells hundreds of millions of dollars in sneakers every year.
Staff at Qiaodan stores in China even told NPR that they would explain the difference between Qiaodan Sports and Air Jordan to any customers who asked. NPR failed to capture such an exchange, but we have to wonder how exactly the workers would tell the noble story of Qiaodan as it relates to Michael Jordan.
Nike isn't the only sneaker company that has faced this problem in China. New Balance also lost a similar fight in a strange case over the use of the phrase "Xin Bai Lun."
