Fake Butterfly case?

Simas · Oct 9, 2017

Hi,

recently the foam from my Butterfly Aluminum case unglued and I saw that the cover is made not from aluminum, but from the cardboard. So when I peeled the foam away it looks like this:

So the question that bothers me is if the case is original or is it fake. Did someone else made such a discovery or is willing to

rokphish · Oct 9, 2017

Much simpler to evaluate where you bought the case from.

Greco · Oct 9, 2017

Nope, Im sure it's original. Just the borders are made of aluminum, all those rigid cases are exactly the same, the only difference is the colour and the brand logo. Butterfly, Thibhar, Stiga, Donic, etc...
I have a Donic case and it's identical.
However, it's a very nice case I like it.

langel · Oct 9, 2017

Absolute garbage, no matter the logo

Simas · Oct 9, 2017

Greco said:
Nope, Im sure it's original. Just the borders are made of aluminum, all those rigid cases are exactly the same, the only difference is the colour and the brand logo. Butterfly, Thibhar, Stiga, Donic, etc...
I have a Donic case and it's identical.
However, it's a very nice case I like it.

Yes, about them being all the same it's 100% true.

The questions is do they all have cardboards and that's how they are being made (and advertised as aluminum) or this is just mine and is fake. As far as I can tell, corners are also made from some shiny plastics...

Why are you sure that mine is original? Did you see the cardboard inside yours and did you buy it from some very reliable vendor? In my case I bought it from some semi- specialized one shop size vendor and now I don't I trust him....

langel said:
Absolute garbage, no matter the logo

Well, I can't agree with both of you

It's nice from inside, the foam does it's job. Also it's the only truly rigid case I could find and that's important. On the other hand I am not a fan of a aluminum briefcase looks...

Greco · Oct 9, 2017

I bought it cheap from a guy from a tt club I know. He was selling it cheap because it was a gift and he didn't use it. I trust him and the case was what I expected.
I'm okay with the cardboard, it does it's job, no complains.
Also, I don't think there's a lot of those fake cases around. It's like a fake hurricane3 non national, it doesn't have much sense.
You can ask a trusted seller about that cardboard, but I'm sure it's original

Simas · Oct 11, 2017

Greco said:
I bought it cheap from a guy from a tt club I know. He was selling it cheap because it was a gift and he didn't use it. I trust him and the case was what I expected.
I'm okay with the cardboard, it does it's job, no complains.
Also, I don't think there's a lot of those fake cases around. It's like a fake hurricane3 non national, it doesn't have much sense.
You can ask a trusted seller about that cardboard, but I'm sure it's original

Yes, you have a point, that although these cases are more expensive then the regular ones, they still go around ~30 usd/eur, so nothing outrageous. Off course being a butterfly it costs 50 instead of 30 (http://shop.butterflyonline.com/alu-case)

I myself (if i remember correctly) bought it around 30 eur as it was on sale.

Anyway it's doesn't sound good in any case:
-if it's fake it's a bad thing by itself
-if it's original, it's even worse, as butterfly (also keeping in mind that it's a more premium table tennis brand) is not disclosing the cheap materials being used and purposefully marketing it as aluminum case

Greco · Oct 14, 2017

Yes, I don't think it costs €50
I paid for it (a Donic case, but it's the same) around €20, so...
However it protects the blade very well

Garrison · Oct 14, 2017

I like those cases too but once the foam starts to crumble it is getting stuck under the edge band -.-

Simas · Oct 16, 2017

Garrison said:
I like those cases too but once the foam starts to crumble it is getting stuck under the edge band -.-

Yes, the foam starts to deteriorate after some time. Although never experienced it being stuck under the edge tape. Maybe there is some sticky glue residues on the edges of your blade?

Simas · Nov 2, 2017

So no one has found cardboard under the foam insert in aluminum bat cases?
The question if the case is fake is still bugging me...

Tony's Table Tennis · Nov 3, 2017

Did you email butterfly?

Floris · Nov 3, 2017

Everybody knows Butterfly only makes frames and rubbers.
Everything else; shoes, clothing and things like cases are made by some digerent factory.

Simas · Nov 3, 2017

Tony's Table Tennis said:
Did you email butterfly?

No, but that's an interesting idea..

If I wrote an email and if they replied that the case is genuine they would by saying something like that: yeah, we put cardboard instead of aluminum to save a dollar so the case would cost 10USD instead of 11USD (or something like that) to manufacture and aren't mentioning it so we could sell them for 50 USD

I am not saying that selling a case with a cardboard for 50USD is bad thing by itself, its a free market and you can sell it for whatever you manage to, but to say that its from aluminum when it's not, that's not ok...

Floris said:
Everybody knows Butterfly only makes frames and rubbers.
Everything else; shoes, clothing and things like cases are made by some digerent factory.

Yes and that is a common practice to do so. Butterfly is more sort of "genuine" then others manufacturers as they have their own rubber factory in Japan. Other manufacturers are making their rubbers in a couple big factories in China and in ESN in Germany. So all Tibhars, Donics, Joolas, etc rubbers are made in one factory..

The same story is with the plastic balls. If my memory serves me right, Butterfly makes its own balls, Nittaku also, all other balls are made by the same couple companies (like DHS) in China...

And off course the same story with everything else too

Tony's Table Tennis · Nov 4, 2017

Simas said:
No, but that's an interesting idea..

Imo, that should be one of the first few things to be done

Imagine you bought a tshirt, and you have a problem with it
Do you go asking questions on social media or forums and expect answers there?

Imo, I have not seen fake Butterfly Alu cases before, so you should ask them if there are fakes or not - the question of your thread

langel · Nov 4, 2017

Simas said:
No, but that's an interesting idea..

If I wrote an email and if they replied that the case is genuine they would by saying something like that: yeah, we put cardboard instead of aluminum to save a dollar so the case would cost 10USD instead of 11USD (or something like that) to manufacture and aren't mentioning it so we could sell them for 50 USD

I am not saying that selling a case with a cardboard for 50USD is bad thing by itself, its a free market and you can sell it for whatever you manage to, but to say that its from aluminum when it's not, that's not ok...

Yes and that is a common practice to do so. Butterfly is more sort of "genuine" then others manufacturers as they have their own rubber factory in Japan. Other manufacturers are making their rubbers in a couple big factories in China and in ESN in Germany. So all Tibhars, Donics, Joolas, etc rubbers are made in one factory..

The same story is with the plastic balls. If my memory serves me right, Butterfly makes its own balls, Nittaku also, all other balls are made by the same couple companies (like DHS) in China...

And off course the same story with everything else too

Generally I agree with you.
But although all tensors are made by ESN, most of them are produced with different brand specifications and characteristics and they do not differ by just the logo, as it is the case with some gadgets and apparels.

And in the speciffic case with this allu case the worst tragedy for the consumer is that the Butterflys' one is the same as any other, but of a double price, and a consumer may feel really fooled with the lack of correspondence between price and quality.

On the other hand - the lack of correspondance between price and quality in such kind of products can be very easy for visual estimation. But what about the other products? I'm sure that a grand portion of Butters' grand is granted because of reasons aside clear personal gratitude, and mostly personally unaware of that.

Simas · Nov 5, 2017

Tony's Table Tennis said:
Imo, that should be one of the first few things to be done

Imagine you bought a tshirt, and you have a problem with it
Do you go asking questions on social media or forums and expect answers there?

Imo, I have not seen fake Butterfly Alu cases before, so you should ask them if there are fakes or not - the question of your thread

I wouldn't be so skeptical about asking in the forum in this case. For example if for someone else the foam got unglued (and that shouldn't be something very unlikely) and he bought the case from a reliable source or from the Butterfly website and saw or didn't see the cardboard he would reply to the post and the question is closed and the one's who are also interested are informed

Also there are a lot of table tennis experts here, as this is a specialized forum.

(This wouldn't be the case with a T-shirt, as I suppose it would be hard to find some features that could allow to identify it's genuinity easily)

I am not sure if such forums should be referred as social media (first they are so much older then social media, also I think that social media is more into news and more general things about some topics because of its feed like structure, and forums are more for storing collective knowledge and more indepth discussion). That actually would be quite an interesting topic for separate discussion imho...

Maybe I'll have to right an email to Butterfly eventually...

Simas · Nov 7, 2017

langel said:
Generally I agree with you.
But although all tensors are made by ESN, most of them are produced with different brand specifications and characteristics and they do not differ by just the logo, as it is the case with some gadgets and apparels.

And in the speciffic case with this allu case the worst tragedy for the consumer is that the Butterflys' one is the same as any other, but of a double price, and a consumer may feel really fooled with the lack of correspondence between price and quality.

On the other hand - the lack of correspondance between price and quality in such kind of products can be very easy for visual estimation. But what about the other products? I'm sure that a grand portion of Butters' grand is granted because of reasons aside clear personal gratitude, and mostly personally unaware of that.

I didn't mean that the rubbers are the same and just different labels are moulded. All rubbers are made with different specifications and composition but by the same ESN factory.

And yes, it's thespecific case with alu cases that the cases are all the same. I wouldn't havebought butterfly case on normal circumstances as for me the price seemed inadequate. As the butterfly was on discount and the price was equal to other cases Itook the premium brand for the price of normal brands. That's why I gotconfused about the cardboard under the foam. As it's unclear for me if forexample butterfly charges more as they substitute the carboard in the originaldesign with alu panel and charge for that and in that case my case is fake, orthey buy the same case with cardboard from the same factory as everyone elseand put double the price. So the original question should be complemented with the question ifsomeone found cardboard under the foam of other brands cases

You are also right about the need for correspondence between price and quality. In behavioral economics there is a concept of not selling umbrellas at the inflated price during the storm. As although you will force the customers to overpay for umbrellas once, they will remember this act as an evil thing and won't return to buy an umbrella when they will need a new one because of that. So that's a very bad business in a long run. So if my butterfly is genuine.... that's a bad business from butterfly.

Tony's Table Tennis · Nov 9, 2017

Simas said:
I wouldn't be so skeptical about asking in the forum in this case. For example if for someone else the foam got unglued (and that shouldn't be something very unlikely) and he bought the case from a reliable source or from the Butterfly website and saw or didn't see the cardboard he would reply to the post and the question is closed and the one's who are also interested are informed Also there are a lot of table tennis experts here, as this is a specialized forum.

(This wouldn't be the case with a T-shirt, as I suppose it would be hard to find some features that could allow to identify it's genuinity easily)

I am not sure if such forums should be referred as social media (first they are so much older then social media, also I think that social media is more into news and more general things about some topics because of its feed like structure, and forums are more for storing collective knowledge and more indepth discussion). That actually would be quite an interesting topic for separate discussion imho...

Maybe I'll have to right an email to Butterfly eventually...

I see this post is from 4 weeks ago, and you figured it may be a good idea to finally ask Butterfly
Based on the title, you said Fake Butterfly Case?
So, what did Butterfly say?
I would love to hear some official response than just further forum members assumptions

langel · Nov 9, 2017

I'm curious about the Bitterflys' answer too.
I'm nearly 99% sure that no one in Bitterfly /and no one in Stiga, Tibhar etc./ can tell you what is the exact ctructure of their genuine third party produce gadgets.

Fake Butterfly case?

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