Cartier Glasses – The Real Deal or Fake?

If you really believe the Cartier glasses you just bought online for under $50 are genuine – excuse me, than you are a dreamer. Cartier Eyewear (sunglasses and normal glasses) retail typically for at least $500 and can reach a price tag of several thousand dollars easily. So, how do you know for sure that your new glasses are really Cartier and not a fake copy made somewhere in Asia in a sweat shop. And if you really want to pay that much money for the “real deal”, I have included some tips where to find genuine Cartier products. And, to round everything up, a few useful links where you can find additional information and a bit of personal opinion about over-priced designer products and copyright / trademark pirates.

Signs of fake / genuine Cartier glasses

• The first giveaway is the price, with new glasses starting at around $500, it will be difficult to find any secondhand deals cheaper than $200. A website or store or dealer in the street that offers you “genuine fake” Cartier glasses for under $50 or similar is offering you rubbish.

• The next thing to look out for is the material the glasses are made of, especially the screws. Cartier never uses plastic for them. Plastic screws = Fake product.

• Serial numbers, Cartier uses a system of serial numbers to certify the authenticity of their products. These 7-digit number is engraved in very small font size in a less visible spot, often under the nose bridge. Large, visible numbers are another giveaway for being a fake product.

• The place you buy or bought them from. Whilst you can find genuine Cartier products like sunglasses and prescription glasses on places like Ebay, the risk being taken for a ride is considerable. The safest place to buy is still a, by Cartier, authorized boutique or reseller. A list of those can be found on their website (see link resources). If your money only stretches to secondhand glasses, you can try Ebay or even Amazon, but I recommend strongly that you check seller feedback, money back warranties and so on.

One last word of warning, the amount of websites that offer “genuine Cartier glasses to unbelievable low prices” is mind boggling. Remember, even if they have the word “Cartier” in their url / domain name it doesn’t mean that they are authorized by Cartier to sell their products. A quick check of their who.is data at http://who.is reveals often a lot, one site I checked turned out to be registered and hosted in China. And you can say what you want, I don’t believe that they are a genuine Cartier partner…

Why designer glasses?

Here comes my personal opinion, you can take it or leave it. I fail to understand why somebody wants to be thousands of dollars just for a product that carries a certain “name”. If I buy glasses, I look for two things: First and foremost the optical quality. My eyes are very dear to me and I would never endanger them by wearing low quality glasses that don’t protect them properly against the sun or that don’t offer the prescribed diopters I need. That is not luxury, that is common sense. Next point would be the look and / or design of my glasses. Hey, I am a woman, I want to look good and not like something that came out of a b-movie horror film But looking good doesn’t need to equal being expensive, there are a lot of good, inexpensive, even cheap glasses around that don’t ask you to pay thousands of dollars for a certain name. But, that’s just me…

Why I am against product piratery

I am an artist myself, a photographer, a digital artist and a writer, so copyright is something close to my hard. You may think what you want about over-prized designer products, but that gives nobody the right to rip off their ideas and copy them. Secondly, the quality is often so inferior, that these kind of pirated products actually can pose a real health risk. Glasses that made of inferior material will break more easily and / or will let those sun rays through they are meant to protect you against. You can say what you want about elevated prices, but at least Cartier glasses are made of the best and securest material available.

Last, but not least, replicas or fake products are mostly produced in so-called sweat shops, where people (and often children!) are working under appalling conditions. When buying these products you make sure that this continues. If nobody would buy them, these kind of inhuman production places wouldn’t have a future. So, if for no other reason, don’t buy replica Cartier glasses if you don’t like the idea that they are produced by children’s slave labour. In opposite to this, buying your glasses, Cartier or another brand, from reputable sources, also insures that the workers that made them got a fair wage and fair working conditions.

Summary:

If you want to spend your hard earned cash on genuine Cartier glasses make sure that you get value for money by buying only at accredited (by Cartier) shops and websites. Remember, if it sounds too good to be true, it is most often not true!