Mooncakes can no longer be sold, but "Hong Kong mooncakes" have become the best-seller. Amid the "crazy" promotions of e-commerce anchors such as Brother Xiao, Hong Kong's Mei Cheng mooncakes claim to be a "Hong Kong brand", and their names and products are similar to the famous Hong Kong brand Maxim's mooncakes. They also have a "low price" that Maxim's mooncakes cannot achieve. It has become the platform's "top seller" this year, with sales exceeding 50 million yuan.
The operator of Meicheng mooncakes told the media that the origin of Meicheng mooncakes is in Guangdong. It is clearly written on the packaging. It has never been said to be produced in Hong Kong and does not involve false propaganda. Meicheng only has its operating registration place and origin in Guangdong. The trademark registration place and brand registration place are both in Hong Kong. The brand belongs to Hong Kong Meicheng Group Company.
On the evening of September 14, amid the turmoil of public opinion, the live broadcast rooms of "Three Sheep" have stopped selling Meicheng mooncakes. Live broadcast rooms such as "Crazy Little Yang Brother" have removed the merchandise display of Meicheng mooncakes, and the same mooncakes have also been removed from the product windows.
In this regard, the operator of Meicheng Mooncake stated that whether the "Three Sheep" live broadcast room involves false propaganda has nothing to do with the brand, and the reason why it is now removed from the shelves has nothing to do with false propaganda."The mooncakes sold so well this year. As the Mid-Autumn Festival approaches, we can no longer ship them before the Mid-Autumn Festival, so we chose to remove them from the shelves."
When Brother Yang fell into the whirlpool of public opinion again, Luo Yonghao once again stood up to add fuel to the fire, saying bluntly, "If you buy something in one of our live broadcast rooms, you will get one back and three indemnity."
According to data from Cicada Mama, in the past 30 days on the Douyin e-commerce platform, Xiao Yang’s sales have reached a maximum of 4.548 million yuan. If he “refunds one and compensates three”, the compensation amount will reach more than 18 million yuan; the sales volume of Zeng Zhiwei’s live broadcast room has reached 18.94 million yuan, and the maximum compensation amount may reach more than 75 million yuan.
On Douyin, bloggers have begun to give consumers tips and teach them a "fake one, pay three" compensation plan.
In response, Liao Jianxun, senior partner of Guangdong Guoding Law Firm, said in an interview with the media that the mooncakes were advertised as Hong Kong brand mooncakes during sales, but consumers were not clearly informed that it was only a registered trademark in Hong Kong and that the mooncakes were all produced in Guangdong.This violates consumers' right to know and will cause consumers to misunderstand that the mooncakes are produced in Hong Kong, which is misleading propaganda.
The operator of Meicheng Mooncake said,It is impossible to "refund one for three" when purchasing from the official website and offline channels. There is no fraud or false propaganda in the sales process. Everything is awaiting the results of regulatory authorities and consumer associations.
Yi Xu, senior partner of Hunan Jinzhou Law Firm, said that according to Article 55 of the Consumer Rights Protection Law, if an operator commits fraud, consumers have the right to demand that the operator bear punitive compensation liability of "refund one and compensate three". The premise isConsumers need to collect sufficient evidence to prove the operator's fraudulent behavior, including but not limited to live broadcast videos, screenshots of product promotion pages, customer service chat records, etc.
Under the banner of "Hong Kong", they sell mooncakes made in Guangdong. In this "fake Hong Kong mooncakes" controversy, the reputation of Xiao Yang and Eric Tsang has been shattered.
Is Eric Tsang also responsible?
In the past month, the founders of Three Sheep Group, Zhang Qingyang (Crazy Little Yang) and Zhang Zhangyang (Crazy Big Yang), have been vigorously promoting Meicheng mooncakes. The mooncakes are available in different styles such as 99 yuan for 3 boxes and 169 yuan for 3 boxes.
Among the 199 talent shows under Meicheng Mooncake, most of them are cut-and-strip advertisements posted by accounts owned by "Three Sheep". On September 4, someone asked under the video, are they Hong Kong Maxim’s mooncakes? In response to this, "Crazy Three Little Sheep" replied that "Hong Kong Meicheng's is also a well-known brand in Hong Kong."
Some netizens said that on the evening of September 14, another account under the Three Sheep Group, "Crazy Little Yang Di", was still selling Mei Cheng mooncakes, and there was always a "Maxim Mooncake" next to this mooncake. This is easy to confuse. "Maxim mooncakes" and "Maxim mooncakes" are sold together, which can easily lead consumers to mistakenly think that both are produced in Hong Kong.
Netizens were also quite angry when Hong Kong movie star Eric Tsang and his daughter-in-law Wang Minyi appeared in Xiao Yang's live broadcast room to deliver Meicheng mooncakes.
Zeng Zhiwei introduced in the "Three Sheep" live broadcast room that "Meicheng mooncakes are very good as gifts." Zhang Qingyang immediately responded, "They all know in Hong Kong that Hong Kong Meicheng sells a box offline for 700 yuan." He also mentioned in the live broadcast that 24,000 orders were sold in 2 minutes.
Wang Hai, a well-known anti-counterfeiter, believed that Zeng Zhiwei’s actions were “disgusting”. He said, “Even if Zhang Qingyang and Kaikai Yang did not select products and have never been to Hong Kong, Zeng Zhiwei must know that this brand does not exist in Hong Kong.”
As the head of Three Sheep's Hong Kong branch, Eric Tsang changed the Douyin account's homepage overnight and removed all information related to Three Sheep after Simba broke the news about Three Sheep's many problems on September 3. But on the afternoon of September 4, Eric Tsang posted a photo with Brother Dayang and Brother Yang on social platforms, with the caption: We are doing well!
Many netizens believe that Zeng Zhiwei's contribution to the Meicheng mooncake platform must have increased consumers' inherent belief that Meicheng mooncakes are a Hong Kong brand, fueled Xiao Yang's "false propaganda", and also increased the spread of Meicheng mooncakes.
Regarding such a "sideline" brand, Zhang Kaiyang said that Hong Kong Meicheng mooncakes have been "sold for three years, and everyone has been working together smoothly."As an influential public figure, Eric Tsang should have selected “cost-effective” products for consumers, but instead he condoned the emergence of “inferior brands”.
Judging from the information displayed on the Meicheng mooncake packaging box, the brand operation center of Meicheng mooncakes is Guangzhou Meicheng Food Company, the manufacturers are Guangzhou Meicheng Technology Company and Foshan Meicheng Food Co., Ltd., and the place of production is Foshan City, Guangdong Province.
Industrial and commercial registration information shows that Guangzhou Meicheng Food Technology Co., Ltd. has a registered capital of 3 million and was established on April 17, 2014. Its address is located in Shiling Town, Huadu District, Guangzhou City. Its legal representative and largest shareholder is Li Shuiqing, and the second shareholder is Zhang Shaodeng.
Guangzhou Meicheng Food Company has a registered capital of 10 million yuan and was established on April 24, 2019; Foshan Meicheng Food Co., Ltd. has a registered capital of 1 million yuan and was established on February 17, 2023.
Through the Hong Kong Company Registry, it was found that Hong Kong Meicheng Group Company was established on April 15, 2019, later than Guangzhou Meicheng Technology Company.
Although Guangzhou Meicheng Technology Company claims that the brand belongs to Hong Kong Meicheng Group Company, industrial and commercial information shows that there is no equity relationship between Guangzhou Meicheng Food Company, Guangzhou Meicheng Technology Company and Hong Kong Meicheng Group Company.
Through inquiries from the Hong Kong Intellectual Property Department, it was found that Hong Kong Meicheng Group Company has registered the words "Meicheng", "Meicheng Cake Art", "Hong Kong Meicheng Mooncakes" and "Meicheng Life" in Hong Kong. Among them, the registration time of "Hong Kong Meicheng Mooncake" is September 22, 2023, which is less than a year ago.
In addition, in addition to the right to use the trademark, when selling Meicheng mooncakes, various accounts of Three Sheep said that a certain flavor of the mooncakes ranked first in sales in the country, which was also suspected of violating advertising laws.
According to Guangzhou Daily, some netizens took screenshots and found that Meicheng mooncakes were previously sold for only 59 yuan for three boxes on other shopping platforms, but in the "Three Sheep" live broadcast, they were priced at 169 yuan for three boxes.
The "Three Sheep" are getting more and more criticized. Where has the supervision gone?
While the Three Sheep Network is evolving crazily, problems are also coming one after another.
This year's CCTV "March 15" party exposed the pork belly with pickled vegetables produced by Anhui Donghui Technology Food Co., Ltd., which uses trough meat. The company's braised pork belly with pickled vegetables was once sold in the live broadcast room of Sanyang Network. On March 18, Sanyang Network issued a statement on the matter. The company apologized, arranged a special inspection, started consumer registration, and began to advance advance refunds.
However, on the evening of September 4, Lu Wenqing, co-founder of San Yang Network, released a video saying that as of now, San Yang Network has not received any punishment from relevant departments for the Meicai meat deprivation incident. He also said that if relevant departments impose penalties on the company, Sanyang Network will not evade or shirk.
Why can the Three Sheep Live Broadcast Room avoid punishment for selling inferior products?
Hefei High-tech Zone Market Supervision and Administration Bureau responded to relevant media on September 5 that Three Sheep released an advertisement, and the production and sales problems of the trough meat had nothing to do with Three Sheep: Although consumers purchased the pickled meat with pickled vegetables in the live broadcast room of Three Sheep Network, because the payee was Hubei Xiaocheng Youxue Technology Development Co., Ltd., so Hubei Xiaocheng Youxuan is the seller, while Anhui Donghui Food Technology Co., Ltd., which was exposed at the March 15 party, is the producer, and Three Sheep Network is just an "advertising publisher", and there is no evidence to show that funds flow to Three Sheep Network.
The Market Supervision and Administration Bureau of Hefei High-tech Zone stated that according to relevant laws and regulations,Consumers in the "Taotou Meat Incident" can only ask for compensation from sellers and producers; for Three Sheep Network, they can only be held accountable at the advertising level.
In some of Xiao Yang's live broadcast rooms, "word games" have also begun to be played. Notes such as "The seller of this product is the store operator to which the shopping link belongs, not this live broadcast room/window" are marked on the product page, trying to draw a clear line of responsibility between the anchor and the seller. However, the relevant words were not marked during the process of bringing Meicheng mooncakes.
On September 9, Wang Hai released a video saying that "Crazy Little Yang Brother" had been fined 500,000 yuan for the "Xianduoyu" fake raw-cut beef rolls sold by "Crazy Little Yang Brother". 42,000 consumers were deceived, and 42 million yuan was required to be compensated to consumers according to the 10-for-10 compensation stipulation.
According to the "Administrative Punishment Decision" issued by Wuhan Qingshan District Market Supervision and Administration Bureau on July 16, 2024, the "Xianduoyu" beef rolls sold by "Crazy Little Yang Brother" for 89.9 yuan in 4 kilograms were determined to be not raw cut beef.
When some media called the Hefei market supervision hotline, the operator responded that there had been a lot of feedback from citizens recently about the problem of Xiao Yang's live broadcast room misleading consumers. "We attach great importance to it and have reported it to the responsible unit as soon as possible. It is now being processed. We have not yet received a response from the responsible unit." When asked about the specific responsible unit, the staff said that the relevant responsible unit is the High-tech Industrial Development Zone Management Committee, and staff will be assigned to deal with it in the future.
"If 'Hong Kong Meicheng Mooncakes' is a self-operated product of Three Sheep, Three Sheep is the advertiser. If Three Sheep only promotes products, according to the "Internet Advertising Management Measures", even adding "non-seller" and other remarks cannot completely draw the line of responsibility between the anchor and the seller." Li Zerui believes that "in actual operation, the anchor's speech, behavior, promotional content, etc. may have an impact on consumers' purchasing decisions."
The quality of the product has "overturned", but the anchor carrying the product is not affected at all, and even "doesn't care about it", which is obviously unreasonable.In the process of online live sales, the anchor who carries the goods is an extremely critical factor that affects consumers' purchases. If there is a problem with the product, especially food, the anchor should also bear the responsibility, instead of letting consumers' trust be exhausted in the process of safeguarding their rights again and again.