This misspelled $600 Trump watch is perfectly on-brand
Brand licensing deals can be an easy way to make a quick buck, but it's not without risks. A man who splurged for one of President Donald Trump's officially licensed watches learned that lesson the hard way after the timepiece arrived with an unfortunate typo. The $640 limited-edition 'Inauguration First Lady' watch the Rhode Island man bought read 'Rump' instead of 'Trump' across its pink face.
'We expected that it would have the integrity of the president of the United States,' Tim Petit, who bought the watch for his wife, told the local news station WJAR. He said it made his wife cry.
Perhaps expecting integrity from a product that trades on the name and likeness of the first felon president in U.S. history, a man whose second term in office has become a historic tangle of conflicts of interest, is asking for too much. But it's also a pitfall that all brands face when they outsource their products. Licensing your brand can increase brand recognition and profits without cost risks, according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, but without specific, enforced licensing requirements, you risk losing out on quality control. Not that the Trump brand is particularly airtight.
Trump has long made money from licensing deals, with resulting products such as Trump: The Game, Trump Water, and Trump Steaks. In between terms, Trump cashed in on new product releases like Trump Sneakers and 'God Bless the USA' Bibles, all using LLCs that licensed his name and likeness to manufacture and market Trump-themed kitsch to his political supporters.
Trump Watches aren't sold directly by Trump, his business, or an aligned political entity, but by TheBestWatchesonEarth LLC, a manufacturer with a business address at a nondescript Wyoming building, which is also home to a daycare center. With Trump back in office, Trump Watches and other licensed storefronts represent something unprecedented: a president personally profiting off of merch sales, a category that until now has been relegated to campaign fundraising. And in a shocking but not surprising twist for the president who's made domestic manufacturing central to his political agenda, the watches make no claim to be made in the United States (GQ actually sourced them to China).
Luckily for the Rhode Island couple with the misspelled watch, the story has a happy ending. Though Trump Watches has a strict policy of no refunds or exchanges and states on its website that 'images shown are for illustration purposes only and may not be an exact representation of the product,' the company made an exception for the 'Rump' watch, though only after the media got involved. Petit said he didn't hear back from the company until after WJAR reached out for comment, and then he got a call from Trump Watches offering to replace the watch and gift him an $800 coupon. Sometimes all it takes is a free press.
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