Consumers’ awareness of luxury brand counterfeits and their subsequent responses: when a threat becomes an opportunity for the genuine brand

Taking the consumer perspective, this work aims to investigate the effect of counterfeiting awareness on consumer advocacy behaviour towards the brand in a specific context, that is, the luxury brand context. We conducted two surveys among actual and potential consumers of the original brand. Study 1 demonstrated the mediating role of customer-based brand equity between the consumers’ awareness of brand counterfeits and their advocacy behaviour towards the genuine brand. Study 2 showed the moderating role exerted by consumers’ emotional attachment to the brand in this framework. This work showed specific mechanisms underlying consumer responses to counterfeits, revealing a wide framework able to uncover important positive spillover effects on counterfeited brands.