In the face of public embarrassment, Woolworths has withdraw from sale a lookalike product a Cape Town entrepreneur says it stole

In the face of public embarrassment,
Woolworths has withdraw from sale a lookalike
product a Cape Town entrepreneur says it stole
from her, then started to manufacture in China.
Woolworths says it apologised sincerely to
Shannon McLaughlin and is deeply committed
to the development of small businesses in
South Africa.
McLaughlin detailed the apparent intellectual
property theft online this week, leading to a
hastily-arranged meeting on Wednesday with
senior Woolworths executives.
See also: Oops Woolworse, you did it
again!
Woolworths says it has withdrawn it baby
carriers from sale and has apologised
unreservedly for what it describes as a “failure
of internal processes.”
McLaughlin was alerted to the lookalike
product in mid-December, but initially received
no response from Woolworths when she
reached out to the company.
Some of the Ubuntu Baba team. Shannon
McLaughlin says her business supports the
local economy as her baby carriers are
manufactured locally. (Photo: Ubuntu Baba)
“While there are differences in our baby carrier,
there are striking similarities which we
acknowledge and take responsibility for. This
is not in line with our values and goes against
the very clear policy and creative guidelines we
have in place for our design process,” the
retailer said in a statement.
Two women working for the Woolworths
division that develops new ideas for the group
apparently ordered McLaughlin’s baby carriers
and had them delivered to the group head
office. They appear to have operated as if it
was perfectly normal to acquire promising
ideas from South African manufacturers, make
a few modest changes, and then create their
own line to be manufactured offshore.
This is not an isolated incident involving the
retailer. It also emerged this week that
Woolworths engaged international experts six
years ago in the aftermath of the furore around
its appropriation of the style and ethos of the
Frankies retro drinks brand to prevent this sort
of incident happening again.
Yet later Woolworths was accused of stealing a
private designer’s hummingbird design for a
scatter cushion.
The baby carrier incident makes for a third
allegation that the company steals intellectual
property.
“This lapse in process is being addressed
internally. We are intensifying and strengthening