Temu Enhances Efforts to Curb Rip-off Greeting Cards

Sat Oct 25 2025 23:16:29 GMT+0300 (Eastern European Summer Time)

In response to industry complaints, Temu has committed to a quicker removal of counterfeit greeting cards, partnering with card designers to protect intellectual property.

Temu, the online shopping platform, has vowed to speed up the takedown of counterfeit greeting cards after facing pressure from the Greeting Card Association. This new initiative aims to better protect designers and their intellectual property while addressing industry concerns about the proliferation of cheap imitation cards. The changes include a new system allowing card publishers to report infringements more efficiently, enhancing the removal process using AI technology.

Online shopping giant Temu has agreed to work with the greeting card industry to remove copied designs from its site more quickly.

Card firms say hundreds of their copyrighted images have been used to create cheap rip-offs, costing them thousands of pounds in lost sales.

Designers told the BBC the process for getting the plagiarised listings removed has been like the fairground game 'whack-a-mole' with copied products re-appearing within days.

Temu said protecting intellectual property was a top priority and that it was encouraging sellers to join the trial of a new takedown process specifically for the greetings card industry.

Amanda Mountain, the co-founder of York-based Lola Design, discovered the catalogue of designs she had built up over a decade had nearly all been copied. Amanda found the images she had created had been lifted and were being advertised by other sellers on cards and other products like t-shirts.

Amanda bought one of the cards using her design and found the image was distorted and the paper was of a poorer quality than hers. It's not a nice feeling to see something you've poured all your love and hours into taken within minutes, she told the BBC.

After pressure from the Greeting Card Association (GCA), Temu has now put in place a bespoke takedown process for the industry which, it says, will mean stolen designs are removed more quickly and won't be able to be re-uploaded.

According to the GCA, the system will then use AI to log the designer's original creation as a protected image. It will then block any products using that design before they appear for sale.

Temu stated that intellectual property protection is a top priority and that it had invested heavily in resources to strengthen trust with brands, sellers and consumers. Amanda Fergusson, the chief executive of the GCA, welcomed the changes as a positive step towards addressing the issue of counterfeit designs.