Skullcandy serialization defends online sales from fakes

Headphones manufacturer Skullcandy is defending its brand by only selling serialized products on online retail platforms such as Amazon.

The US company's chief executive Hoby Darling told investors in its second-quarter results call last week that the policy is designed to reassure buyers that products bought over the these channels are not counterfeit or grey market.

Serialization "takes a little bit of time," he said, adding that Skullcandy is being "more aggressive" than the rest of the industry in adopting this approach. "We want to make sure both our third-party retailers and our consumers have a good experience," he told investors.

The comments came as Skullcandy has been stepping up its online sales with a new direct-sales, digital storefront on Amazon.

A couple of years ago the company has introduced labels for its product which include a 13-digit unique identification code (UIC) that consumers can use to verify the authenticity of a purchase when they register the product for warranty purposes.