This article is ridiculously timely as just the other day I was accused of carrying a fake Chanel bag. For real…a designer resale expert and fashion writer for LePrix who owns a fake?

Of all the people who would be caught carrying a FAKE, it wouldn’t be me! Well, this morning I learned about Real Authentication, and I immediately signed up because it’s obvious to me this bag—and maybe a few others—will need an extra level of protection and authentication before I’m accused of selling a fake.

What’s Real Authentication? It’s a designer authentication company that lets you authenticate and verify your item from anywhere, anytime…which means there’s an app! And since LePrix is one of the world’s top designer resale companies, it just makes sense for us to feature them in this month’s Shop & Chat.

Tell me about the founding of Real Authentication.

Real Authentication was founded by Anastacia Bouzeneris and Jenna Padilla. We met while working together as authenticators at another designer resale company and both realized there was a need in the industry for a quick, easy and reliable way to authenticate luxury goods, so we took a leap and launched Real Authentication!

How and why did you launch Real Authentication?

We’ve been authenticating in the secondary market for nearly a decade, and we’ve held positions as Senior Authenticators for one of the industry’s top resellers. Because we’ve been in the industry for a long time, we’ve noticed the speed at which the designer resale industry has grown and become one of the primary ways of buying luxury goods. While we were working for various resellers in the industry, we’d witness clients struggle with reasons why their item was either deemed authentic or counterfeit. The clients were unable to find a quick, reliable and easy way to authenticate goods and find credible information surrounding authenticity in general. Even internally at our company, it was difficult to find a reliable source for authentication.

Why are you so passionate about fighting counterfeits?

Not only have we seen our clients get taken advantage of by scammers, but we’ve been burned too! There are few things more disturbing than being scammed and having zero recourse. We absolutely love and appreciate the craftsmanship and heritage behind the brands we service, but we are primarily motivated by finding justice for our clients and offering a reliable, non-biased source of regulation to the secondary market as a whole.

How do you authenticate?

We analyze everything—from the client information all the way down to the denier of a stitch. Not only do we have two highly-trained authentication experts who review every single order, but we also use technology that we created—Smart Database Scan—to crosscheck data within our system and identify any red flags. With the higher quality of the fakes today, you can never be too careful! We always recommend getting multiple opinions to verify authenticity though.

What are the most popular authentication requests that come your way?

Chanel, Gucci and Louis Vuitton will always be our most authenticated brands as they tend to be the most popular and in turn the most counterfeited. We see so much variety overall though, it is always exciting sifting through our admin panel.

What was your first luxury vintage purchase?

Jenna: I’ll always remember what first spiked my interest in the secondary market… I came across a vintage Chanel Crystal Sautoir necklace for $100 and could tell immediately it was authentic and incredibly underpriced! I wore it for months and then tossed it on eBay to make a quick and massive profit. I was sold!

Anastacia: My journey into the secondhand market started in 1999 when I opened my eBay account. One of my first purchases was a vintage Louis Vuitton bag. It was well used, but new to me! To this day, I still have the bag as it’s a reminder of my journey right from the start.

To find out more about Real Authentication, click here.