Tassilo Gummel, Gleb Stolyarov, Polina, Nikolskaya and David Gautier-Villars
PARIS (Reuters) – Nike (NYSE:) stopped selling its sportswear to Russia shortly after Moscow launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine more than two years ago. But that didn’t stop Footballstore.ru, an online sports store owned by the Russian football club Zenit.
Among the dozens of Nike-branded products the site offers are Phantom GT2 Elite soccer cleats from the American sportswear maker for 29,999 rubles, or about $330.
The man who brought these shoes to Russia is Wijnand Herinks, a 40-year-old Dutch citizen living in Moscow. From the very beginning of the conflict, Heerinks built a thriving business providing Russian consumers with Western goods whose producers had left Russia.
“Nike doesn’t want their products coming to Russia,” Herinks told Reuters during a video call from his office on the outskirts of Moscow, where boxes of Western brands line the shelves. But he added: “They’re also not telling us not to do it.”
Both Nike and Lego told Reuters they had not given Herinckx permission to import their products into Russia.
By reviewing customs records, corporate records and internal company documents, and speaking with Heerinks himself, Reuters learned how his business sources branded goods including Nike and Lego: it uses intermediaries with no apparent connection to Russia as buyers, and then ships goods to Russia. – often via Turkey – and finally delivers them to retailers in Russia.
There are at least dozens of firms like Herinckx that use gray market methods to ship Western goods into Russia, according to a Reuters analysis of customs data. His operation shows how attempts by Western governments and brands to isolate the Russian economy collide with the reality of global business: where there is demand, someone will fill it.
Restrictions by Western governments mainly concern industrial products that can be used to create weapons for the Russian war machine. Such products are typically subject to US and European Union sanctions. Herinks said his focus is on non-sanctioned consumer products. Reuters found no evidence that his firm was violating sanctions.
But companies like Herinks’s help the Russian economy indirectly: Consumers can still buy the foreign goods they became accustomed to after the collapse of communism more than a generation ago. Customs data analyzed by Reuters showed, for example, that the value of Nike products imported into Russia fell 81% in 2022 to $21 million but rose in 2023 to at least $74 million.
The sportswear giant said it did not supply Heerinks’ firm or any related businesses. “We no longer have Nike-owned physical or digital retail operations in Russia,” the company said in a statement. “We do not ship products to Russia or allow any market partners to distribute products there.” The company also said it has a dedicated team to investigate unauthorized distribution channels. The representative did not answer questions about how the products get into Russia.
In mid-2022, following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, Nike announced it was pulling out of Russia and Lego said it was closing its Russian business.
As global brands stopped selling or stopped exporting due to the invasion, Russia allowed businesses to import products from abroad without the permission of the trademark owner. Russia said its so-called parallel imports amounted to more than $70 billion in the two years to the end of 2023.
Some legal experts say seeking relief under Russian law will be challenging for Western brands, leaving few other legal options for brands trying to enforce intellectual property rights that are typically tied to the territory where the infringement took place.
The availability of Western brands allows Russian President Vladimir Putin to “project the message that the war does not undermine the ‘normal life’ of the Russian middle class,” said Sergei Guriev, a Russian economist who is rector of Sciences Po University in Paris.
‘PROUD OF IT’
Heerinks’ Russian company has 82 employees and projected revenues of 35 million euros, or about $37 million, in 2024, he said. Last year, that figure was $23.7 million, according to the company.
At the time of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Herinks was working in the Moscow office of the German company Hellmann Worldwide Logistics. According to Herinks, he led a team of more than 20 people inside Hellmann that served foreign companies that wanted to sell their products in Russia without opening local branches.
Hellmann quickly decided to leave Russia. Herinx remained where he was. According to Herinks, he was previously married to a Russian woman with whom he had children. “Our life is here. Everything we have, we built here,” he said.
He took over the management of one of Hellmann’s Russian divisions, renamed it Herinckx Trade Solutions Rus (HTS Rus) and registered it in the name of his wife in April 2022. Heerinks initially used Hellmann’s email servers and a variation of the Hellmann logo in his marketing.
Both Heerinks and Hellmann said they had a transition agreement allowing the Dutchman to use part of his old employer’s infrastructure. Hellmann said the agreement to use her logo expired in October 2022, and her intellectual property has since been used without her consent. Heerinks stated that this was an oversight and he stopped using the Hellmann logos in January 2024. Hellmann stated that he now has no connection with the Herinckx business and does not have any operating business in Russia.
Among the products Herinckx ships to Russia are Reebok sports shoes and Emporio Armani wristwatches, according to Herinckx and a Russian bank that lists HTS Rus’ assets pledged against the loan.
Heerinks said he did not have permission from the two brands. Armani Group stated that it had stopped authorized deliveries to Russian distributors and did not know how XTS Rus received these products. The owner of Reebok Authentic Brands Group, which announced in 2022 that it would suspend operations of all branded stores and e-commerce in Russia, did not respond to a request for comment.
The Dutchman’s company does not publicly disclose information about its clients. But Reuters identified some of its Russian clients by reviewing documents the company filed with Russian tax authorities. Among the clients were the largest Russian supermarket chains and online stores.
Heerinks said his firm is a conscientious company that also does charitable work. When asked why he decided to publicly talk about his activities, he replied: “What we do is very cool, we are proud of it.”
EUROPEAN ROUTE
His achievements include importing Lego bricks. The Danish firm said it strictly adheres to its policy of not selling to Russia. According to Herinks and Lego, when the company sells products to retailers or distributors, it stipulates in the contract that they must not resell them to Russia.
To get around this problem, Herinks said he created a chain of intermediaries between Lego and Russia. Some of the Lego bricks he buys are first bought from the manufacturer by a company in Europe that has nothing to do with his business, he said, declining to name the company. He then buys the bricks from the company using a Dutch-registered company he owns, HTS Europe BV, he says.
According to Herinks, the goods are then trucked directly from Europe to Russia, passing through customs along the way.
Once in Russia, Lego comes under the control of Herinckx’s Russian business, HTS Rus, according to loan and tax documents. Heerinks told Reuters he supplied Lego to about 48 Russian firms, mostly specialized toy retailers.
“My kids play with Legos,” Herinks said. “I have nothing against other kids playing with Legos.”
However, Lego has problems with its operation.
After Reuters contacted Lego for comment in late April, the Danish firm said it had written to HTS Rus accusing it of making a false claim on its website about its partnership with Lego. Subsequently, the XTS Rus company changed the English version of its website, removing the image of Lego figures and replacing it with ordinary children’s plastic toys. As of June 13, the Lego logo was still present on the Russian version of the site.
“We are concerned about news of this influx of goods given that we stopped supplying LEGO products to Russia in March 2022,” Lego said in a statement to Reuters. “This is an issue that we take seriously and are taking action on while ensuring compliance with the local laws and regulations in which we continue to operate.”
TRANSPORTATION IN TURKEY
Some Western goods come through Turkey, a favorite hub for gray market imports into Russia. Heerinks said he sources Nike and some Lego products from Turkey through HTS Poer Dis Ticaret Limited Sirketi, which he said sources products from Turkish retailers or distributors. He declined to give their names.
HTS Poer co-founder Murat Erbelger told Reuters that the Turkish company has nothing to do with the sanctioned products. “We are running a legitimate business,” he said. Erbelger did not respond to questions about HTS Poer’s collaboration with Herinckx Trade Solutions. When asked by Reuters about gray market goods entering Russia through Turkey, the Turkish Presidential Communications Department did not respond.
Customs data from June 2022 to December 2023 showed that HTS Poer shipped at least $4 million worth of Nike products to Russia. Herinks told Reuters that, as far as he knew, all of these shipments of Nike goods were destined for his company.
As soon as Nike products enter Russia, they go to Herinckx retail customers. Among them, according to tax reports and an internal document of HTS Rus, is Footballstore.ru. Russian corporate records show that the trading platform is 100% owned by the Zenit football club.
The Zenit club is sponsored by Gazprom (MCX:), the Russian state gas company, and is also partly owned by Gazprombank. The lender is under US sanctions against the Russian banking sector. Gazprombank, Gazprom and Zenit did not respond to requests for comment.
Reuters purchased Nike Phantom GT2 Elite football boots from an online store. They were delivered in 10 days. Nike has not commented on the shoes.
The box containing the shoes showed a production date of September 2022, three months after Nike said it would stop selling in Russia. It also had a label indicating Herinckx’s HTS Rus as the importer.