Hi, please could I get your views on the following situation;

Basically I live in the UK and have started to buy stock from, my father in S. Africa who is an authorised stockist of a premium branded sport sock. He buys direct from the manufacturer and has favourable trading terms with them 60+ days. The issue I have is that the manufacturer in S. Africa is part of an established company based in Germany. The items made in S. Africa that I want are not found in the UK or Europe for that matter, I have spent many hours trying to find suppliers/distributors of the exact items here and just can't find them. The range produced in S. Africa seems to be unique to the country.

So would it be considered a parallel import if the products don't exist here even though the brand does and the items are bought through an authorised distribution channel in S. Africa?

Yes it would be.

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Ok thanks for that, I don't want to retail the items but as I aim to be a specialised sports product distributor, the socks will complement the products already sourced for which I will have distribution rights. So the only way to get the socks will be to bring them in myself as there is no distributor here, and as I wont be retailing them does that mean a retailer here can source them from me to resell and not fall foul of EU regulation as the items will already be in the EU?

Yes ,get a trade mark and pattern on whatever items you have if they are unique ...