Grey market
The grey market is trade in genuine, non-counterfeit products through distribution channels that have not been authorized by the brand or manufacturer. The products are real; the route they took to the buyer is not the one the brand intended. That distinguishes the grey market from the black market, which deals in counterfeit or illegal goods.
How products end up on the grey market
Typical routes are parallel import (buying in a market where the product is cheaper and reselling where it is more expensive), surplus or end-of-line stock sold on by distributors, and stock diverted from a channel it was intended for — for example goods meant for one country's wholesale channel appearing on another country's marketplace.
Why brands care
Grey-market sellers often price below authorized resellers, which pressures the market price and the margins of the official channel. Warranty and service can be murky for buyers, product presentation is outside the brand's control, and authorized partners understandably object to being undercut by sellers who carry none of the channel obligations.
The EU nuance: exhaustion of rights
Within the European Economic Area, trademark rights are 'exhausted' once a product has been placed on the EEA market by the brand or with its consent: from that moment the product can be freely resold within the EEA, and the brand cannot use its trademark to block that resale. Reselling genuine goods inside the EEA is therefore in principle lawful, while imports from outside the EEA without the brand's consent are a different matter. For brands this means the practical lever in Europe is usually visibility and channel management rather than prohibition. This page describes the concepts and is not legal advice.
How PricePatrol fits in
PricePatrol's market scans answer the question that precedes any grey-market discussion: where is my product actually being sold, and at what price? Unknown shops and unusually low prices surface as data, so brand teams know where to look first.