I don't believe that at all. Anyone who buys knock-offs is doing so to save money b/c their supply of cash is limited. They're willing to deal with imperfections to save a couple hundred bucks. Assuming no knockoff parts existed, i think its a safe assumption that the vast majority of those people would avoid buying a kit in general (if im wrong, find me a broke drifter w/ a 6666 kit or bn kit or w/e in america). Its just like any other luxury brand - before copies and knock-offs exist, the items are exclusive. Any company who produces such items KNOWs they are never going to reach the mass market and they do not expect to. The kinds of people that buy name brand luxury items do it for the indirect benefits which are unattainable by purchasing copy cat items. They purposely spend exorbitant amounts of money to be gain a sense of personal satisfaction and feeling of exclusivity. Whether copies exist or not, to the luxury item purchaser it does not matter (obviously to an extent). Louis vuitton, Gucci, and Rolex still thrive b/c of this fact. If those kits are $1800 and that's the bottom line, then the manufacturer already knows that they are only ever going to sell maybe 10 kits total in a year. A knock-off will not effect such sales.
I also want to ad - supermade has been here for a while. Many a fanboi swung on the nuts of supermade. Coming in $1200 a kit, you dont seem many people buying them. So where are the knock-offs? Maybe one will pop up, maybe they won't. The point is, a nice, expensive kit being brought to the states does not guarantee a knock of.
