Colgate and P&G have been caught playing gimmicks on Chinese customers!

This is not a breaking news, but definitely worth posting.
Crest(from P&G) and Colgate both have earned big bucks from booming China for years. Long time ago, with heavily funded ads campaigns, their tooth paste products easily defeated domestic brands of China, and have dominated Chinaurban market since then. It is well known that Chinese have always trusted American brands, which they believe stick to the higher standards and thus have credibility.
In fact Colgate and Crest have played gimmicks on Chinese customers for a long time without being caught. It is well known that TV advertisements are their heaviest weapon for selling their products to Chinese customers. About 10+ years ago, immediately after Crest(or Colgate) started bombing Chinese audience with their appealing TV ads, Chinese customers noticed there was a strong constrast between the international brands and domestic brands. The effectiveness of Colgate and Crest products has been endorsed by the organizations such as Chinese stomatology society and National preventive group for tooth diseases. Although Chinese people had not heard about these organizations before, the endorsements from these seemingly independent national groups indeed painted trustable image on the Crest and Colgate. Actually people've considered Crest and Colgate so trustable that no one even bothered to know where these organizations are and what they do. Nobody knew how these endorsements have been done until this April, when a resident at Nanjing city called a reporter working for a local newpapers "modern expess", questioning the preventive effectiveness of these toothpastes towards oral and tooth diseases. The reporter's first clue is asking help from the organizations behind these endorsements.

Several days later, when the reporter managed to find National preventive group for tooth diseases, he was shocked. He couldn't believe this organization only has two people. There are only two desks in its office, which is located on the 4th flooor of an old messy building with a sign of student dorm in the campus of medical school at Beijing University. Next he found he didn't even have to leave this building to find another organization: Chinese stomatology society, which is located on 5th floor of the same building. These two organizations are much the same in their "simplistic" nature.

When asked about the criteria of endorsements, these organizations acknowledged that they decided the criteria by themselves but wouldn't let reporter to see the written documents. When asked about the specimen, they said that they don't collect specimen from the market but accept whatever submitted by the companies. When asked about the procedures, they couldn't even explain exactly where they did the test and how many patients or customers they have surveyed for endorements.

An insider estimated the cost for a endorsement is up to 1 million yuan a year. But why would an giant international company such as Colgate or P&G like to hire these organizations to endorse their products?

Another insider told the reporter, the material cost of a tube of their toothpaste is about 0.48 yuan RMB (about 4 cents in USD) while the price of a tube is around 10 yuan. The toothpaste belongs to the category of highly substitutable products. A strong advertisement compaign is essential to keep them dominating the market. Every year Colgate and Crest spent hundreds of millions yuans in China market and have effectively held larger chunk of China market for years.

All in all, a market gimmick successfully won the trust from Chinese customers and opened the gate for these crocodiles. Now who is responsible for misleading customers? The immature Chinese customers themselves or insensitive news media? Or someone else?
I decide to boycott Crest and Colgate toothpaste, man, this is a tough decision.

Update: I couldn't even find the chinese website for Colgate......This is a very respectful way to do business with Chinese customers.