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Temu pulls its U.S. Google Shopping ads

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Re: Temu pulls its U.S. Google Shopping ads

#281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's really interesting to see people being ignorant, and proud of their ignorance. Imagine someone saying "All American products are garbage. And I obviously never bought anything American, why on Earth would I buy garbage?"

It is really interesting to see people making up stuff in their heads. Nowhere did I talk about "all", obviously Chinese factories can produce extremely high quality products. E.g. iPhones. Temu is a trash distributor, the race to the bottom needs to be stopped. Their entire business model is being cheap and shipping trash.

> Their entire business model is being cheap and shipping trash.

[citation needed]

I spent a few thousand on items on AliExpress, and I'm satisfied with almost all of them. How come?

Re: Temu pulls its U.S. Google Shopping ads

#282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had bad reviews been supressed by amazon several as well, so at this point I'm assuming any review system is theater.

Amazon definitely don't do anything like this.

Seller-side here. Amazon combine my author page, with that of A.A. Milne. Some of my products show up under the deceased author, some of his under mine. Reviews for one particular product are combined.

My seller ID is separate, my last name is also Milne, but my first is James.

He wrote a book called "The Red House Mystery", I wrote an homage to it because I am related to the man, called "Red House". Different products, with different ISBNs.

Combined reviews. [0]

That's not exactly a fair process for customers - and no, I can't get them uncombined. I've been trying for years. But if the seller can't get rid of something completely misleading, that seems to have been caused by a very badly automated process, then there are processes at Amazon that cause problems.

[0] https://www.amazon.com.au/Red-House-James-Milne-ebook/dp/B0C...

Re: Temu pulls its U.S. Google Shopping ads

#283
post #20

I loved temu, aliexpress, and shein. I probably averaged 1 item per day arriving to my house, for years and years. Mostly little electronics parts and specialized tools for my workshop. Buying from Amazon or locally would have cost me 10x as much. Obviously it's over now. Anyone getting a package in May will be hit with a $75-$150 or more bill per package, even a 75 cent envelope will be charged +$75. I feel bad for…

What a great day to be European. I think that websites like Temu or AliExpress are particularly popular in poorer countries because we're used to scammy tactics, and we know how to navigate them. We know what to buy in order to get what we want, and for this purpose, AliExpress is awesome, because there are so many products you can't find locally. Meanwhile customers from rich countries expect better customer service…

According to this report (https://www.earnestanalytics.com/insights/temu-growing-faste...), Temu is growing fastest among high income earners. Would be interesting from which countries most customers come from.

Re: Temu pulls its U.S. Google Shopping ads

#284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Temu/Aliexpress/etc are for buying very cheap clothing. 2 out of 3 items fit and 1 out of 3 is decent quality. That's still cheaper, depending on what tariffs your country is charging. I wouldn't buy something where a warranty would be useful from them. Ok, maybe very niche hobby products, but then I wouldn't expect a warranty.

Not entirely. For cycling there are now a group of trusted companies that many people purchase from - WinSpace, Magene, iGPSport, that stand behind their products. I have a Magene p505 crank-based power meter - £250 delivered. It's as accurate as ones costing 4X as much, and has not shown any signs of issues in the year+ I've been using it. The idea that AliExpress is just for cheap tat is less and less true, and pro…

> The idea that AliExpress is just for cheap tat is less and less true, and products in certain sectors coming out of China are just much better value for money (and often, as good as, or better quality) than you'd find from homegrown companies.

Not just better value for money, I often find that AliExpress sells things I simply cannot find anywhere else.

A recent example: I was looking for something to balance the 3rd axis on my telescope, There are very few products on the market from mainstream brands and none were what I needed. On Ali I easily found several options. These are basically just machined pieces of metal so not really anything than can break.

Same goes for storage bags and cases. You can often find a bag or case specifically made for your device, while there isn’t anything for sale locally.

Re: Temu pulls its U.S. Google Shopping ads

#285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So destroying the economy is worth making a few people feel better about minimizing their life? Because that's what is happening. How about people exercise some common sense and not buy things they don't need as opposed to millions of people becoming homeless and military aggression between the USA and China getting much more likely

Some people may feel that their economy was already destroyed when manufacturing was moved to China. Ever drive around Ohio, West Virginia, Indiana, etc? So many dead towns, thanks to jobs moving elsewhere. I think ending the pipeline of landfill fodder from Temu is a great thing. That kind of consumerism is like eating a diet of pure sugar. Feels good for a second, but bad for the consumer, environment and economy.

I was one of those people who always purchased American when things were being off shored, and I still do as often as I can, especially tools.

Do you know who made the Chinese made goods thing a reality? People from Ohio, West Virginia, Indiana etc. People went into a store, saw the cheaper item, often inferior Chinese item on the shelf and bought it instead of the domestically produced item, even the stuff that said "Designed in America, Made in China". They did this because it was cheaper.

I think you're mistaken if you think some external force "did this to us".

We all do it, some items are just not worth the exuberant price tag, especially if you're only going to use something occasionally.

At least from my observation, the balance was actually not so bad in the last 5 years or so, plenty of good American options available and cheaper Chinese stuff when that was appropriate. I think America will be worse off from this because the cost of so many things will be way higher now, DIY for example will be off the table for a lot of people. The cost of a drill will become ridiculous, for example.

I think ending the pipeline of landfill fodder from Temu is a great thing. That kind of consumerism is like eating a diet of pure sugar. Feels good for a second, but bad for the consumer, environment and economy.

There would've been other ways to go about solving the environmental impacts of Temu than this. In my opinion.

Re: Temu pulls its U.S. Google Shopping ads

#286
post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did an experiment for my blog awhile back that never got written up (lack of time, mostly), but it is was just me ordering about $30US of stuff from Temu to see why they were so aggressively marketing themselves, the app auto-installing on my Samsung smartphone I have for work, etc. The experience left me feeling very, very dirty. The items in question were some small fire sticks for camping, a couple of solar port…

I personally am always weary of cheap power banks. Given the rest of the corners cut on the device, how sure are you that the circuitry and the batteries themselves are of acceptable safety standards. Even the batteries in expensive devices can become dangerous and I would assume that those undergo some higher leven of QA, testing and safety standards.

Paying more =/= quality, unfortunately. Believe me, I wish it were otherwise. Don't be afraid to open up those battery banks now and then if you want to be sure, put a meter on them and scope them if you know how, but you'll find what I typically find; a lot of the same cheap components all wrapped in a pretty package. But because one came from China and one was "made" in the USA, you'll pay a lot more for one than you will the other. You can probably guess which.

I say that as someone who works in manufacturing as a controls and repair tech for industrial IoT and electromechanical integrations (I wear a lot of hats, long story). Trusted brands like Rockwell, Siemens, etc aren't really doing anything that much different than their cheaper competitors and they know it. It's a big part of the reason why their business model includes aggressive pushes to keep their customer "in their world," so to speak, trying to be a one-stop-shop for all their control needs when good number of applications really don't need anything beyond a Koyo Click PLC you can get used for $50 on eBay instead of the $1200 A/B unit. Heck, I've seen automation cells that could have the PLC swapped out with a $20 Arduino and nobody would know the difference except the controls guy. I'd love to say this over-priced cult-like hooey is restricted to the automation industry, but it's definitely not, and bleeds all over a variety of consumer industries, especially those of personal electronics. We are getting ripped off left and right, but if there's a fruit logo or some inventor's name we recognize on the packaging, we're okay taking out a second mortgage to afford it.

In the end, the quality standards in many cases are just a lot of hot air, CYA statements and sales BS. Price is really dictated by the customer's perception of the product, and when you create that trust, legitimate or not, you get to price your product much higher than your competitor, regardless if your product is _actually_ better than theirs. They get away with this because, for the most part, customers don't take the screws out and actually look inside.

Now, that is not to say my experience is always true. There are plenty of companies that make their quality standards and testing pretty transparent so the consumer can review them at their leisure and make a choice. I'm just saying most do not, which creates a lot of shadowy areas where many companies can get away with things simply because they know nobody is looking and taking their word at face value.

Re: Temu pulls its U.S. Google Shopping ads

#287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is really interesting to see people making up stuff in their heads. Nowhere did I talk about "all", obviously Chinese factories can produce extremely high quality products. E.g. iPhones. Temu is a trash distributor, the race to the bottom needs to be stopped. Their entire business model is being cheap and shipping trash.

> Their entire business model is being cheap and shipping trash. [citation needed] I spent a few thousand on items on AliExpress, and I'm satisfied with almost all of them. How come?

Because you are a consumer and someone who enjoys trash.

To be honest "consumer" is really one of the worst things to call someone, but I think it applies very well to someone like you.

Re: Temu pulls its U.S. Google Shopping ads

#288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon is just not a good place to go, you're going to be buying something very low cost that someone is drop-shipping as a way to maximise their profit, not provide a good product. You need to know the brands to buy (Trace Velo, Peak Torque and China Cycling helps here) and buy directly from their Ali Express store, or from their website. Amazon is only if you need a cheap bike maintenance tool within a couple of da…

useless to know the brand. Amazon will change the seller every time you see an item, and pretend the reviews apply. then the new seller will ship you counterfeits while selling under the good brand and reviews. after a few sales, seller bestbikesbrooklin7456, is banned and you are offered bestevercyclesocal888 and the cycle restart.

[dead]

Re: Temu pulls its U.S. Google Shopping ads

#290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Temu/Aliexpress/etc are for buying very cheap clothing. 2 out of 3 items fit and 1 out of 3 is decent quality. That's still cheaper, depending on what tariffs your country is charging. I wouldn't buy something where a warranty would be useful from them. Ok, maybe very niche hobby products, but then I wouldn't expect a warranty.

AliExpress is great for electronics. Not the „I need a phone“ stuff (although for that it’s fine too, I think), but more the „I need an ESP-32 module“.

Mouser/Farnell etc don't have those? Or i guess not as many options.

I got my last esp-32 from Mouser iirc. In Europe. They finally sorted out EU fulfillment warehouses.

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