Anyone ever bought anything through Alibaba? Looking at their site, I honestly don't know how it works. Can someone explain it?
"Anyone ever bought ANYTHING through Alibaba? Looking at their site, I honestly don't know how it works. Can someone explain it? Autospell curse? Nope, I've never bought anything through Alibaba but seems like every time I'm searching for something a bit oddball, the damn site ends up popping up. Generally it seems to be a wholesale outlet for China cheap goods but in bulk.
Thanks for the translation, thought Dan may have been drunk posting last night. Damn auto correct. No. I find Google shopping a decent starting point, eBay or a few others to be my goto sites, at least initially. ~Bill
Wow, no idea how that happened. I was sober, but tired and laying in bed. Apparently didn't reread what I typed. Ouch.
I would venture to say most people in the US haven't purchased anything from them or even know who they are. They're based overseas and most of their product ships from foreign countries. The US is still Amazon territory. Additionally, it's setup to be more of a business-to-business store than business-to-consumer. Often there's minimum purchase quantities on products. Speaking of which, most of the products they sell are Chinese ripoffs of popular consumer goods. You can find knock off electronics for cheap but it's all garbage that ships direct from China.
Yeah, I figure it's mostly for businesses looking to import large quantities. I've seen a lot of talk about the Alibaba IPO, so was curious what all the buzz is about.
I've used AliExpress (always pre-paid cards) for some cheap red dots and scopes before. for the price pretty crazy good.
I've got a little experience with them. There was a time I was going to expand our fishing lure business into tungsten and I explored some options for bulk supply via Alibaba simply because there are only a handful of places on the planet that can manufacture products with it. What I've learned about them is that there are a TON of scam artists that thrive off the site. It's truly the wild west and there is very little regulation. It seems that they are more about brokering the deal vs. actually processing the transaction and protecting both buyer and seller like eBay or Amazon. I'm not sure I'd do much on there based on my previous experience.
It is similar to an amazon, but a lot of the products are sold in bulk at a substantial discounted price. It's considered a global wholesale trade. For example you are looking for a set of wheels for a car that here in the US cost $500 a wheel. You will find these exact wheels on Alibaba, but you may need to purchase a pallet of them where they come out to $50 a wheel. You then can sell the left over wheels or merchandise if you wish. What I do know is the damn stock better rally after the IPO the other day cause I'm down 3%!!!
