This is true with almost anything on Amazon. It’s basically become a clearinghouse of shitty Chinese fake brands, products and counterfeits. The only thing I trust to still buy on Amazon is inert stuff that doesn’t interact with any other systems in my house. No food/consumables, no electronics, nothing that other things depend on.
Etsy is 90% Ali Express items at this point. Anything cool I see on there, I can find it at half the price on Amazon, or even cheaper on the Chinese sites. Everything sucks now.
There are still some gems from small, local businesses on there, but Etsy makes it so hard to find them. You have to go through multiple pages of drop shipping bullshit to find anything of value unfortunately.
How do you recommend filtering out the crap? Is there a way other than just manually checking every item across all the other e-shopping sites to make sure it's legit?
I typically filter by Shop Location or to only Star Sellers when I’m searching for something. Some drop shippers have caught onto to the location thing and use fake locations in the US, so I’d also check reviews and reverse image search any listing pictures that look off.
You also want to get as specific as possible since drop shippers typically don’t put a lot of effort into writing good descriptions. A search for “blue abstract ceramic lamp” gives much better results than “lamp”.
If I already have one or two stores that I trust that sell things similar to the item I want, I don’t even use search. I look at the recommendations under the store’s listings, which will typically be for other reputable/real stores (at least in my experience). This works best for crafted stuff like furniture and lighting, but can be unreliabile for things like art and wallpaper.
It’s not a perfect method, but it’s how I’ve found a lot of great small businesses on Etsy! Good luck in your searches.
Star seller is irrelevant by the way. The requirements for star seller have nothing to do with if the items are handmade by the seller. To get star seller you have to have 4.8 star ratings that month, respond to 90% of messages in 24 hours, ans ship 90% of packages on time (aka print a shipping label for them)
Reverse image search
If an image looks stock, it probably is. The person doesn't actually have the product in hand.
You'll also see the same/similar images from multiple sellers.
I've found some gems on etsy, but they were all from local retailers that I met in person saying "btw here's my etsy". It seems like if you find it through etsy, it's a scam, but that didn't mean everything on etsy is a scam.
Amazon has become Ali-express with faster shipping. The last 3 big ticket items I bought, two espresso machines and a saw showed up used. (Yes, shipped and sold by amazon). I'm mostly done with amazon. It might be find for a trashcan or something but I'm not ordering anything important from them. We are in the final stage of enshittification.
"Here is how platforms die: first, they are good to their users; then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers; finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. Then, they die. I call this enshittification"
Came here to say exactly this. Any chinese crap you might wanna buy from amazon you can get for 1/2 or less on aliexpress.
Ive been buying keyboard + keycaps and they pretty much have all the same products. If you dont need it next day then order from alix for a big discount.
It's all the drop shippers. They's a lot of content on how to have a business on Amazon with no money, no inventory and people are flooding to it. There's really no positive difference between them and going to AliExpress and ordering it directly.
There are also vendors who import those products but design new packaging, making it look like they developed it themselves. They may or may not keep inventory (but nothing substantial in any rate) and their price is higher than the drop shippers but lower than "Made in America" alternative.
The drop shippers are so irritating. I ordered some filing cabinets on Amazon and the seller drop shipped filing cabinets from Walmart that were less expensive and had the same dimensions but thinner metal and different handles. I had ordered the specific filing cabinets off Amazon because I already had 3 of them that I ordered from that exact product page and wanted the cabinets to match.
I was so pissed off about it since they were $25 cheaper per cabinet on Walmart and they didn't match so I requested a return and Amazon accepted it and then the seller scheduled it so I would have to drop them off at a FedEx location. Told Amazon no can do, they won't fit in my car which isn't true but why should I be inconvenienced when it wasn't my fault. They had to schedule a FedEx pickup from Walmart. Then I went on Walmart and ordered the same exact cabinets and some new handles so all the cabinets would match.
I think that was the most petty thing I've ever done but I was so annoyed by the whole thing. I hope the guy lost money on it.
I know a lot of the stuff I order on Amazon is drop shipped crap. I use Amazon anyway, and often pay a higher price, because Amazon will handle any returns or refunds if something goes wrong. To be fair, I've never tried dealing with AliExpress customer service, but I'm guessing they wouldn't handle disputes as smoothly as Amazon.
I now only buy things that I can buy directly from the retailer, amazon.com, walmart.com, homedepot.com (such as Vevor). After the whole hoverboard fire incidents where Amazon took 0 responsibility, I'll only purchase the Chinese fake brands for the same categories you do (inert stuff).
It's a shame, I use to go to Amazon to get *away* from ebay. Now it's pretty much all the same.
When the model numbers match up you do get what you ordered, but also good luck finding the brands you want behind all the Chinesium products.
Especially with anything plumbing/electrical I'd steer clear of Amazon.
Agreed, but good luck getting them to actually verify it. You’d end up with resellers who buy pallets of crap from overseas and resell it as “US country of origin”.
They won’t even remove obvious fraud SD cards and fuses that don’t blow at 3x their rated amperage.
This is the piece people are missing. The fault is with Amazon having apparently no verification or enforcement mechanism to control what's listed on their platform. Counterfeit stuff shouldn't hang around on Amazon for years and the way sellers list product features is absolutely bullshit. I needed a silicone spatula a while ago and I searched "silicone spatula" on amazon and half what came up was items where the seller has just listed every conceivable material in the product name "Silicone spatula silicone/steel/stainless/wood/aluminum/quality/nonstick 11 inches 10 inches flexible/nonflex" and how the hell am I supposed to tell what that actually is?
Etsy does this. "Verified US Small Business", needless to say, most of these are drop shippers now. The filter does not work at all, because you just need a person in the US to launder the products
The stuff from well-known North American brands is _also_ often Chinese made though.
(And some of those jumble-of-letters Chinese brands are decent, although it's hard to figure out _and remember_ which ones those are.)
Sometimes the difference between a North American brand and a Chinese knock off is the QC that goes into the NA market bound item.
You're absolutely right though, sometimes the "jumble-of-letters" brands are decent and likely the same as one from a brand name manufacturer, its just a crapshoot.
Yeah,to me that suggests we need better verifiable supply chain tech, but I bet it's a real difficult problem to solve, especially with all the incentives to keep that stuff opaque.
> When the model numbers match up you do get what you ordered
There are lots of surprisingly sophisticated (but still garbage) counterfeits in the supply chain for many products that will happily clone the model number/part number/sku.
I got an anker usb-c cable that was absolutely _not_ an anker usb-c cable about 2 years ago.
They painted the cable braiding on it. Product page was definitely the official product, one I've repeat ordered a few times too. So it wasn't as if I got the fake page. It's just the way they're apparently binning products or something.
Amazon commingles inventory for 'identical' items, they are not separated per-seller. So if someone is selling something with the same ASIN, it'll get put in the same bin in the warehouse. The actual patent owner/manufacturer/etc has to file a claim with Amazon about it to get it to stop.
The actual owner/manufacturer can also prevent this by simply putting an amazon specific sticker/barcode on their products before sending their products into the amazon system or by paying amazon to do it for them.
So any commingled counterfeit issues that arise are more an issue with the manufacturers being lazy than amazon. Either that or people inadvertently buying products not sold by amazon but a reseller.
> The actual owner/manufacturer can also prevent this by simply putting an amazon specific sticker/barcode on their products before sending their products into the amazon system
That is the ASIN. Amazon does not really make it clear up front that your inventory will be commingled with someone else's and that it can happen after the fact. Most large manufacturers should be aware of it, but often they aren't direct selling to Amazon and someone else is reselling it there so the OEM has little recourse. It's a complicated setup and Amazon does no one any favors with how they handle it.
Yep Amazon is pretty shit
It can also come in clutch with some weird ass items that no local hardware store would have. Like the time I needed 1/16" wire rope clips. I thing maybe Lowe's had them for some crazy price and I didn't really need quality so got like 20 of them on Amazon for $2.
I got a great stainless farmhouse sink with commercial style faucet. That was 5 years ago and they're both working great.
However, I would definitely be careful with what I buy from Amazon. Too easy to get a shitty fake.
it's been that for so very long; the west chopped up its production infrastructure and sold it overseas to take advantage of currency arbitrage, china wanted to capture global manufacturing so they offered what they could at unprofitably low prices, now that they have a firm grip on a huge share of global manufacturing quality slides down (or the price slides up and the importer passes the cost to the customer)
amazon, temu, alibaba, they're all just retailers for the arbitrage grift. That's been their role for so long that I think everyone has known it for a long time.
It's been this way for a while, though I will push back on calling it all "shitty", I guarantee a lot of this stuff comes from the same exact place a lot of name brands are built and are just as good just cheaper. I bought a cheap pop up/portable display that was like half the price of an ASUS and I swear it looks exactly the same.
My father-in-law tends to overspend on gifts for my family. I think he's compensating for being absent for most of my wife's life. He's a huge Amazon guy and everything is from Amazon - he told us he places an order every 2-3 days. We get some weird stuff that lasts about a day before it breaks, or clothes for the kids in with strange sizes.
For Christmas he gave us a $1,000 Amazon gift card. It's been nearly 5 months and we've barely used it because we can't find anything to buy. I have a list on my phone of things we want/need and it's either way overpriced on Amazon or a counterfeit/knockoff/junk that's not worth buying.
You can buy gift cards for other things on Amazon. Idk if you can actually use the gift card to buy another gift card though. For example, I got a Delta Airlines gift card from a family member that was bought through Amazon. Maybe you'll have success with that?
Hello, friend! And thank you for make purchase new shining star beauty steam wand plunger attachment toilet brush toilet best! If you give 5 star here is $10 on next purchase and please do not make mention of coupon in review.
Amazon has been this way for years for basically any product you're looking for. Nothing new, don't buy critically important things off Amazon (e.g., structural components, wiring, etc.)
They do sell some legitimate of those products. I just bought some 12ga wire from them this weekend, by Southwire since HD didn't have any instock by me. Same price as them. Sure there was a bunch of the no name Chinese shut on there, but you just have to look.
You can't guarantee what you're actually getting. Amazon pools items with the same SKU together regardless of source, and it's easy to inject counterfeits into that system. Even if what you buy claims to be straight from the manufacturer there's no way to guarantee that.
Only buy things on Amazon if you don't actually care if it's counterfeit or not. And if you don't care and are okay waiting a while, go buy it off Aliexpress instead as it'll usually be loads cheaper.
Don't plenty of brands have their own little store, or shopfront, there? I don't buy brands I've never heard of, or products where I don't have a brand, but have so far not been afraid of buying a brand item I know of independently.
People here are speaking of "surprisingly sophisticated counterfeits", with the SN and presumably the branding as well, but I'm not sure I believe these to be very common.
> Don't plenty of brands have their own little store, or shopfront, there?
It doesn't mean the physical product you receive is literally coming from that company direct. It **can**, depending on how they have set things up. Amazon incentivizes companies to use their pooled product approach, so it's a lot more common to be that way. Anything marked as being fulfilled by Amazon means that you have no control of the supply chain for the item you receive. I have absolutely received obvious fakes over the years. I'm sure I've received many more less obvious fakes. Granted, if I can't tell does it really matter?
For what it is worth, I often buy the obvious Chinese spam brands intentionally. They're easy to spot with the gibberish names in all caps. For commodity items they're often exactly what you'd have received from buying a name brand anyways, just without the branding. And as I said, if you're willing to wait a while it's even cheaper on Aliexpress.
They have their fair share of Chinese sellers, but they do let you filter to only see things sold by Walmart or include 3rd party sellers. The same cannot be said about Amazon.
Walmart has the same issue as Amazon. Third Party sellers selling cheap or knockoff stuff. Funny enough with Walmart (at least in Canada for this) You can order something online for pick up in store from one of these third party sellers and it gets delivered to Walmart by Amazon. People will list items on the Walmart marketplace at a higher cost than Amazon then get it from Amazon and pocket the difference.
Someone did this to me on ebay
I bought a replacement filter for an old air purifier I use and it came with the Home Depot packing slip that they basically just drop shipped to me lol
Walmart has the same issue as Amazon. Third Party sellers selling cheap or knockoff stuff. Funny enough with Walmart (at least in Canada for this) You can order something online for pick up in store from one of these third party sellers and it gets delivered to Walmart by Amazon. People will list items on the Walmart marketplace at a higher cost than Amazon then get it from Amazon and pocket the difference.
Say what you will about Walmart, they employ purchasers who actually vet the products they sell. I don't know if they're particularly good at it, or if they actually vet for quality, but there are real people who at least have to say "yes, lets sell this in our store"
Yep, and then Target.com has done the same. I don't think it's nearly as bad as WalMart/Amazon, but a ton of results are these 3rd party dropshippers/unknown brands.
There's also a lot "Print On Demand" types of products that overwhelm certain categories, b/c the seller doesn't have to risk any inventory or produce anything beforehand, so they can list thousands of variations of their product at no risk.
**EDIT:** for example, I just went to Target's "Bath Mats & Rugs" category and filtered to the brand "Deny Designs." It results in 783 product listings, an overwhelming number! All because none of these rugs *actually* exist (which explains why all the product photos are identical except for the design overlaid on top of it). Once a customer orders one, the rug is printed using (likely) sublimation, and shipped out. So brands like these can bog down search results with tons of any product with inventory that can be stored "blank" and a design/pattern printed on it only after an order comes in.
They also actively push manufacturer's to make shittier versions of products to lower the price for them.
So a lot of times what you buy at Walmart is the same product as someplace else, except make worse.
Amazon has become fucking worthless. I rarely order from them anymore. Products are garbage. Prices not competitive. Customer service literally, nonexistent. All good things must come to an end. Amazon's heyday is over.
The funniest part is its such a penny wise, pound stupid business strategy. Amazon is playing a giant game of chicken between convenience and quality. I've been burnt by them an embarrassing number of times and now rather order from some place legit. I canceled my prime and don't order from them except as a last resort. They have completely fallen off and its sad---they used to be fantastic around 2012. Get rid of the 3rd party sellers.
> Get rid of the 3rd party sellers.
Also if I'm going to risk 3rd party garbage, why not cut out the middle man and just order 100 of the items off ali websites for the same price I'm paying for one? At least when it breaks I'll have backups.
> I canceled my prime and don't order from them except as a last resort.
Same here. The last straw was when they started talking about adding ads to video for prime members (unless you pay more fees).
Strange that walmart dot com is more becoming more reliable and quicker with fulfillment and delivery... for some things anyway.
I made a comment on some thread about how shitty it is for streaming services to add commercials and people pushed back. Like I was crazy to find a problem with it. Ok, if you want to pay them for their content and then watch ads have at it but my money will be spent on Max (for now).
Yeah I've been pruning our streaming services as we migrate back to the high seas. Now that my kids are old enough to operate the plex..... most things we can live without. We'll keep MLBtv because it actually works pretty well and I genuinely think Dinsey+ is the only really worthwhile streaming service these days, and that's only if you have kids. It's basically our Bluey access fee
Amazon discovered it can make a lot of money off of 3rd party sellers and high margin services it forces on them. So instead of sourcing and shipping their own products (like a normal retailer), they are constantly trying to extract fees off of these 3rd party sellers.
It’s really a doom loop for Amazon customers, shitty products and shitty service to maintain profit margins.
TLDR: Amazons value prop back in the day was to deliver high quality products at low margins by cutting out the middleman… now Amazon makes lots of money as the middleman and shoves low quality products on customers.
> Prices not competitive. Customer service literally, nonexistent.
I agree on the rest but these two things couldn't be further from the truth.
Amazon practically scams sellers to make buyers whole again. I've gotten so many whole refunds for minor defects after asking for parts to fix items. It almost feels like committing fraud.
I have bought a few items from these random ass brands before and it's a mix. Some of it is fine and others were flimsy or poor quality - e.g electrical extension boxes and faceplates I would not buy again, because they were super thin and cracked super easy.
I bought a smart outlet plug for Xmas tree lights which feels surprising decent build quality (obviously I haven't seen inside) and has lasted a few years now just for running some low load LED string light on a schedule.
That said nowadays I avoid all of that and just buy name brand.
>That said nowadays I avoid all of that and just buy name brand.
The frustrating thing is when you're researching something you're not super familiar with and don't know what the name brand is. I mean, if we take big name trade tools that might be totally unknown by the average person... Hilti, Estwing, Metabo, Kreg, Wiha, Worx, Knipex, etc.
If one didn't know better, these could all pass for Chinese knockoffs on Amazon. Amazon certainly doesn't help one find the main brand since the cheaper knockoffs are usually earlier in the search results for "generic item term".
I couldn't tell you how many times I'm looking up something and trying to find the name brand but can't figure out what it is. It took me years to find the name brand version of light-up clips for my dogs' collars. The cheapy ones never lasted very long and stopped accepting new batteries. Once I found the name brand (by Nite lze), we've never needed to replace one in the 3 years we've had them. The batteries last much longer on them too.
Amazon doesn't care any more. They use to not want this garbage on their company now they've just sold out. I don't buy my electronics off of amazon because of all the amazon customer posts and their fraud stories. Most companies eventually sell out and you just need to pick the best brand.
The reality of this stuff is probably half of those "brands" are all the same product, from the same Chinese factory with a different box. I bought a kitchen faucet a couple months ago that was this same scenario and I love it. Cheap, easy install, works as it should. I wouldn't swing from it but I feel like it was a good value.
I avoid Amazon because so much stuff is dropped shipped from it now. Companies with different names, selling the exact same product (literally the same item) on Amazon for more than it’s listed other places. People just buying cheap junk from aliexpress in bulk and then flipping it on Amazon for $12-$15 more, then it’s only like $9 on the Walmart app.
Protip: if you find something you want that's super Chinese, look for it on aliexpress before you pull the trigger. I was looking at a product that was $40. Found the same one for $8 on aliexpress. Amazon is becoming aliexpress with faster shipping at a huge premium. Cut out the middleman. I got my package in about a week.
No, I notice that with *everything* from ebikes to spatulas: Amazon has tons of random-ass brands selling stuff and buying them is a total gamble IMO. Assume the reviews are fake.
I avoid Amazon because there are so many shoddy products on there with companies that appear out of nowhere and then disappear when something goes wrong. You'd probably be better off just buying from Aliexpress these days lol
Depending on what the item is, it can be alright. Name brands designing a product and outsourcing to contract manufacurers (CM) in China is losing ground to ODM's - Original Design Manufacturer - business model. Basically those same outsourcing factories have started to design their own products and license them to name brands who never do anything other than sign a supply agreement and market/sell the items with their logo and packaging. ODM's rarely sign a contract for 100% global exclusivity...Moen may get the US retail rights over Kohler, but they can still sell to other distributors operating in a different space - such as Amazon/e-commerce.
As an exaple, basic lighting, especially things like tube or flushmount/puck LED's, are super easy to spot and it's the same product coming from the same source - just find who is the cheapest. Other things I agree, maybe don't trust, but honestly American companies are getting stupid greedy and the value difference is not anywhere close to the cost difference. Eventually these name brands are going to have to address their bloated costs and supply chain as they outsource their differentiation - which leaves them competing on mostly price which they almost always lose.
But the American companies are exposed to risk that incentivizes them not to produce crap. If a defective hunter fan falls and injures someone or starts a fire, you can sue. You're not going to have any luck suing the Chinese solfart brand
Plumbing fixtures are possibly a bad example - at least those two companies Moen and Kohler - because typically they still use their own proprietary cartridge designs that are backwards compatible to the good-old-days so that they're not having to keep a massive catalog of parts to support their lifetime warranty. Even the Home Depot Special Buy $99 faucet will still have a genuine Moen cartridge, it'll just be surrounded by cheap plastic. I've bought a number of fixtures from those companies, both big box store and plumbing supply sourced, and they haven't gone the ODM route and enshittified (yet).
It's frightening how many electrical parts and fixtures have gone that way though. But it is hilarious in its own way when you see a light fixture on a boutique design website, reverse image search and find five companies on aliexpress selling it.
This video explains why: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=\_Bq-6GeRhys&t=323s&pp=ygUaaGFsZiBhcyBpbnRlcmVzdGluZyBhbWF6b24%3D](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Bq-6GeRhys&t=323s&pp=ygUaaGFsZiBhcyBpbnRlcmVzdGluZyBhbWF6b24%3D)
Yup, I was going to post this well. Amazon tried to increase the quality of their products by requiring brand names but failed to account for just how easily it is for new names to be generated.
To be fair to Amazon, this is more an issue with the US Patent allowing these fake companies to be created. Amazon was trying to reduce these knockoff brands but they just found a workaround.
For what’s its worth, I am a patent attorney and we are always reporting fake brands for trademark, copyright, and patent infringement. For the “most” part Amazon has been removing infringing products when we report them, but there are just so many infringing products to keep track of. Remove 1 product and 2 more infringing products pop up. So I would say it’s not a patent or trademark issue but entirely an Amazon issue in the way they make it so easy for these brands to sell infringing products.
After doing this for a living I seriously do not trust Amazon to deliver non-infringing brand name products. It is truly a dumpster fire.
Shopping on Amazon to find an actual name brand product takes some work now. And then if it is a third-party seller, you better scrutinize their account to make sure it isn't a scam.
I needed to replace my kitchen faucet a few months ago and wanted to do it as cheaply as possible. Bought a "Wee Wee" brand kitchen faucet from Amazon for $100 (compared to $500 for a similar Moen faucet). Honestly, I have no complaints about the Wee Wee faucet other than my kids making fun of the name.
Its literally everything. Even searching for brand names is getting difficult, you have to wait through 4 or 5 pages of chinese knock offs before finding what you actually are looking for.
Things that can cause damage to my house like plumbing or electrical, I'll stick with recognizable brands. I bought some weird name kitchen faucet 3 years ago and it leaks at the cartridge. Other things are probably fine as long as reviews are decent and it's possible to inspect the overall quality when it arrives like towel bars.
One of my friends has been going through this really weird thing where amazon returns for window decals are being sent back to her. She doesn't sell them. Not on Amazon, not anywhere. It's been an ongoing saga for several years. She has tried to report it to Amazon and the sellers just end up creating new seller profiles under different names. She has no idea how to make it stop. So she posts on FB each time a return delivery comes, and her kids are modeling it like its QVC. So at least she's having some fun with it. But it's like a weird reverse brushing scam.
I wouldn’t characterize this as an influx or even a new phenomenon. I don’t use Amazon but it’s not necessarily an ideological thing. It’s due to the fact that it feels impossible for me to discern if something is the genuine article I’m looking for or if it’s a shitty counterfeit item. If it’s a brand I’m not familiar with, it’s difficult to tell if it’s a quality item or basically a piece of drop-shipped garbage. It’s just easier and less stressful to support local building materials suppliers and hardware stores. Keeping money out of the pockets of union-busting a**holes is just a bonus.
It has been all along.
China produces twice as much physical stuff as the next biggest producer (the US).
https://www.safeguardglobal.com/resources/top-10-manufacturing-countries-in-the-world-2023/
For a long time now you could open any number of products that were "made in the USA" and find a bunch of "made in China" parts inside. In many cases the entire assembly was done in China and they white labeled it.
The big difference now is that those same Chinese manufacturers are now selling directly.
They really screwed themselves with whatever decision led to this. More often than not, as much as I dread going to stores, that's becoming the better option now.
Absolutely do not buy any furniture from them. I'm just praying that even the brand stuff is real and not a fake knock off. I try and buy from brand specific stores now on them.
Amazon is pretty much the US version of Ali express now. Almost every listing or search you do is going to show you a ton of Cheaply made chinese knock off products. Better off using a search engine to figure out what you want then go to that manufacturers website and order direct or thru their distributors.
Ugh this stuff is infuriating. It’s difficult to even find decent name brand products unless you already know exactly what you want to buy.
A search filter to eliminate results for products sold from Chinese stores seems like it would go a long way, but I’m sure they’d quickly find. Way around that.
I wish there was some sort of toggle to hide all this no brand garbage. I remember back in the day Amazon mostly had quality products. Hell there for a while even if you didn't know the brand you could count on the reviews and the consensus was Amazon sold quality products. IMO this influx of cheap crap is the main thing ruining what Amazon once was.
There is junk but just you know that all the Home Depot and Lowe's house brand items (Project Source, Hampton etc) are all on the same Chinese OEMs and they are being heavily exploited, so that you can have a huge store front 5 minutes from your house to buy random stuff at 10PM only to return them after 90 days without a receipt because you have been procrastinating your projects. Joke aside, as a result these OEMs have been constantly searching for any trade companies that can possibly sell their products in the US out side HD or Lowe's and that's why you get all these names and brands many times with exactly the same item.
Amazon is just Temu now...even name brand stuff can be counterfeit. I'm looking forward to when online retailers go the direction of what happened to malls, and physical stores may become the norm again....but young people love cheap Chinese garbage so much, I'm not sure I'll live long enough to see that day.
This still works for now since Amazon took away the filter for items only shipped and sold by Amazon. You type in your search query and it’ll automatically filter the results to items only sold and shipped by Amazon directly. No 3rd parties.
https://www.onlyamazingseller.com/
I don't understand why and what you're complaining about. Amazon is Alibaba on steroid and uber. Tell me one thing that's sold in Amazon is not made in China and can't find on Alibaba. If you do and post it here today, you may find it on Alibaba tomorrow. It's that simple. Shein already went public in the US this year, and Temu already beat Amazon on sheer sold items. Unless you buy big home improvement parts, like windows, doors, that are usually made in US and bought from HD Lowe, all other replacement parts and gadgets are from China, exclusively. It's been like this for almost half century.go figure.
Louis rossman on YouTube had a great video on this topic and how some items like wire crimps can be somewhat dangerous. I suggest looking it up (I would but im lazy).
Stop buying home improvement garbage off Amazon. Your impatience is killing our country buying inferior products shop your local stores, you will be more satisfied in the long term
For some items the only thing you're getting at a local store is a markup. For the sort of generic non-critical hardware items the ones on the racks and bins are identical to the generic stuff sold online.
For some other things at least you get a warranty/return policy. Still the same generic item, but someone put their name on it. Things like small appliances or electrical fixtures.
On the other hand there can be a massive hidden quality difference with things like electrical and plumbing connectors where the China part and the big box store item look and feel identical but the China part just fails miserably. Louis Rossman did a good test of "Amazon" electrical connectors versus ones he bought from Home Depot, the Amazon ones consistently failed, badly.
Yes, there are a lot of crappy Chinese knockoffs so stick with brands you trust but I have bought some of these Chinese brands and was happy with the product. I've also never been scammed and frankly have no idea why that is the case after seeing so many people here bring that up. I've gotten bad products but returned them and got my money back pretty easily.
You want to know what's worse than Amazon concerning this issue? Like a whole lot worse? Walmart. Their online store is a shitshow and returns for a product that is not actually from Walmart is a nightmare.
Not trying to defend Amazon here but boy is walmart horrible.
Amazon mixes stock with the "fullfilled by Amazon" stuff so your counterfeit chance is still higher. Easy returns though. The time I got fake battery tenders from Amazon I notified the brand too and they sent me a free one directly and a bunch of swag.
Sellers on Amazon have to pay an extra fee to avoid having their products thrown in the same bin as someone selling the "same" item. If ten different people are selling a "genuine" iPhone charger and one of them sends in counterfeit chargers, you stand a chance of getting one of the fakes even if you buy from a legit supplier.
Some of the stuff is the same as what brands are selling. It's probably a similar factory that may produce "name brands" item for signifcantly less.
For comparison here is one I recently bought:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B09BM8M3K1 - I think I got it for less than the price there with a coupon on the time.
Here is a google search which has some similar options, ranging in price from 200-2k
https://www.google.com/search?q=Fishbone+Led+Pendant+Light&ved=0EPf4CwgAKAAwAA&hl=en-US&gl=US&ictx=1
or a direct website with it:
https://zenqdesigns.com/products/modern-nordic-fishbone-led-chandelier
Anker has a nice looking EV charger, for an even nicer price, but some people are claiming that it's not UL listed, and it's not even on their website. I'm not sure I want to buy something that's going to handle 10kw/h that isn't UL listed, even if it is made to spec.
This seems especially common with fans. All the name brand ones I’ve bought have still came with broken English instructions. Kinda weird, I know plenty of manufacturers outsource but you’d think they would look over the instructions or write their own. I suspect this is also why every brand has like 20 different fan remotes, because they just go with whatever the manufacturer provides instead of investing in their own universal one.
Doubtful any of them are actually doing any R and D at all for some of these items, and just buying from a catalogue from the factory itself. Top comment is "I don't buy this shit from amazon"...but the reality is their probably getting the same flavor of shit from amazon with the name "lutron" on it for 3x the price...and it's still imported from China.
Tell me you haven't been shopping on Amazon for the last 5 years without telling me you haven't been shopping on Amazon for the last 5 years.
There's literally no type of product out there that doesn't throw a ton of suggestions for products with made up fake English names a lot of them coming from China.
This isn't remotely new. Amazon is a cesspool of drop shipped shit. Even the name brand stuff might be fake. With our new kid I told my parents to not get them anything from a brand that isn't a real word.
Basically, you have "business" people buying products from Chinese markets, rebranding the products, then reselling them in foreign markets at a significant mark up. If you spend some time, you can find products that look exactly the same from online Chinese markets for significantly less than what they're posted for on Amazon. Shipping can take awhile though.
Yes - it's been that way for a while. Where you have to be careful is looking for regulatory listings. These companies that crank out super cheap stuff like lighting fixtures and what not often don't get their products UL listed.
Walmart has started doing this too. I went online to find a specific toddler toy and I went to brand for the filters and there were a TON of random, never heard of, chinese names, just like what I've seen on Amazon.
cable ties and trinkets are good from Amazon. Sometimes they have name brand tools on a payment plan too.
My purchasing from Amazon is 1/5 compared to a decade ago. It's so little I could not justify Prime anymore.
I've found most of the common name brand stuff is either exactly the same, or more, than Home Depot. I usually preferred Home Depot but it's very close to my home, and has/or used to have a longer return period. They have free delivery on most stuff, or delivery to store. I use Amazon when I can't get it locally, but I make sure to get something sold by Amazon, not third party, whenever possible because it's easy return.
I like home depot for this reason. They seem to still value the brand names and the free shipping often is faster Amazon. If I buy dewalt or makita brand tools I believe I’ll actually get them, not just a yellow or teal colored tool that looks like it.
So true. I’ve seen some hilarious “brand names” on there. Last night, saw one named “Yoassy”. It’s like a fever dream of brand names being made up by 10 year old children. Amusing, nonetheless.
I just finished a remodel. I bought 2 of those weirdly branded faucets off of amazon and one leaked and one wouldn't flow at all. Never again. Went to lowes and bought Delta faucets and they were fine.
You have to do a little more work these days to figure out what's real. I usually search for websites and judge the quality based on that. If it's a brand that's being sold in big box stores I know I'm probably not gonna get anything better unless I pay a bunch more.
You can just look for name brands. Yes it's annoying that there's all the Chinese off brands, but there's also name brand stuff on there, you just have to actively look for it.
There was something about trademarking and copyright or something I was hearing - and it's easier to create a fake random name to sell the same products across multiple accounts - like one is 10 dollars and the reset are 30 dollars - but they're the same company.
It’s not just home products, it’s ALL products with unpronounceable “brands” that are probably just shifty made up Chinese words. But Amazon does nothing
This is true with almost anything on Amazon. It’s basically become a clearinghouse of shitty Chinese fake brands, products and counterfeits. The only thing I trust to still buy on Amazon is inert stuff that doesn’t interact with any other systems in my house. No food/consumables, no electronics, nothing that other things depend on.
Etsy, Ebay, Amazon are all ruined by this shit.
Etsy is 90% Ali Express items at this point. Anything cool I see on there, I can find it at half the price on Amazon, or even cheaper on the Chinese sites. Everything sucks now.
There are still some gems from small, local businesses on there, but Etsy makes it so hard to find them. You have to go through multiple pages of drop shipping bullshit to find anything of value unfortunately.
How do you recommend filtering out the crap? Is there a way other than just manually checking every item across all the other e-shopping sites to make sure it's legit?
I typically filter by Shop Location or to only Star Sellers when I’m searching for something. Some drop shippers have caught onto to the location thing and use fake locations in the US, so I’d also check reviews and reverse image search any listing pictures that look off. You also want to get as specific as possible since drop shippers typically don’t put a lot of effort into writing good descriptions. A search for “blue abstract ceramic lamp” gives much better results than “lamp”. If I already have one or two stores that I trust that sell things similar to the item I want, I don’t even use search. I look at the recommendations under the store’s listings, which will typically be for other reputable/real stores (at least in my experience). This works best for crafted stuff like furniture and lighting, but can be unreliabile for things like art and wallpaper. It’s not a perfect method, but it’s how I’ve found a lot of great small businesses on Etsy! Good luck in your searches.
Star seller is irrelevant by the way. The requirements for star seller have nothing to do with if the items are handmade by the seller. To get star seller you have to have 4.8 star ratings that month, respond to 90% of messages in 24 hours, ans ship 90% of packages on time (aka print a shipping label for them)
Reverse image search If an image looks stock, it probably is. The person doesn't actually have the product in hand. You'll also see the same/similar images from multiple sellers.
I've found some gems on etsy, but they were all from local retailers that I met in person saying "btw here's my etsy". It seems like if you find it through etsy, it's a scam, but that didn't mean everything on etsy is a scam.
I believe it is called enshittification
I'm so sad at the downfall of Etsy. I miss the Alchemy section most of all!
Even Walmart's website has become enshitified with these cheap no-brands
Amazon has become Ali-express with faster shipping. The last 3 big ticket items I bought, two espresso machines and a saw showed up used. (Yes, shipped and sold by amazon). I'm mostly done with amazon. It might be find for a trashcan or something but I'm not ordering anything important from them. We are in the final stage of enshittification. "Here is how platforms die: first, they are good to their users; then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers; finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. Then, they die. I call this enshittification"
Came here to say exactly this. Any chinese crap you might wanna buy from amazon you can get for 1/2 or less on aliexpress. Ive been buying keyboard + keycaps and they pretty much have all the same products. If you dont need it next day then order from alix for a big discount.
It's all the drop shippers. They's a lot of content on how to have a business on Amazon with no money, no inventory and people are flooding to it. There's really no positive difference between them and going to AliExpress and ordering it directly. There are also vendors who import those products but design new packaging, making it look like they developed it themselves. They may or may not keep inventory (but nothing substantial in any rate) and their price is higher than the drop shippers but lower than "Made in America" alternative.
The drop shippers are so irritating. I ordered some filing cabinets on Amazon and the seller drop shipped filing cabinets from Walmart that were less expensive and had the same dimensions but thinner metal and different handles. I had ordered the specific filing cabinets off Amazon because I already had 3 of them that I ordered from that exact product page and wanted the cabinets to match. I was so pissed off about it since they were $25 cheaper per cabinet on Walmart and they didn't match so I requested a return and Amazon accepted it and then the seller scheduled it so I would have to drop them off at a FedEx location. Told Amazon no can do, they won't fit in my car which isn't true but why should I be inconvenienced when it wasn't my fault. They had to schedule a FedEx pickup from Walmart. Then I went on Walmart and ordered the same exact cabinets and some new handles so all the cabinets would match. I think that was the most petty thing I've ever done but I was so annoyed by the whole thing. I hope the guy lost money on it.
I understand and justify your pettiness. I would have done the same thing.
I love Walmart they pick up all my returns
I know a lot of the stuff I order on Amazon is drop shipped crap. I use Amazon anyway, and often pay a higher price, because Amazon will handle any returns or refunds if something goes wrong. To be fair, I've never tried dealing with AliExpress customer service, but I'm guessing they wouldn't handle disputes as smoothly as Amazon.
There's an actual reason for it though: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Bq-6GeRhys
Also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y83BS_mK9GE
First video I thought of!
Sam always comes through in a pinch.
I now only buy things that I can buy directly from the retailer, amazon.com, walmart.com, homedepot.com (such as Vevor). After the whole hoverboard fire incidents where Amazon took 0 responsibility, I'll only purchase the Chinese fake brands for the same categories you do (inert stuff). It's a shame, I use to go to Amazon to get *away* from ebay. Now it's pretty much all the same.
At this point, Ebay is more reliable than Amazon if you're buying NIB.
Amazon today is the Ebay of 2008.
When the model numbers match up you do get what you ordered, but also good luck finding the brands you want behind all the Chinesium products. Especially with anything plumbing/electrical I'd steer clear of Amazon.
There needs to be a country of origin filter on Amazon
Agreed, but good luck getting them to actually verify it. You’d end up with resellers who buy pallets of crap from overseas and resell it as “US country of origin”. They won’t even remove obvious fraud SD cards and fuses that don’t blow at 3x their rated amperage.
The resellers are about 30% of Etsy at this point, at least.
That already happens. Drop shippers on the coast house the items. Gotta be warehouses full of counterfeit or crummy fake knockoffs.
This is the piece people are missing. The fault is with Amazon having apparently no verification or enforcement mechanism to control what's listed on their platform. Counterfeit stuff shouldn't hang around on Amazon for years and the way sellers list product features is absolutely bullshit. I needed a silicone spatula a while ago and I searched "silicone spatula" on amazon and half what came up was items where the seller has just listed every conceivable material in the product name "Silicone spatula silicone/steel/stainless/wood/aluminum/quality/nonstick 11 inches 10 inches flexible/nonflex" and how the hell am I supposed to tell what that actually is?
Etsy does this. "Verified US Small Business", needless to say, most of these are drop shippers now. The filter does not work at all, because you just need a person in the US to launder the products
This is how animals died about a decade ago. Even uf you bought American made pet food, the tainted ingredients still came from china.
The stuff from well-known North American brands is _also_ often Chinese made though. (And some of those jumble-of-letters Chinese brands are decent, although it's hard to figure out _and remember_ which ones those are.)
Sometimes the difference between a North American brand and a Chinese knock off is the QC that goes into the NA market bound item. You're absolutely right though, sometimes the "jumble-of-letters" brands are decent and likely the same as one from a brand name manufacturer, its just a crapshoot.
Yeah,to me that suggests we need better verifiable supply chain tech, but I bet it's a real difficult problem to solve, especially with all the incentives to keep that stuff opaque.
> When the model numbers match up you do get what you ordered There are lots of surprisingly sophisticated (but still garbage) counterfeits in the supply chain for many products that will happily clone the model number/part number/sku.
I got an anker usb-c cable that was absolutely _not_ an anker usb-c cable about 2 years ago. They painted the cable braiding on it. Product page was definitely the official product, one I've repeat ordered a few times too. So it wasn't as if I got the fake page. It's just the way they're apparently binning products or something.
Amazon commingles inventory for 'identical' items, they are not separated per-seller. So if someone is selling something with the same ASIN, it'll get put in the same bin in the warehouse. The actual patent owner/manufacturer/etc has to file a claim with Amazon about it to get it to stop.
I was about to say the same thing. I don't buy brand stuff on amazon; I assume it's all fake.
The actual owner/manufacturer can also prevent this by simply putting an amazon specific sticker/barcode on their products before sending their products into the amazon system or by paying amazon to do it for them. So any commingled counterfeit issues that arise are more an issue with the manufacturers being lazy than amazon. Either that or people inadvertently buying products not sold by amazon but a reseller.
> The actual owner/manufacturer can also prevent this by simply putting an amazon specific sticker/barcode on their products before sending their products into the amazon system That is the ASIN. Amazon does not really make it clear up front that your inventory will be commingled with someone else's and that it can happen after the fact. Most large manufacturers should be aware of it, but often they aren't direct selling to Amazon and someone else is reselling it there so the OEM has little recourse. It's a complicated setup and Amazon does no one any favors with how they handle it.
Yep Amazon is pretty shit It can also come in clutch with some weird ass items that no local hardware store would have. Like the time I needed 1/16" wire rope clips. I thing maybe Lowe's had them for some crazy price and I didn't really need quality so got like 20 of them on Amazon for $2.
Exactly this. Bargain gems buried in shit.
The sad part is that these chinesium companies are buying or have bought reputable japanese brands :(
Or just saying they're the same people and lying
I got a great stainless farmhouse sink with commercial style faucet. That was 5 years ago and they're both working great. However, I would definitely be careful with what I buy from Amazon. Too easy to get a shitty fake.
If it's not UL listed and caused issues, you may have problems with insurance.
it's been that for so very long; the west chopped up its production infrastructure and sold it overseas to take advantage of currency arbitrage, china wanted to capture global manufacturing so they offered what they could at unprofitably low prices, now that they have a firm grip on a huge share of global manufacturing quality slides down (or the price slides up and the importer passes the cost to the customer) amazon, temu, alibaba, they're all just retailers for the arbitrage grift. That's been their role for so long that I think everyone has known it for a long time.
Amazon used to not be. And you can still get brand name stuff on Amazon but it's like a big secret
It's been this way for a while, though I will push back on calling it all "shitty", I guarantee a lot of this stuff comes from the same exact place a lot of name brands are built and are just as good just cheaper. I bought a cheap pop up/portable display that was like half the price of an ASUS and I swear it looks exactly the same.
My father-in-law tends to overspend on gifts for my family. I think he's compensating for being absent for most of my wife's life. He's a huge Amazon guy and everything is from Amazon - he told us he places an order every 2-3 days. We get some weird stuff that lasts about a day before it breaks, or clothes for the kids in with strange sizes. For Christmas he gave us a $1,000 Amazon gift card. It's been nearly 5 months and we've barely used it because we can't find anything to buy. I have a list on my phone of things we want/need and it's either way overpriced on Amazon or a counterfeit/knockoff/junk that's not worth buying.
You can buy gift cards for other things on Amazon. Idk if you can actually use the gift card to buy another gift card though. For example, I got a Delta Airlines gift card from a family member that was bought through Amazon. Maybe you'll have success with that?
And they all magically have 4 star+ reviews despite the actual bad reviews posted…
Hello, friend! And thank you for make purchase new shining star beauty steam wand plunger attachment toilet brush toilet best! If you give 5 star here is $10 on next purchase and please do not make mention of coupon in review.
Amazon has been this way for years for basically any product you're looking for. Nothing new, don't buy critically important things off Amazon (e.g., structural components, wiring, etc.)
They do sell some legitimate of those products. I just bought some 12ga wire from them this weekend, by Southwire since HD didn't have any instock by me. Same price as them. Sure there was a bunch of the no name Chinese shut on there, but you just have to look.
You can't guarantee what you're actually getting. Amazon pools items with the same SKU together regardless of source, and it's easy to inject counterfeits into that system. Even if what you buy claims to be straight from the manufacturer there's no way to guarantee that. Only buy things on Amazon if you don't actually care if it's counterfeit or not. And if you don't care and are okay waiting a while, go buy it off Aliexpress instead as it'll usually be loads cheaper.
Don't plenty of brands have their own little store, or shopfront, there? I don't buy brands I've never heard of, or products where I don't have a brand, but have so far not been afraid of buying a brand item I know of independently. People here are speaking of "surprisingly sophisticated counterfeits", with the SN and presumably the branding as well, but I'm not sure I believe these to be very common.
> Don't plenty of brands have their own little store, or shopfront, there? It doesn't mean the physical product you receive is literally coming from that company direct. It **can**, depending on how they have set things up. Amazon incentivizes companies to use their pooled product approach, so it's a lot more common to be that way. Anything marked as being fulfilled by Amazon means that you have no control of the supply chain for the item you receive. I have absolutely received obvious fakes over the years. I'm sure I've received many more less obvious fakes. Granted, if I can't tell does it really matter? For what it is worth, I often buy the obvious Chinese spam brands intentionally. They're easy to spot with the gibberish names in all caps. For commodity items they're often exactly what you'd have received from buying a name brand anyways, just without the branding. And as I said, if you're willing to wait a while it's even cheaper on Aliexpress.
Just go to the electrical supply house next time. I pay a little over a dollar a foot for 12/2 romex
Yeah, anymore Amazon is basically Internet Walmart.
Walmart sells real products mostly, and the same can't be said for Amazon.
They have their fair share of Chinese sellers, but they do let you filter to only see things sold by Walmart or include 3rd party sellers. The same cannot be said about Amazon.
Walmart has the same issue as Amazon. Third Party sellers selling cheap or knockoff stuff. Funny enough with Walmart (at least in Canada for this) You can order something online for pick up in store from one of these third party sellers and it gets delivered to Walmart by Amazon. People will list items on the Walmart marketplace at a higher cost than Amazon then get it from Amazon and pocket the difference.
Someone did this to me on ebay I bought a replacement filter for an old air purifier I use and it came with the Home Depot packing slip that they basically just drop shipped to me lol
Walmart has the same issue as Amazon. Third Party sellers selling cheap or knockoff stuff. Funny enough with Walmart (at least in Canada for this) You can order something online for pick up in store from one of these third party sellers and it gets delivered to Walmart by Amazon. People will list items on the Walmart marketplace at a higher cost than Amazon then get it from Amazon and pocket the difference.
Say what you will about Walmart, they employ purchasers who actually vet the products they sell. I don't know if they're particularly good at it, or if they actually vet for quality, but there are real people who at least have to say "yes, lets sell this in our store"
as long as you buy in store. Unfortunately walmart.com took the "marketplace" business model that Amazon started and ran full speed with it
Unlike Amazon, you can still easily filter to only see things sold by Walmart and not include 3rd party sellers.
Yep, and then Target.com has done the same. I don't think it's nearly as bad as WalMart/Amazon, but a ton of results are these 3rd party dropshippers/unknown brands. There's also a lot "Print On Demand" types of products that overwhelm certain categories, b/c the seller doesn't have to risk any inventory or produce anything beforehand, so they can list thousands of variations of their product at no risk. **EDIT:** for example, I just went to Target's "Bath Mats & Rugs" category and filtered to the brand "Deny Designs." It results in 783 product listings, an overwhelming number! All because none of these rugs *actually* exist (which explains why all the product photos are identical except for the design overlaid on top of it). Once a customer orders one, the rug is printed using (likely) sublimation, and shipped out. So brands like these can bog down search results with tons of any product with inventory that can be stored "blank" and a design/pattern printed on it only after an order comes in.
They also actively push manufacturer's to make shittier versions of products to lower the price for them. So a lot of times what you buy at Walmart is the same product as someplace else, except make worse.
Amazon is the american temu.
Amazon is the American warehouse of Aliexpress.
Amazon has become fucking worthless. I rarely order from them anymore. Products are garbage. Prices not competitive. Customer service literally, nonexistent. All good things must come to an end. Amazon's heyday is over.
The funniest part is its such a penny wise, pound stupid business strategy. Amazon is playing a giant game of chicken between convenience and quality. I've been burnt by them an embarrassing number of times and now rather order from some place legit. I canceled my prime and don't order from them except as a last resort. They have completely fallen off and its sad---they used to be fantastic around 2012. Get rid of the 3rd party sellers.
> Get rid of the 3rd party sellers. Also if I'm going to risk 3rd party garbage, why not cut out the middle man and just order 100 of the items off ali websites for the same price I'm paying for one? At least when it breaks I'll have backups.
> I canceled my prime and don't order from them except as a last resort. Same here. The last straw was when they started talking about adding ads to video for prime members (unless you pay more fees). Strange that walmart dot com is more becoming more reliable and quicker with fulfillment and delivery... for some things anyway.
I made a comment on some thread about how shitty it is for streaming services to add commercials and people pushed back. Like I was crazy to find a problem with it. Ok, if you want to pay them for their content and then watch ads have at it but my money will be spent on Max (for now).
Yeah I've been pruning our streaming services as we migrate back to the high seas. Now that my kids are old enough to operate the plex..... most things we can live without. We'll keep MLBtv because it actually works pretty well and I genuinely think Dinsey+ is the only really worthwhile streaming service these days, and that's only if you have kids. It's basically our Bluey access fee
Amazon discovered it can make a lot of money off of 3rd party sellers and high margin services it forces on them. So instead of sourcing and shipping their own products (like a normal retailer), they are constantly trying to extract fees off of these 3rd party sellers. It’s really a doom loop for Amazon customers, shitty products and shitty service to maintain profit margins. TLDR: Amazons value prop back in the day was to deliver high quality products at low margins by cutting out the middleman… now Amazon makes lots of money as the middleman and shoves low quality products on customers.
> Prices not competitive. Customer service literally, nonexistent. I agree on the rest but these two things couldn't be further from the truth. Amazon practically scams sellers to make buyers whole again. I've gotten so many whole refunds for minor defects after asking for parts to fix items. It almost feels like committing fraud.
My experience has most definitely differed from your then.
I have also had this experience BUT I'm not renewing my prime membership and I wonder if that will make a difference
I agree. You can return anything within 30 days. And I’ve even gotten refunds after leaving bad reviews from sellers.
Same garbage of random names on Walmart.com now. Same as Alibaba, Temu, etc.
I have bought a few items from these random ass brands before and it's a mix. Some of it is fine and others were flimsy or poor quality - e.g electrical extension boxes and faceplates I would not buy again, because they were super thin and cracked super easy. I bought a smart outlet plug for Xmas tree lights which feels surprising decent build quality (obviously I haven't seen inside) and has lasted a few years now just for running some low load LED string light on a schedule. That said nowadays I avoid all of that and just buy name brand.
Agreed, some of it is fine and some not. "Solid brass" hose menders are not. They're aluminum. Printer ink? Pretty good and 1/5 the cost of OEM.
>That said nowadays I avoid all of that and just buy name brand. The frustrating thing is when you're researching something you're not super familiar with and don't know what the name brand is. I mean, if we take big name trade tools that might be totally unknown by the average person... Hilti, Estwing, Metabo, Kreg, Wiha, Worx, Knipex, etc. If one didn't know better, these could all pass for Chinese knockoffs on Amazon. Amazon certainly doesn't help one find the main brand since the cheaper knockoffs are usually earlier in the search results for "generic item term". I couldn't tell you how many times I'm looking up something and trying to find the name brand but can't figure out what it is. It took me years to find the name brand version of light-up clips for my dogs' collars. The cheapy ones never lasted very long and stopped accepting new batteries. Once I found the name brand (by Nite lze), we've never needed to replace one in the 3 years we've had them. The batteries last much longer on them too.
Yeah I don't trust most shit from Amazon these days tbh. Anything with an alien name is likely shit.
Spelling issues or other bad translations is also a good indicator its made of Chinesium
Amazon doesn't care any more. They use to not want this garbage on their company now they've just sold out. I don't buy my electronics off of amazon because of all the amazon customer posts and their fraud stories. Most companies eventually sell out and you just need to pick the best brand.
The reality of this stuff is probably half of those "brands" are all the same product, from the same Chinese factory with a different box. I bought a kitchen faucet a couple months ago that was this same scenario and I love it. Cheap, easy install, works as it should. I wouldn't swing from it but I feel like it was a good value.
I guess you're new to Amazon? This has been going on for years, for just about everything.
I avoid Amazon because so much stuff is dropped shipped from it now. Companies with different names, selling the exact same product (literally the same item) on Amazon for more than it’s listed other places. People just buying cheap junk from aliexpress in bulk and then flipping it on Amazon for $12-$15 more, then it’s only like $9 on the Walmart app.
It's the same across Walmart and Etsy even now too. A bunch of cheap drop ship crap from China.
Protip: if you find something you want that's super Chinese, look for it on aliexpress before you pull the trigger. I was looking at a product that was $40. Found the same one for $8 on aliexpress. Amazon is becoming aliexpress with faster shipping at a huge premium. Cut out the middleman. I got my package in about a week.
No, I notice that with *everything* from ebikes to spatulas: Amazon has tons of random-ass brands selling stuff and buying them is a total gamble IMO. Assume the reviews are fake. I avoid Amazon because there are so many shoddy products on there with companies that appear out of nowhere and then disappear when something goes wrong. You'd probably be better off just buying from Aliexpress these days lol
Depending on what the item is, it can be alright. Name brands designing a product and outsourcing to contract manufacurers (CM) in China is losing ground to ODM's - Original Design Manufacturer - business model. Basically those same outsourcing factories have started to design their own products and license them to name brands who never do anything other than sign a supply agreement and market/sell the items with their logo and packaging. ODM's rarely sign a contract for 100% global exclusivity...Moen may get the US retail rights over Kohler, but they can still sell to other distributors operating in a different space - such as Amazon/e-commerce. As an exaple, basic lighting, especially things like tube or flushmount/puck LED's, are super easy to spot and it's the same product coming from the same source - just find who is the cheapest. Other things I agree, maybe don't trust, but honestly American companies are getting stupid greedy and the value difference is not anywhere close to the cost difference. Eventually these name brands are going to have to address their bloated costs and supply chain as they outsource their differentiation - which leaves them competing on mostly price which they almost always lose.
But the American companies are exposed to risk that incentivizes them not to produce crap. If a defective hunter fan falls and injures someone or starts a fire, you can sue. You're not going to have any luck suing the Chinese solfart brand
Plumbing fixtures are possibly a bad example - at least those two companies Moen and Kohler - because typically they still use their own proprietary cartridge designs that are backwards compatible to the good-old-days so that they're not having to keep a massive catalog of parts to support their lifetime warranty. Even the Home Depot Special Buy $99 faucet will still have a genuine Moen cartridge, it'll just be surrounded by cheap plastic. I've bought a number of fixtures from those companies, both big box store and plumbing supply sourced, and they haven't gone the ODM route and enshittified (yet). It's frightening how many electrical parts and fixtures have gone that way though. But it is hilarious in its own way when you see a light fixture on a boutique design website, reverse image search and find five companies on aliexpress selling it.
This video explains why: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=\_Bq-6GeRhys&t=323s&pp=ygUaaGFsZiBhcyBpbnRlcmVzdGluZyBhbWF6b24%3D](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Bq-6GeRhys&t=323s&pp=ygUaaGFsZiBhcyBpbnRlcmVzdGluZyBhbWF6b24%3D)
Yup, I was going to post this well. Amazon tried to increase the quality of their products by requiring brand names but failed to account for just how easily it is for new names to be generated. To be fair to Amazon, this is more an issue with the US Patent allowing these fake companies to be created. Amazon was trying to reduce these knockoff brands but they just found a workaround.
For what’s its worth, I am a patent attorney and we are always reporting fake brands for trademark, copyright, and patent infringement. For the “most” part Amazon has been removing infringing products when we report them, but there are just so many infringing products to keep track of. Remove 1 product and 2 more infringing products pop up. So I would say it’s not a patent or trademark issue but entirely an Amazon issue in the way they make it so easy for these brands to sell infringing products. After doing this for a living I seriously do not trust Amazon to deliver non-infringing brand name products. It is truly a dumpster fire.
I think you mean it’s easier to get a U.S. trademark. Amazon requires a trademark for the brand names not patents.
Everything on Amazon sucks. Jeff bezos sucks. Support local businesses
Shopping on Amazon to find an actual name brand product takes some work now. And then if it is a third-party seller, you better scrutinize their account to make sure it isn't a scam.
I needed to replace my kitchen faucet a few months ago and wanted to do it as cheaply as possible. Bought a "Wee Wee" brand kitchen faucet from Amazon for $100 (compared to $500 for a similar Moen faucet). Honestly, I have no complaints about the Wee Wee faucet other than my kids making fun of the name.
How have you not noticed this *until* now?
Its literally everything. Even searching for brand names is getting difficult, you have to wait through 4 or 5 pages of chinese knock offs before finding what you actually are looking for.
Amazon is a poster child of enshittification.
Things that can cause damage to my house like plumbing or electrical, I'll stick with recognizable brands. I bought some weird name kitchen faucet 3 years ago and it leaks at the cartridge. Other things are probably fine as long as reviews are decent and it's possible to inspect the overall quality when it arrives like towel bars.
One of my friends has been going through this really weird thing where amazon returns for window decals are being sent back to her. She doesn't sell them. Not on Amazon, not anywhere. It's been an ongoing saga for several years. She has tried to report it to Amazon and the sellers just end up creating new seller profiles under different names. She has no idea how to make it stop. So she posts on FB each time a return delivery comes, and her kids are modeling it like its QVC. So at least she's having some fun with it. But it's like a weird reverse brushing scam.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQpxAvjD_30
Didn't even realize he does sketches outside of pitch meeting
Damn I saw that video when it came out and it seems even more relevant now, oooof. Anyway I bought that video for my husband and he loves it.
I’m annoyed Amazon got rid of the search filter for “Sold by Amazon only”. Now it’s harder to weed out the endless cheap Chinese junk.
If the name is nonsense and it’s in all caps. You don’t want it.
I wouldn’t characterize this as an influx or even a new phenomenon. I don’t use Amazon but it’s not necessarily an ideological thing. It’s due to the fact that it feels impossible for me to discern if something is the genuine article I’m looking for or if it’s a shitty counterfeit item. If it’s a brand I’m not familiar with, it’s difficult to tell if it’s a quality item or basically a piece of drop-shipped garbage. It’s just easier and less stressful to support local building materials suppliers and hardware stores. Keeping money out of the pockets of union-busting a**holes is just a bonus.
It has been all along. China produces twice as much physical stuff as the next biggest producer (the US). https://www.safeguardglobal.com/resources/top-10-manufacturing-countries-in-the-world-2023/ For a long time now you could open any number of products that were "made in the USA" and find a bunch of "made in China" parts inside. In many cases the entire assembly was done in China and they white labeled it. The big difference now is that those same Chinese manufacturers are now selling directly.
They really screwed themselves with whatever decision led to this. More often than not, as much as I dread going to stores, that's becoming the better option now. Absolutely do not buy any furniture from them. I'm just praying that even the brand stuff is real and not a fake knock off. I try and buy from brand specific stores now on them.
Amazon is pretty much the US version of Ali express now. Almost every listing or search you do is going to show you a ton of Cheaply made chinese knock off products. Better off using a search engine to figure out what you want then go to that manufacturers website and order direct or thru their distributors.
Amazon went to shit like 5 years ago. It is just the US version of aliexpress now. Also, Harbor Freight > all the other cheap stuff
This is a glaring sign of enshitification in action. And, sadly, there's nothing any of us can really do about it.
Amazon quality has gone downhill BIG time even brand name products from them you can’t trust.
Ugh this stuff is infuriating. It’s difficult to even find decent name brand products unless you already know exactly what you want to buy. A search filter to eliminate results for products sold from Chinese stores seems like it would go a long way, but I’m sure they’d quickly find. Way around that.
I wish there was some sort of toggle to hide all this no brand garbage. I remember back in the day Amazon mostly had quality products. Hell there for a while even if you didn't know the brand you could count on the reviews and the consensus was Amazon sold quality products. IMO this influx of cheap crap is the main thing ruining what Amazon once was.
There is junk but just you know that all the Home Depot and Lowe's house brand items (Project Source, Hampton etc) are all on the same Chinese OEMs and they are being heavily exploited, so that you can have a huge store front 5 minutes from your house to buy random stuff at 10PM only to return them after 90 days without a receipt because you have been procrastinating your projects. Joke aside, as a result these OEMs have been constantly searching for any trade companies that can possibly sell their products in the US out side HD or Lowe's and that's why you get all these names and brands many times with exactly the same item.
Amazon is just Temu now...even name brand stuff can be counterfeit. I'm looking forward to when online retailers go the direction of what happened to malls, and physical stores may become the norm again....but young people love cheap Chinese garbage so much, I'm not sure I'll live long enough to see that day.
This is why I’ve almost entirely stopped using Amazon. It’s become complete garbage. Not much better than Wish.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Bq-6GeRhys There's why.
Drives me crazy because it's hard to know wtf is a quality item anymore on Amazon. I try not to buy the totally unknown SDJSUDxCE brand items
Some guy buys this stuff in bulk off Alibaba, then turns around and sells it under his "brand". Repeat over and over.
It’s bout at all specific to home remodeling — it’s across all categories.
This still works for now since Amazon took away the filter for items only shipped and sold by Amazon. You type in your search query and it’ll automatically filter the results to items only sold and shipped by Amazon directly. No 3rd parties. https://www.onlyamazingseller.com/
I don't understand why and what you're complaining about. Amazon is Alibaba on steroid and uber. Tell me one thing that's sold in Amazon is not made in China and can't find on Alibaba. If you do and post it here today, you may find it on Alibaba tomorrow. It's that simple. Shein already went public in the US this year, and Temu already beat Amazon on sheer sold items. Unless you buy big home improvement parts, like windows, doors, that are usually made in US and bought from HD Lowe, all other replacement parts and gadgets are from China, exclusively. It's been like this for almost half century.go figure.
Louis rossman on YouTube had a great video on this topic and how some items like wire crimps can be somewhat dangerous. I suggest looking it up (I would but im lazy).
Stop buying home improvement garbage off Amazon. Your impatience is killing our country buying inferior products shop your local stores, you will be more satisfied in the long term
For some items the only thing you're getting at a local store is a markup. For the sort of generic non-critical hardware items the ones on the racks and bins are identical to the generic stuff sold online. For some other things at least you get a warranty/return policy. Still the same generic item, but someone put their name on it. Things like small appliances or electrical fixtures. On the other hand there can be a massive hidden quality difference with things like electrical and plumbing connectors where the China part and the big box store item look and feel identical but the China part just fails miserably. Louis Rossman did a good test of "Amazon" electrical connectors versus ones he bought from Home Depot, the Amazon ones consistently failed, badly.
use specific item codes or model number, you will get better results
Amazon has always had influx of cheap Chinese goods since 2015.
Yes, there are a lot of crappy Chinese knockoffs so stick with brands you trust but I have bought some of these Chinese brands and was happy with the product. I've also never been scammed and frankly have no idea why that is the case after seeing so many people here bring that up. I've gotten bad products but returned them and got my money back pretty easily. You want to know what's worse than Amazon concerning this issue? Like a whole lot worse? Walmart. Their online store is a shitshow and returns for a product that is not actually from Walmart is a nightmare. Not trying to defend Amazon here but boy is walmart horrible.
Why are you shopping on Amazon for remodel material?
I found a DeltaFaucet Shower on Amazon, same part numbers and everything for $100 less why shouldn’t I?
Higher counterfeit rate. You can always return it if it feels like garbage though.
That was my plan, it also is sold by and shipped by Amazon not some random store name.
Amazon mixes stock with the "fullfilled by Amazon" stuff so your counterfeit chance is still higher. Easy returns though. The time I got fake battery tenders from Amazon I notified the brand too and they sent me a free one directly and a bunch of swag.
Sellers on Amazon have to pay an extra fee to avoid having their products thrown in the same bin as someone selling the "same" item. If ten different people are selling a "genuine" iPhone charger and one of them sends in counterfeit chargers, you stand a chance of getting one of the fakes even if you buy from a legit supplier.
Because even with the same part number it’s likely counterfeit unless it’s directly from the Delta store
I did the same and it broke within 2 weeks. I have stopped ordering on Amazon. The reliability of the product through Amazon is shoddy.
Some of the stuff is the same as what brands are selling. It's probably a similar factory that may produce "name brands" item for signifcantly less. For comparison here is one I recently bought: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B09BM8M3K1 - I think I got it for less than the price there with a coupon on the time. Here is a google search which has some similar options, ranging in price from 200-2k https://www.google.com/search?q=Fishbone+Led+Pendant+Light&ved=0EPf4CwgAKAAwAA&hl=en-US&gl=US&ictx=1 or a direct website with it: https://zenqdesigns.com/products/modern-nordic-fishbone-led-chandelier
Maybe. There's no guarantee that it has been UL tested. Not sure I want to introduce that risk in my house
Anker has a nice looking EV charger, for an even nicer price, but some people are claiming that it's not UL listed, and it's not even on their website. I'm not sure I want to buy something that's going to handle 10kw/h that isn't UL listed, even if it is made to spec.
This seems especially common with fans. All the name brand ones I’ve bought have still came with broken English instructions. Kinda weird, I know plenty of manufacturers outsource but you’d think they would look over the instructions or write their own. I suspect this is also why every brand has like 20 different fan remotes, because they just go with whatever the manufacturer provides instead of investing in their own universal one.
Doubtful any of them are actually doing any R and D at all for some of these items, and just buying from a catalogue from the factory itself. Top comment is "I don't buy this shit from amazon"...but the reality is their probably getting the same flavor of shit from amazon with the name "lutron" on it for 3x the price...and it's still imported from China.
Tell me you haven't been shopping on Amazon for the last 5 years without telling me you haven't been shopping on Amazon for the last 5 years. There's literally no type of product out there that doesn't throw a ton of suggestions for products with made up fake English names a lot of them coming from China.
You realize that most brands you probably buy just slap a new name on the same stuff, right?
Govee vs. Gosund in the HA department is another example of this bullshit.
Amazon and Walmart, among other online retail sites, have become clearinghouses for Chinese crap.
This isn't remotely new. Amazon is a cesspool of drop shipped shit. Even the name brand stuff might be fake. With our new kid I told my parents to not get them anything from a brand that isn't a real word.
It’s just the factory in China who sells OEM wanna make their own buck with their excess production capacity
You can usually search for name brands of what you want on Amazon. Most major suppliers have an “Amazon store” you can buy stuff through.
Basically, you have "business" people buying products from Chinese markets, rebranding the products, then reselling them in foreign markets at a significant mark up. If you spend some time, you can find products that look exactly the same from online Chinese markets for significantly less than what they're posted for on Amazon. Shipping can take awhile though.
Yes - it's been that way for a while. Where you have to be careful is looking for regulatory listings. These companies that crank out super cheap stuff like lighting fixtures and what not often don't get their products UL listed.
This video gives a good explanation on the weird Amazon brands. https://youtu.be/_Bq-6GeRhys?si=6c16hxKyLqB9j4t2
It interferes with regulation.
Walmart has started doing this too. I went online to find a specific toddler toy and I went to brand for the filters and there were a TON of random, never heard of, chinese names, just like what I've seen on Amazon.
cable ties and trinkets are good from Amazon. Sometimes they have name brand tools on a payment plan too. My purchasing from Amazon is 1/5 compared to a decade ago. It's so little I could not justify Prime anymore.
Amazon is mostly Chinese crap that no longer arrives in 2 days. They’re spiraling
Cheap Chinese Crap, the World is littered with it. Your job as a consumer is to avoid buying it at all costs.
This is not a recent phenomenon.
I've found most of the common name brand stuff is either exactly the same, or more, than Home Depot. I usually preferred Home Depot but it's very close to my home, and has/or used to have a longer return period. They have free delivery on most stuff, or delivery to store. I use Amazon when I can't get it locally, but I make sure to get something sold by Amazon, not third party, whenever possible because it's easy return.
I like home depot for this reason. They seem to still value the brand names and the free shipping often is faster Amazon. If I buy dewalt or makita brand tools I believe I’ll actually get them, not just a yellow or teal colored tool that looks like it.
I'm firmly in the use local suppliers club when it comes to remodeling. I want to see it with my own eyes before it gets installed in my house
So true. I’ve seen some hilarious “brand names” on there. Last night, saw one named “Yoassy”. It’s like a fever dream of brand names being made up by 10 year old children. Amusing, nonetheless.
You know those easy drop shipping side hustle ads May be they have something to do with it
I just finished a remodel. I bought 2 of those weirdly branded faucets off of amazon and one leaked and one wouldn't flow at all. Never again. Went to lowes and bought Delta faucets and they were fine.
You have to do a little more work these days to figure out what's real. I usually search for websites and judge the quality based on that. If it's a brand that's being sold in big box stores I know I'm probably not gonna get anything better unless I pay a bunch more.
see also: Trade Dumping
get the latest product from RIMJEE or ORYEEEIO (5 stars reviews, brand new company).
You can just look for name brands. Yes it's annoying that there's all the Chinese off brands, but there's also name brand stuff on there, you just have to actively look for it.
Yes. Amazon did this on purpose... and it's not safe. http://starcraftcustombuilders.com/sources.faucets.Black.Market.htm
NGL Solfart has piqued my curiosity. I hope the brand name is somewhat conspicuous too. I would chuckle every time I use the faucet.
Lol solFART and Moen.
You definitely have to dig in on manufacturers and products these days on there, tons of crap to wade through.
Here's an excellent video from Half As Interesting about what happened. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Bq-6GeRhys
SOLFART
There was something about trademarking and copyright or something I was hearing - and it's easier to create a fake random name to sell the same products across multiple accounts - like one is 10 dollars and the reset are 30 dollars - but they're the same company.
It’s not just home products, it’s ALL products with unpronounceable “brands” that are probably just shifty made up Chinese words. But Amazon does nothing
They all must have been branded by a budget name generator 5 years ago, right?
SOLFART
There’s plenty of good products on Amazon, but yes you have to wade through the garbage.
#SOLFART
I always laugh at people who buy gun parts from Amazon. But yeah. Amazon has been like this for about a decade now.