Budget-conscious buyers hunting for rock-bottom prices at Temu may be getting more than they bargained for, a recent U.K. news program has found.
In “The Truth About Temu: Dispatches,” Channel 4 reporter Ellie Flynn found dangerous levels of toxic heavy metals in items from a $4 “silver effect” necklace to a $14 children’s jacket.
Operated by PDD Holding under the auspices of WhaleCo, the Chinese-founded marketplace has gained a massive following over the past two years, with one-quarter of the British population downloading the app and some half a million users worldwide.
Temu’s explosive rise has everything to do with the impossibly cheap prices it offers on everything from swimsuits to electric scooters, which can cost 10-40 percent less than on Shein, even for identical goods. That and the gamification of commerce—think discount roulette wheels and countdown timers—that once led GlobalData Retail analyst Neil Saunders to describe it as “addictive as sugar.”
Sometimes I’m blown away by the quality. Like a lot of the shit I’d buy locally is chinese made anyway.
Often you get stuff like ‘premium’ retailers getting the stuff that QC passed to a higher standard or whatever but it’s worth minor decreases in quality for a 1000% discount or whatever absurd retail markup there is.
The thing is, if you’re buying something for a dollar it’s gonna be about that quality. you need to know the brands that make good shit. Like some of the 40 dollar kitchen knives on aliexpress are amazing value, some are scams. Electronic components are similar. I can buy an esp32 there for 5 bucks, or locally for 45. Same product.
Now would I trust a fruit bowl bought for 2 dollars to be good? lol no. There’s just material reality at the end of the day. No amount of genius engineering and dubious manufacturing conditions can make high quality material appear from thin air.