this post was submitted on 13 Mar 2025
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Mildly Infuriating

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The seller in question was selling items they didn't have at a nearly 50% markup.

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[–] conditional_soup@lemm.ee 58 points 1 day ago (4 children)

I'm out of the loop, what's drop shipping and why is it bad?

[–] daggermoon@lemmy.world 100 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

The seller just buys the item on Amazon and sends it to your address usually at an inflated price. They sell stock that they don't own.

[–] tiramichu@lemm.ee 5 points 1 day ago (8 children)

To play the role of the annoying five year old, "And why is that bad?"

[–] blueeggsandyam@lemmy.world 2 points 14 hours ago

Drop shippers aren’t normally authorized sellers/resellers for the product so the manufacturer doesn’t have to warranty their products. Unfortunately, you won’t find out until 6 months down the road.

It can also hurt small businesses because they don’t get to interact with their customers. Their products could get negative reviews on Amazon even if they never wanted sell the product on Amazon. Negative reviews could be because of the shipping or customer service provided by the drop shipper and the customer doesn’t know that the business had nothing to with those issues.

[–] Protoknuckles@lemmy.world 90 points 1 day ago (2 children)

They offer no service or benefit. They are a needless middleman.

[–] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 8 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Can't people just buy directly then, why do they choose to use these dropshippers?

[–] Protoknuckles@lemmy.world 16 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Usually people are unaware they are dealing with a dropshipper.

[–] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 7 points 1 day ago (1 children)

But if you compare prices, why wouldn't you go for the lower price?

If you don't compare prices, well, at that point it's just on you tbh.

[–] Protoknuckles@lemmy.world 7 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

It's usually over different websites and look like different levels of quality. For example, my friend bought a part of their Halloween costume on etsy, expecting something of decent hand made quality. Instead he got something mass produced from a factory drop shipped from Amazon.

[–] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 3 points 20 hours ago

Ah, well that makes more sense.

[–] Croquette@sh.itjust.works 9 points 1 day ago

Dropshippers don't advertise themselves as such.

[–] sunzu2@thebrainbin.org 4 points 1 day ago

That's how modern business operates. Market t is statured and the market aint got a lot of new ways to make money so these "entrepreneurs" just trying to middle man everything 69 times

Best example is any e commmer transactions, so you regular buyer and seller but now you also got amazon, bank, visa, some advertising algo that sells your data...

Jfc I am just trying to buy a pair of fucking socks.

[–] daggermoon@lemmy.world 61 points 1 day ago (1 children)

They're taking your money without providing you any value. It's dishonest and it's against eBay's terms of service (unless they are working directly with the supplier, which I highly doubt is the case.)

[–] Darkassassin07@lemmy.ca 45 points 1 day ago (1 children)

It's a way of farming sales and reputation, to build an account for later scamming with.

A brand new account running a scam gets picked up almost immediately as they're watched closer. An account that's been around for 5 years, selling products without reports of fraud, suddenly switching to scams stays under the radar longer.

[–] IceFoxX@lemm.ee 7 points 1 day ago

Great answer. Thank you.

[–] WoodScientist@sh.itjust.works 18 points 1 day ago (1 children)

A deliberately deceptive business practice that does nothing to help consumers and only raises prices? If you have to have it explained to you why that is bad, well I'm sorry, but you are beyond saving.

[–] tiramichu@lemm.ee 4 points 1 day ago

Very kind and polite of you

[–] AA5B@lemmy.world 10 points 1 day ago (2 children)

You should suspect it for items with really long delays. They are waiting for a sale or new pricing. They sold you something they don’t have and don’t plan to send until they find it cheaply enough to hit their profit target.

Meanwhile you could have bought from someone who actually has it, direct from the original seller without extra markup, or waited for the same sale they are

[–] moody@lemmings.world 7 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Also you may be avoiding Amazon, but end up giving them your business against your wishes.

This has been my issue. I'll order something from a seller and it shows up two days later, delivered by Amazon.

[–] Brekky@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago

They're short sellers

[–] Ledivin@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago

Why is doing literally nothing but adding cost a bad thing? 🤷‍♂️ they're even selling on the same platform, it makes the actual-priced product harder to find or is just a full-on scam, pretending they sell higher quality products than actuality.

[–] Mokopa@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago

The complexity of returns wouldn't be ideal I guess, you don't have the original receipt etc.

[–] finitebanjo@lemmy.world 1 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

The other replies are a bit wrong.

The definition of dropshipping is that the seller / retailer does not have any stock of the product and instead orders the product from a supplier whenever a sale occurs.

Many have pointed out this usually occurs with middlemen and scalpers turning profit on goods available elsewhere for lower prices, but it also technically applies to print-on-demand and other manufactured at point of sale goods.

[–] conditional_soup@lemm.ee 1 points 18 hours ago

I'm assuming that there's no issue with print-on-demand and manufacture at POS; I know pretty much what I'm getting if I order a 3D printed dingus.

[–] ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de 11 points 1 day ago (1 children)

To be a little more clear from what op said, it's when someone sells it from eBay to a person that didn't shop around to see if the product was cheaper from other retailers. The ebay seller than buys it from another retailer where the product was offered for less money and then the seller has it shipped from that retailer directly to the buyers house. It's bad in the sense of some eBay shoppers purposely want to avoid giving their money to a specific retailer (like amazon), or they just feel mad that they could have gotten the product cheaper to begin with.

[–] chicken@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 1 day ago

I don't mind this personally with ebay, I might be out a few extra dollars sometimes but at least I am supporting independent sellers and not having to waste time visiting and put my info into many websites. If they are violating the terms of service of Amazon Walmart etc. to do so, great, I support that. If they are waiting for sales to get a better price, fine, I wouldn't want to bother with that myself.

If their lack of actually having the item resulted in me not getting it at all, I'd be a little pissed about it, but I haven't experienced that. Overall I like ebay way better than other e-retailers.

[–] TheFogan@programming.dev 18 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Basically the way it usually works is.

Chinese knock off mass factory, makes stores and has the items.

They find a guy in America and say "Hey can you list our items on ebay, when you sell them, we'll take $20, you can probably sell them for $50.

Guy lists item for $50, someone buys it, he then just e-mails the dropshipper and asks them to send it straight to the buyer. Sometimes he will have to give ebay a fake tracking number (because ebay doesn't approve the practice).

Point is the drop shipper is just there to conceal the actual source of the product. That's generally because they are sketchy in some other way.

A co-worker of mine at one point got into a drop shipping scam. She was selling golf clubs that way (she was selling them about 80% of expected retail, place she was buying from was charging her about 25% of retail. She didn't know (but probably should have guessed) that the clubs she was selling were counterfeit, and she about had a heart attack when her 2nd customer called her out on it (she refunded him and took the loss).

[–] dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world 8 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Yes, and it's basically a given that most of this crap is counterfeit, unless it's a scheme as dopey as simply ordering it from Amazon and shipping it back to you. Which still isn't a guarantee that it isn't counterfeit, come to think of it.

That profit margin for the drop shipper has to come from somewhere.

And this is coming from someone who deliberately orders counterfeit crap. (Yes, knives, how did you guess?) But if you're okay with that you may as well buy it directly from whoever is making the knockoffs in the first place via Aliexpress or whatever and pay a lot less in the process.

[–] southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Me? Order an obvious fake of an overpriced knife so that I can decide if I like the design in person? Nah, never!

quickly shoves small box of counterfeits under bed

[–] dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Ha-ha, your box of counterfeits is small...

[–] southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 day ago

It's not the size of the box that matters, it's how you use it!

At least, that's what my mom told me