I’ve seen 4 site on FB (I know I know) all offering the same exact item (a mag safe adjustable phone stand that can clip to things or has a tripod and adjusts). They are literally all the same thing for the same price. I would assume they’re from the same manufacturer. So how can I find out which is the real source, or does it matter and just pick one.

  • junkthief@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    3 hours ago

    They’re all dropshipped from the same manufacturer. Maybe they’ll make one different stop along the way to the customer to have a different branded decal put on or be put into branded boxes, but they all originate from the same place

    • ramble81@lemm.eeOP
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      26 minutes ago

      Yeah, I’m trying to find out who the original is as I’d just prefer to order from them directly. But most likely they don’t do B2C. I saw a suggestion for Ali Express may get closer to the source. I just hate going to a third party

  • leadore@lemmy.world
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    7 hours ago

    Probably all the same company tracking which variations in how they advertise it get the most clicks.

    • Aliexpress has an increasing number of items that apparently can’t be shipped to my state, for some undisclosed reason. I use it only infrequently, but recently I had occasion to look for two items, and it wouldn’t let me add them to my cart unless I changed my exit node to a different country or state.

      I have no idea what that’s about, but it made me sad. Sometimes you just want a cheap nicknack that you’ll receive some months in the future after forgetting you ordered it.

      I’m not OP, BTW. I’m just injecting commentary.

      • CameronDev@programming.dev
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        31 minutes ago

        I’m in Australia, only thing I’ve had issues with are archery stuff, which sometimes gets marked as firearms, which triggers our customs agents.

      • CmdrShepard42@lemm.ee
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        3 hours ago

        They’ve been scaling back sales to the US due to the tariffs and changes to the exceptions not requiring import duties on things under $800

  • kreynen@kbin.melroy.org
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    7 hours ago

    @ramble81@lemm.ee I don’t understand how this is profitable. We were shopping for a kitchen light fixture. Found the same light at several stores. Ordered it from one that claimed to be in Italy. Item shipped from China. I understand A/B testing and having multiple storefront you treat live burner phones when you get a reputation/review issue, but these sites were all using the same retargetting to place ads in my socials for weeks after the light was installed. Normally I add users to a list NOT to retarget after conversion. The other stores carrying the same product kept advertising something I had already purchased.

  • Secret Music@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    8 hours ago

    Lol so is this just a thing with Facebook advertising these days? Last time I went on a couple of months ago, it kept advertising the exact same cardigans to me over and over but from different ‘shops’. There were even two with completely different shop names that had the same sob story about a “going out of business sale”, complete with crying face reactions as if life long fans of this shop were sad about the news.

    I find it kinda funny in a way. Here’s the social media powerhouse Meta making advertising central to their business but they can’t even bother doing a little quality checking and not letting it be flooded with obvious fake shops that can’t even do deception and trickery right.

    • jqubed@lemmy.world
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      8 hours ago

      It’s not just Facebook, I’ve seen it a lot in ads on mobile games and a lot of them look like they’re made for social, Tik Tok and similar. A lot of them claim to be going out of business, and the one that really makes me laugh is the one that’s obviously an AI-generated old man talking about having to shut down his decades-old business making hand-crafted leather goods. If the leather goods they sell are hand-crafted I’m sure it’s coming from a sweatshop in China or somewhere even cheaper, not an artisanal workshop from a single craftsman.

  • Mothra@mander.xyz
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    9 hours ago

    I’d say it doesn’t matter. If it is the same product, chances are they are all reselling from the same manufacturer.