Temu legitimate website or scam?

[QuarterMillionMan]

Temu | Explore the Latest Clothing, Beauty, Home, Jewelry & More

Based in Boston, I keep seeing ads for $5 tennis shoes, $1.79 fast chargers for cell phones, $9 jackets, etc. It looks sort of like an Amazon website where they sell anything & everything.

[kork13]

I have no idea, and have never heard of it. Though if you're paying attention enough to look into it, congrats to their marketing department.

If it's legitimate, it's probably one of those outfits that resells overstock or returned merchandise. They but a pallet of merchandise for pennies on the dollar & sell it for anything they can get. (BTW, this is another sourcing technique that some eBay sellers use).

But then... I've generally found that when you feel the need to ask if a given product/service/offer is legitimate, 80% of the time the answer will be "no." When it is legit, the quality of said product/service tends to be insufficient.

[QuarterMillionMan]

Ha-ha good points kork.

[disneysteve]

Some quick googling shows that it is a legit site. It’s a new player and is part of the PDD e-commerce ecosystem. PDD is a publicly traded company on NASDAQ.

[ua_guy]

Not to be the wet blanket, but it looks like a lot of cheap electronics and fast-fashion from overseas. No thank you, even if it's legit.

[disneysteve]

Not to be the wet blanket, but it looks like a lot of cheap electronics and fast-fashion from overseas.

I was thinking the same just from a quick glance. Some of it looked like dollar store stuff.

[QuarterMillionMan]

I ended up taking a chance on Temu and ordered this $15 casual men's shoes and free shipping. Walmart has a similar model for $39. A DSW shoe warehouse location in Torrance about 7 miles away has a similar model on its website for $69 which I'd drive over and get it tonight but $15 Temu was so cheap it beat out Walmart and DSW's instant I can have it now albeit $69 so I'll wait for Temu's expected delivery of Dec 8. For $15, I'll take my chances w/Temu.

[james.hendrickson]

Any chance its a value trap? So like an inferior copy of that type of shoe that's going to fall apart a couple months after you buy it?

[kork13]

Any chance its a value trap? So like an inferior copy of that type of shoe that's going to fall apart a couple months after you buy it?

My understanding is that most of what Temu sells is either exactly that (cheap, poor quality junk that won't last), or else illegal knockoffs of branded products (that may or may not be of comparable quality) -- all of it produced & imported from China (part of how they sell stuff so cheap). And by making small one-off sales to consumers (each shipment below import exemption levels), they avoid paying the proper import taxes (the other side of their cheap prices).

Apparently my wife has started using them for random stuff, but I refuse to ... and while I'm visiting my family later this month (back home from Japan), I'll hopefully convince her to stop using them. The company may be "legitimate", but they most assuredly skirt the line.

[QuarterMillionMan]

My expectation of the quality is very low for $15 I expect maybe 6 months tops before the soles start to flap but for that $15 price I'm okay with it falling apart. I think kork is correct on all those points of Temu. My main concern is that I was worried about my credit card information being hacked so I used Paypal for this $15 purchase and will continue to use Paypal for future purchases. Temu takes all sorts of payment methods. I saw they take Cash App, Venmo, etc.

[Petunia 100]

I thought that Temu was based in China. A budgeting YouTuber whom I follow has bought office supplies from Temu and reported that she was happy with the products. I have never used them and don't plan to.

[QuarterMillionMan]

Free shipping on all orders. Temu may become my new Amazon.

[james.hendrickson]

My understanding is that most of what Temu sells is either exactly that (cheap, poor quality junk that won't last), or else illegal knockoffs of branded products (that may or may not be of comparable quality) -- all of it produced & imported from China (part of how they sell stuff so cheap). And by making small one-off sales to consumers (each shipment below import exemption levels), they avoid paying the proper import taxes (the other side of their cheap prices).

Apparently my wife has started using them for random stuff, but I refuse to ... and while I'm visiting my family later this month (back home from Japan), I'll hopefully convince her to stop using them. The company may be "legitimate", but they most assuredly skirt the line.

What is amazing to me Kork, is how many people don't care if a company is breaking the law. Its the same with streaming bootlegged content A lot of people get on whatever the latest torrents website is and download bootlegged copies of whatever they want to watch, regardless of whether or not the sites are legal.

[VanessaKruze]

I've come across those Temu ads too, and it does seem like they have a crazy range of stuff at super low prices. I'd just be a bit cautious and do some research before splurging.

[QuarterMillionMan]

Intended to order this $1.98 mini pocket USB rechargeable flashlight but when I clicked submit, a window popped up saying minimum order is $10. Oh well I'll wait until I find enough items to meet the $10 minimum order (if I knew I would have added this flashlight to my shoe order last night but no biggie). On a side note they take Google Pay but I didn't see Apple Pay.