Dropshipping, how does it work?

Dropshipping means that a store does not keep its own stock. The goods come directly from a manufacturer. He is often in another country. Dropshipping in itself is a legal way of doing business. Only today more and more entrepreneurs are offering goods that come directly from AliExpress or another Chinese site. The items offered are a lot more expensive than in China. The buyer does not know this and therefore pays much more than the product is actually worth. The retailer puts the difference in his own pocket. It is wrong, but not forbidden. It is up to the buyer to find out where something is cheapest.

The dropshippers advertise on Facebook, among others. The comments only contain enthusiastic messages from buyers. The negative reactions remove the advertisers. It is then difficult to judge whether a product is good and whether the company is reliable. Only the angry emojis (faces) under the ad show that there are also dissatisfied customers.

As long as sites are transparent about their dropshipping practices, there’s nothing to worry about. The customer can then decide for himself what to do with it. But there are also dropshipping sites that pretend they have been around for a long time and have done a lot of research on the products. While they were founded recently and offer no contact information, Chamber of Commerce number or decent warranty. Often it says in the fine print that returns must go directly to the manufacturer, so at your expense to Asia.

Do you see an article on the internet that appeals to you? Then first check the following:

• Take a good look at the photo of the product and search via Google whether the product is also for sale elsewhere. Search using keywords or the photo of a product. How this works is explained in the tip ‘Quickly find pictures from websites’.
• Check with Dutch webshops (sites that end in .nl) when the store was founded. Has the site only existed for a short time, and the store itself says it has been around for a long time? Then it is probably a dropshipper. If you do decide to do business with the seller, check carefully what the conditions for return and warranty are. To find out how long a site has been around for:
  • Go to www.sidn.nl
  • Enter the store’s web address in the search bar.
  • click on check.
  • The message appears that the website is active. click on Show me the details.
  • Agree to the terms and conditions and click Show data.
  • The ‘Registration date’ shows when the site was founded.