Ordering Online & Shipping from China is Cheaper than Buying Local...

You know things are screwed up when you can buy a product from China, have it shipped across the world to your home address, and still have it be 10 times cheaper than crossing the street and buying it from your local store...

Now, for those of you who are already doing this, this story is probably years late... But it didn't really "hit home" for me until a buddy of mine got a package from China, and I inquired as to what exactly he ordered..

My friend just got a new computer, and he needed an RJ45 Network Cable for his internet access. Like any computer layman (non-computer dude), he visited Future Shop and Best Buy to see how much a 15m RJ45 cable would be... To his surprise, it was ridiculously expensive.

At Future Shop, the cheapest 15m RJ45 Cable that they had was listed for $47.99 (+ tax):

At Best Buy, the cheapest 15m RJ45 Cable that they had was listed for $45.99 (+ tax):

Now, he was pretty sure that spending approximately $50 + tax for a supposedly cheap product like an RJ45 network cable seemed pretty insane, so he decided to take a quick look on eBay.ca to see if he was completely off-base..

To his surprise, he was able to find a 15m RJ45 Network Cable on sale from a Retailer in China for $1!! So he looked into it further, and he found out that with the International Shipping Rate he was looking at a grand total of $4.93 USD!!

It's no surprise then that he went ahead and ordered it immediately.  Here's what came in the mail after a few days:

So I went to XE.com and I did the conversion from USD to CAD and I found that $4.93 USD = $5.06813 CAD based on the current rate.

So we are looking at a difference between $5.07 from China, and $45.99 from Best Buy, or $47.99 from Future Shop. Using the $45.99 lower price, and adding the 13% Taxes applied here in Toronto, we are looking at a final total of $51.97. $51.97 / $5.07 = 10.25. So, buying an RJ45 Cable from across the world, and having it shipped and delivered to your front door is 10.25 times cheaper than crossing the street and going to your local Future Shop or Best Buy... When you take a step back and think about everything that's involved in you getting that cable from China, at least to me it seems pretty crazy that it's that much cheaper... One would wonder how that even makes sense??...

Now, for any computer dude like myself, I know you've probably been biting your tongue this entire time, thinking that everyone knows that shopping at Future Shop and Best Buy for your computer stuff, is like shopping at Pusateri's (fine foods grocery store in Toronto) for your cereal. You can go there and spend a fortune on that cereal, or you can go to a place like Food Basics, and get the exact same cereal for far cheaper.

Well, the same thing is true in terms of computer stuff.. I would be more likely to go to a place like TigerDirect.ca for my network cables, than Future Shop or Best Buy. So, I figure it would only be fair to include the TigerDirect.ca price for their 15m RJ45 cable to see if the premise of this article still holds true.

So, I went to the TigerDirect.ca website, and I found that the cheapest 15m RJ45 Cable that they had was listed for $17.99 (+ tax):

So, $17.99 plus the 13% tax = $20.33. Performing the same comparison with the Chinese cable, we find that $20.33 / $5.07 = 4.01. So, still, buying the cable from China and having it shipped across the world to his front door was still 4 times cheaper than taking a drive to TigerDirect and picking one up from there...

You can't argue with the facts... Something is definitely screwed up in our system when this is the case...

Anyway, the final test of this is to see if the Chinese network cable works... Obviously if it doesn't, then the return policy and customer service does play a part. So I asked my buddy about that, and he told me that when he's ordered stuff online before from overseas, he's only been disappointed once (where the item he ordered didn't work). And in that case, the eBay Retailer was so worried about getting a negative review, that he told him to just keep it, and he refunded his money immediately...

Now you tell me, when's the last time you went to a local store and tried to return something, and have them so worried about losing your business, that they apologize and refund your money no questions asked?

The world is changing folks… I say it everyday. Slowly these companies that order their products from China, and then mark it up 4 to 10 times the price before putting it on our shelves, are going to be in for a cold reality check soon in this new world of ours..

--jackandcokewithalime


(Images:
http://www.futureshop.ca/en-CA/product/dynex-dynex-50-cat6-network-cable-grey-te500-50-sgr/10071939.aspx?path=335e56b3278cd8f26a260f75117307e1en02 (Future Shop)
http://www.bestbuy.ca/en-CA/product/dynex-dynex-50-cat6-network-cable-gray-te500-50-sgr/10071939.aspx?path=b68eb99c934c5ebf4da4ca72d0b01260en02&lid=fp-10071939-dynexdynex50cat6networkcablegr-en (Best Buy)
http://www.xe.com/ucc/convert.cgi?Amount=4.93&From=USD&To=CAD (XE)
http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/searchtools/item-Details.asp?EdpNo=331718&sku=C184-8042 (TigerDirect))