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To be fair, Samsung had to scrap a whole phone model because of battery problems. The Boeing 787 suffered with problems of batteries catching fire (and accordin

To be fair, Samsung had to scrap a whole phone model because of battery problems. The Boeing 787 suffered with problems of batteries catching fire (and according to some reports still does). It's a tricky problem to avoid.

ikeboy 7y ago
Anecdotally I've spoken to people who compete with Amazon private label in electronics and they tell me Amazon doesn't care about quality, and that the factories they were buying from were known to be lower quality. I've also heard the opposite about Anker - that they always get the best quality.
- VRay 7y ago
  AmazonBasics isn't any more trustworthy than any of the junk you find on AliExpress or at Wal-Mart/Target/Best Buy. (Except that it has a good return policy backing it, I think)
  - ceejayoz 7y ago
    Amazon is at least liable (theoretically, at least) if they sell an AmazonBasics product that winds up giving my kids lead poisoning, and will have a lot harder time disappearing into the wind to avoid a lawsuit. They disclaim any liability for third-party sellers.
    - partialrecall 7y ago
      Sure, but will a lawsuit unpoison your kid? Unless Amazon is currently testing products for lead before recommending them, which somehow I doubt, then the potential of a lawsuit against Amazon isn't actually protecting your child.
      - ceejayoz 7y ago
        There's at least someone with deep pockets to go after, which is very much not the case for some random drop shipper in China.
- roywiggins 7y ago
  It makes sense- if Anker's batteries start exploding, nobody will buy Anker's batteries again, and that's a significant part of their brand. If Amazon's batteries start exploding, it's not quite the same magnitude. People will still shop at Whole Foods.
  - bluedino 7y ago
    Samsung doesn't have a problem selling phones
    - roywiggins 7y ago
      People buy Samsung phones because they're good phones, people buy Anker batteries because they're good batteries. If they start exploding people will find some other, better battery brand. Admittedly a phone that explodes is a bad phone, but Samsung can still sell its "good phone" brand the same way Apple can still sell its laptops.
    - vinay427 7y ago
      Samsung also has a very long track record of producing cell phones that are deemed safe which neither Anker nor Amazon can match in batteries. You either need an extensive positive record to easily bounce back or need to be willing to write it off as an auxiliary business (e.g. if Amazon had battery issues).
- dpark 7y ago
  I’m sure Amazon’s competitors are the best source for unbiased feedback about the quality of Amazon-branded products.
- NeedMoreTea 7y ago
  Anker are difficult to gauge, I've a few products of theirs, mostly bought a few years ago, with nothing recent - those have been excellent quality and value. Yet I've also started to notice precisely identical unknown brands for most of their products on Amazon. So I no longer have any certainty. Are Anker merely badge engineering some random white label product, or are Amazon / Anker just not caring or able to do anything about dozens of clear counterfeits?
  - ikeboy 7y ago
    Are those identical products being sold as Anker, or under different brands? If it's different brands then it's not counterfeit just to make a product that looks similar to another one.
    - NeedMoreTea 7y ago
      There's similar and completely indistinguishable, except for brand name and logo. e.g. their desk lamps, also their mice. Seems to be the case for almost every Anker product I remember looking at recently.
      - ikeboy 7y ago
        Nothing illegal about that unless Anker has a design patent.
        vinay427 7y ago
        I appreciated your response but as far as I can tell, they were asking whether Anker is badge engineering generic products or is a victim of counterfeiting, which I think is a slightly different question that I'm also looking for the answer to.
        ikeboy 7y ago
        The only way it would be counterfeit is if they sell it as an Anker product or print Anker on the product. My assumption would be that the same factory that makes Anker products is also selling the same designs to competitors - it's also possible that a different factory just cloned it. Note that even if it's the same factory, they could have different quality control for different clients. So quality can differ even on identical designs.
- Spare_account 7y ago
  The issue, then, is how do I guarantee that the Anker branded product I'm buying through Amazon is genuinely Anker manufactured. I'm of the understanding that Amazon comingle stock from different supply chains in their warehouses so presumably I can't trust them to be supplying genuine hardware.
  - ikeboy 7y ago
    Most Anker stuff is sold by only Anker, so that wouldn't be a problem.
  - jfim 7y ago
    In that specific instance, Anker also sells directly from their website, so you can shop there if you're concerned about counterfeited merchandise.
  - amelius 7y ago
    Perhaps products should include a tiny circuit (e.g. challenge-response) that can prove that the product is genuine.
- otakucode 7y ago
  My understanding, and this might just be marketing PR I honestly don't know, is that Anker sends their own QA people to the factories in China, so they're able to meet a higher standard. I always rely on them for battery stuff, and now USB cables since apparently no one else can make cables that reliably work to connect my phone to my car except them. I went through half a dozen different brands before theirs finally worked and remained working.
jschwartzi 7y ago
With a power-supply it's not a hard problem to avoid. You have to hire independent engineers to evaluate the product design and establish testing procedures to verify that the product isn't unsafe. And you have to do QA and design verification during receiving on all batches of product to confirm that the manufacturer followed the design. I've never had a power supply catch fire and I've done some really dumb stuff in my lab. Frankly it's a matter of paying for UL/CE marks(including testing) and actually looking at the component layout, and Amazon doesn't strike me as the kind of company to respect that kind of QA/Verification work. Batteries are a different story because they're basically tiny plastic bombs. Somehow Samsung managed to deliver almost 15 years of Android phones before having their batteries catch fire, and that was almost certainly a result of skipping essential QA/Verification processes because they've never had a problem before.
- alistairSH 7y ago
  How is a power bank different than a battery? Isn't the power bank just several batteries crammed in a casing, with a power-out port?
  - nokcha 7y ago
    jschwartzi was talking about power supplies (i.e., devices that transform mains AC power to DC power), not power banks.
    - VBprogrammer 7y ago
      Really? Do people describe chargers or power supplies as power banks? Surely the 'bank' part of it implies some kind of storage.
      - Pxtl 7y ago
        I do hear chargers with a large number of ports called "power banks" - I think the implication is that it's like a line of ATMs serving many customers.
throwaway_law 7y ago
>It's a tricky problem to avoid. Its really not though, its just that between insurance and the courts its currently cheaper to enter products into the stream of commerce that will catch fire x% of times and hurt Y people costing $z, than it is to manufacture/supply/distribute/retail a product that won't catch fire in 100% of cases. Hell even when z exceeds the cost of proper manufacturing, these companies are significantly more likely to spend money lobbying for changes to insurance and/or products liability litigation than fix the products to make the current formula work rather than spend more money on the cost of the product(s).
- TylerE 7y ago
  You’re assuming nothing bad ever happens with the “name brand” product, which is patently bullshit. Every consumer product I. The shelves is cost engineered to death.
  - throwaway_law 7y ago
    I replied to a comment talking about defective Samsung and Boeing products...those are name brand products. However, knock off products are usually worse, at least if you are burned by an exploding Samsung or die in a defective Boeing...you and/or your family will be compensated as these companies are identifiable and insured. If you are burned by an exploding knock off, odds are: 1) you won't even be able to identify the manufacturer or seller; 2) you won't have jurisdiction to sue the manufacturer or seller; and 3) they probably aren't insured and will just fold up shop and start anew.
phjesusthatguy3 7y ago
To be fair, "bringing manufacturing back to America" would bring these problems back as well. Yes, it's the manufacturer's fault. It's really the company hiring the manufacturer who's at fault, though. Cash Rules Everything Around Me and all that. If the company writing the checks can write checks to people who are going to cut corners, people will die. Full stop.

ikeboy 7y ago

Anecdotally I've spoken to people who compete with Amazon private label in electronics and they tell me Amazon doesn't care about quality, and that the factories they were buying from were known to be lower quality. I've also heard the opposite about Anker - that they always get the best quality.

VRay 7y ago
AmazonBasics isn't any more trustworthy than any of the junk you find on AliExpress or at Wal-Mart/Target/Best Buy. (Except that it has a good return policy backing it, I think)
- ceejayoz 7y ago
  Amazon is at least liable (theoretically, at least) if they sell an AmazonBasics product that winds up giving my kids lead poisoning, and will have a lot harder time disappearing into the wind to avoid a lawsuit. They disclaim any liability for third-party sellers.
  - partialrecall 7y ago
    Sure, but will a lawsuit unpoison your kid? Unless Amazon is currently testing products for lead before recommending them, which somehow I doubt, then the potential of a lawsuit against Amazon isn't actually protecting your child.
    - ceejayoz 7y ago
      There's at least someone with deep pockets to go after, which is very much not the case for some random drop shipper in China.
roywiggins 7y ago
It makes sense- if Anker's batteries start exploding, nobody will buy Anker's batteries again, and that's a significant part of their brand. If Amazon's batteries start exploding, it's not quite the same magnitude. People will still shop at Whole Foods.
- bluedino 7y ago
  Samsung doesn't have a problem selling phones
  - roywiggins 7y ago
    People buy Samsung phones because they're good phones, people buy Anker batteries because they're good batteries. If they start exploding people will find some other, better battery brand. Admittedly a phone that explodes is a bad phone, but Samsung can still sell its "good phone" brand the same way Apple can still sell its laptops.
  - vinay427 7y ago
    Samsung also has a very long track record of producing cell phones that are deemed safe which neither Anker nor Amazon can match in batteries. You either need an extensive positive record to easily bounce back or need to be willing to write it off as an auxiliary business (e.g. if Amazon had battery issues).
dpark 7y ago
I’m sure Amazon’s competitors are the best source for unbiased feedback about the quality of Amazon-branded products.
NeedMoreTea 7y ago
Anker are difficult to gauge, I've a few products of theirs, mostly bought a few years ago, with nothing recent - those have been excellent quality and value. Yet I've also started to notice precisely identical unknown brands for most of their products on Amazon. So I no longer have any certainty. Are Anker merely badge engineering some random white label product, or are Amazon / Anker just not caring or able to do anything about dozens of clear counterfeits?
- ikeboy 7y ago
  Are those identical products being sold as Anker, or under different brands? If it's different brands then it's not counterfeit just to make a product that looks similar to another one.
  - NeedMoreTea 7y ago
    There's similar and completely indistinguishable, except for brand name and logo. e.g. their desk lamps, also their mice. Seems to be the case for almost every Anker product I remember looking at recently.
    - ikeboy 7y ago
      Nothing illegal about that unless Anker has a design patent.
      - vinay427 7y ago
        I appreciated your response but as far as I can tell, they were asking whether Anker is badge engineering generic products or is a victim of counterfeiting, which I think is a slightly different question that I'm also looking for the answer to.
        ikeboy 7y ago
        The only way it would be counterfeit is if they sell it as an Anker product or print Anker on the product. My assumption would be that the same factory that makes Anker products is also selling the same designs to competitors - it's also possible that a different factory just cloned it. Note that even if it's the same factory, they could have different quality control for different clients. So quality can differ even on identical designs.
Spare_account 7y ago
The issue, then, is how do I guarantee that the Anker branded product I'm buying through Amazon is genuinely Anker manufactured. I'm of the understanding that Amazon comingle stock from different supply chains in their warehouses so presumably I can't trust them to be supplying genuine hardware.
- ikeboy 7y ago
  Most Anker stuff is sold by only Anker, so that wouldn't be a problem.
- jfim 7y ago
  In that specific instance, Anker also sells directly from their website, so you can shop there if you're concerned about counterfeited merchandise.
- amelius 7y ago
  Perhaps products should include a tiny circuit (e.g. challenge-response) that can prove that the product is genuine.
otakucode 7y ago
My understanding, and this might just be marketing PR I honestly don't know, is that Anker sends their own QA people to the factories in China, so they're able to meet a higher standard. I always rely on them for battery stuff, and now USB cables since apparently no one else can make cables that reliably work to connect my phone to my car except them. I went through half a dozen different brands before theirs finally worked and remained working.

jschwartzi 7y ago

With a power-supply it's not a hard problem to avoid. You have to hire independent engineers to evaluate the product design and establish testing procedures to verify that the product isn't unsafe. And you have to do QA and design verification during receiving on all batches of product to confirm that the manufacturer followed the design. I've never had a power supply catch fire and I've done some really dumb stuff in my lab. Frankly it's a matter of paying for UL/CE marks(including testing) and actually looking at the component layout, and Amazon doesn't strike me as the kind of company to respect that kind of QA/Verification work. Batteries are a different story because they're basically tiny plastic bombs. Somehow Samsung managed to deliver almost 15 years of Android phones before having their batteries catch fire, and that was almost certainly a result of skipping essential QA/Verification processes because they've never had a problem before.

alistairSH 7y ago
How is a power bank different than a battery? Isn't the power bank just several batteries crammed in a casing, with a power-out port?
- nokcha 7y ago
  jschwartzi was talking about power supplies (i.e., devices that transform mains AC power to DC power), not power banks.
  - VBprogrammer 7y ago
    Really? Do people describe chargers or power supplies as power banks? Surely the 'bank' part of it implies some kind of storage.
    - Pxtl 7y ago
      I do hear chargers with a large number of ports called "power banks" - I think the implication is that it's like a line of ATMs serving many customers.

throwaway_law 7y ago

>It's a tricky problem to avoid. Its really not though, its just that between insurance and the courts its currently cheaper to enter products into the stream of commerce that will catch fire x% of times and hurt Y people costing $z, than it is to manufacture/supply/distribute/retail a product that won't catch fire in 100% of cases. Hell even when z exceeds the cost of proper manufacturing, these companies are significantly more likely to spend money lobbying for changes to insurance and/or products liability litigation than fix the products to make the current formula work rather than spend more money on the cost of the product(s).

TylerE 7y ago
You’re assuming nothing bad ever happens with the “name brand” product, which is patently bullshit. Every consumer product I. The shelves is cost engineered to death.
- throwaway_law 7y ago
  I replied to a comment talking about defective Samsung and Boeing products...those are name brand products. However, knock off products are usually worse, at least if you are burned by an exploding Samsung or die in a defective Boeing...you and/or your family will be compensated as these companies are identifiable and insured. If you are burned by an exploding knock off, odds are: 1) you won't even be able to identify the manufacturer or seller; 2) you won't have jurisdiction to sue the manufacturer or seller; and 3) they probably aren't insured and will just fold up shop and start anew.

phjesusthatguy3 7y ago

To be fair, "bringing manufacturing back to America" would bring these problems back as well. Yes, it's the manufacturer's fault. It's really the company hiring the manufacturer who's at fault, though. Cash Rules Everything Around Me and all that. If the company writing the checks can write checks to people who are going to cut corners, people will die. Full stop.