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In Germany there are companies that buy up returns by the kilogram (mostly clothes), sometimes the e-commerce companies even pay them to take the goods off thei
by ThePhysicist 6y ago
In Germany there are companies that buy up returns by the kilogram (mostly clothes), sometimes the e-commerce companies even pay them to take the goods off their backs. They then ship them to countries like Irak, Serbia or Lebanon to prevent those perfectly goood items to "flood" the European market. That way especially clothing brands protect their inflated prices.
- baxtr 6y agoI think the alternative would be to destroy the fashion items. I prefer the method you describe. I’m not saying it’s right. It’s just how the world of fashion works.
- TheGallopedHigh 6y agoWhether right or wrong it decimates the destination country’s market place. Food for thought.
- bigwavedave 6y agoI guess I really know nothing about economics... Sincere question: how does paying less for functionally/fashionably equivalent products hurt the economy of the country that's consuming them?
- TheGallopedHigh 6y agoThe local makers of said clothing can’t compete with low prices and therefore go out of business.
- hn_throwaway_99 6y agoThe same detrimental effects can happen with lots of aid given to Africa. Basically, the majority of Africa is clothed with first world hand-me-downs. The result is that there is virtually no market for home-grown clothing makers in Africa. Think about it, the US has "anti-dumping" laws to protect US manufacturers, but we "dump" into other countries all the time in the form of "aid".
- bigwavedave 6y agoAh, that makes plenty of sense. Thank you!
- savanaly 6y agoIsn't this just the broken window fallacy though? Creating work is not a good thing in and of itself.
- rocqua 6y agoIt makes global economic sense to 'dump'. It just doesn't locally. And to counter my earlier point, it makes sense globally if you value profit the same everywhere. But profit made by people in low income is worth a lot more. So are capital investments by those people. This is the result of those people 'consuming more'. In more humane terms, this is the result of poor people having more of a need for money. But that is 2 different ways of saying the same thing.
- TheKarateKid 6y agoAre you really complaining about too much aid being given to a continent mostly stricken with extreme poverty? I think the African people have more to worry about than supporting local clothing makers. The fact that they can be clothed cheaply allows them to concentrate on other problems they are facing. See: Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.
- hn_throwaway_99 6y ago> Are you really complaining about too much aid being given to a continent mostly stricken with extreme poverty? Yes, absolutely, and there is plenty of evidence that a lot of this aid keeps Africa in extreme poverty. This is not an extreme, or at this point even a particularly unusual, viewpoint. Some other sources that argue, convincingly in my opinion, why much of the aid given to Africa over the past 50 years has been counterproductive: https://youtu.be/Jv4cAVzC8xM https://youtu.be/Jv4cAVzC8xM - good video about a Ghanaian entrepreneur and how NGO aid hurts the economic development of his country https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/10/13/why-trying-to-help-poor-countries-might-actually-hurt-them/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/10/13/why-t... https://www.google.com/books/edition/_/-gYxhXHjOckC?hl=en https://www.google.com/books/edition/_/-gYxhXHjOckC?hl=en https://www.forbes.com/sites/rainerzitelmann/2019/08/05/africa-doesnt-need-more-development-aid-it-needs-more-capitalism/#2d3c223f6ba2 https://www.forbes.com/sites/rainerzitelmann/2019/08/05/afri...
- derefr 6y agoSo, then, why aren’t there companies doing the reverse: buying up the bulk clothing return boxes, not shipping them out of the country, but instead retailing them locally (and, indeed, “flooding” the domestic market in the process)? Seems like exactly the sort of competitive strategy I’d expect from the “off-price” stores (TJ Maxx in the US, Winner’s in Canada, etc.).
- cwhiz 6y agoI would assume it’s an issue of agreements with Amazon.
- dwild 6y agoMany companies does that, they buy the pallets and sell the stuff, sometime even on Amazon directly. There's plenty of Youtube video talking about it. There's even a shop near I live that even clearly advertise that they sell returns from Amazon. It's way scarier the stuff they send directly to landfill. I know someone that works in chemical waste disposal and they had a deal with Walmart to take care of it all (I'm pretty sure they still do). She was taking back some pretty nice stuff that could easily be sold pretty easily.
- jrochkind1 6y agoGood thing they don't mind flooding the market in Iraq, Syria, or Lebanon!
- gilrain 6y agoThis practice has resulted in it being impossible for local competitors to spring up in those places, incidentally. When your clothing market is flooded with nearly-free product from overseas, domestic competition becomes impossible. This would seem good for consumers superficially, but it winds up limiting economic growth and creating a dependence which is likely to eventually fail.
- theshrike79 6y agoThis is also a deep Youtube rabbit hole to dive into. People buying returned stuff in bulk and seeing what happens, kinda similar to people buying rented warehouses when the lease expires.