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Taobao....... Who has used them?
 

Has anyone used them before?
Taobao Link

Besides the fact that the entire site is based in China as well as the text.
I understand that there are "Agents" that will do your buying and re-shipping for you.
Such as this site:
Spree on Taobao Now!


Pros?

Cons?

I was thinking about doing that before but I never considered it since it took too much time and money. You first have to wit for the item to come to them which could take a while. It's easier just sourcing out a supplier and doing it yourself.

MyBad. I read the title as Tobacco....:rolleyes:

I clicked the link. When I arrived at the page, I didn't recognize the font. I got about 1 inch from my monitor, tilited it almost perpendicular to my face, squinted and crossed my eyes. I think I made out a line-art image of Ozzy Osbourne wearing a Micky Mouse hat. But I was unable to discern what he was demonstating.

What is taobao?

^^^taobao is the Chinese equivalent to ebay. Buy-it now format. Hilarious to use, though you can get English-speaking guides to help.:ranger:

Taobao Field Guide - Buy from Taobao with English Guides

Taobao is the most popular auction site in China. It is the biggest ebay competitor in china. Unfortunately taobao is only for chinese users, but they have launched a new site called aliexpress which can be found at alibaba.com. Aliexpress is in english but it is not an auction site. Aliexpress is comparable to dhgate.

Ah, so Ozzy could have been holding anything. The thrust of the thing is that he was selling 'something' using taobao.

Thanks for the explanation. It's clear as mud, now. Before, I had no clue whatsoever.

On the less humorous side, I'm intrigued.

I more interested in other big Asian auction sites. Taobao would not have a product I am looking for..:faint:

Lol, we have some chinese users on the forum. Maybe they can help us read chinese.

What other auction sites are there lynda? The only big auction sites I know of are taobao and ebay.

While back you could get your own password and talk to sellers directly...There was website explaining how to do this. I'll look if I have this link still..

I have frequently purchased resellable goods from taobao, think of it as the no-rules, black-market half-brother of eBay, where pakes and illicit items are commonplace, and at very reasonable prices. ^_^

And to get an account all you need is to be able to read basic chinese, and make frequent use of google translator. Furthermore you need a chinese bank account to use their payment system 'Alipay', which won't be too hard to get legally, just finding someone to help you set one up would be the problem - especially if you live in a country which does constant overseas sweeps to counter tax evasion via offshore bank accounts. ^_^

You either contact the seller directly, probably 5-10% direct EMS ship internationally. For the rest you'll need a friend/contact/agent to physically receive the items at a chinese address, and reship them to you.

Yes, you probably need a friend in china. I have 2-3 friends in china.

And they have to be pretty trustable and loyal friends that you can count on to not take your money and bail, if not then use many of the many 'taobao agents/buying services' on the net. Just google that. They should charge 5-10% commissions on everything incl. shipping fees, and their forex currency rates are usually reduced to add to their commission. But most of them I hear are good...

Yes, I would rather have some agent do it for me since I have never met those so called "friends." Also most agents get a discounted ems quote.

So has anyone ever ordered anything from a "taobao agents/buying services"?

If so then what was your experience?

what a qoute
 

Green, I am interested in your guide, I especially made note of the fact when they said

"Experience in dealing with Chinese sellers, overseas buyers may not know the quirks of Chinese mentality. "

:) Man I feel like a fish out water but god willing i will jump into the China scene DIRECTLY by 2010

I use TaoBao ALL the time! Since I can speak and write in Chinese, all my suppliers are from TaoBao. You can pretty much find any thing you want to sell on Ebay being sold on TaoBao (Once I even bought some Chinese snacks). But none of the branded stuffs are real. Besides that, you can still find some computer related items to sell.

The difficult part is that you need someone who can speak and read Chinese to use the site. And you need someone in China to help you pay for the items. Sometimes the sellers will take Western Union payment, but most time they accept bank transfer only. In conclusion, the language is huge barrier. If you can figure that part out, TaoBao is way better than DHgate and Alibaba.

Anybody who wants to use TAOBAO find supoliers, i can help you.

i use taobao a lot.. i've got a friend over there who works as an agent for me..

I've never used the guides though so couldn't comment on them..

a lot of the items sold on ioffer are half the price on taobao

How about tradetang.com? I've purchased there only once, but it went ok.

Lots of uninteresting stuff. Anything tempting is absolutely knock off. Many sellers are out to take your money and run. If you do find the one good supplier there, it won't be long before their competitors snitch them out to the authorities and thus an arrest ensues. Sometimes they turn over the supplier's customer list (with you on it) to the US fuzz.

Looks pretty, bites you in the hind end. Be careful or better yet be wise.

Err a silly question. Their price is in RMB?

RMB could refer to:
Renminbi, the currency of the People's Republic of China
Malaysian Ringgit is also sometimes referred to as RMB

The renminbi (sign: ¥; code: CNY) is the currency of the People's Republic of China whose principal unit is the yuan.

How does their payment system work? It seems like the buyer would have to have some credits in the account before purchasing?

Typically Western Union or bank transfer to escrow balance in advance?

Vic,

Snitching does not work in China. Corruption, bribery, nationalism. Every month or every other month, the Chinese conduct a 'publicity raid' usually after a G20 or G7 meeting. Hundreds of factories producing knock-off of various quality[ b to aaa], thousands of distributors and ten of thousands of wholesalers. By time it gets on Taoboa its in the hands of MILLIONS of retail sellers. Makes Ebay look like a toddler learning to walk. The world will never be the same when just 10% of the chinese approach the US per capita income. Last economist figure was 50million chinese at USA per capita income levels about a 1/3rd the way there by the sound of things.

I am finally going over next month. My relatives [ business people over your sideof the world ] go every 3 moths or so, $25-$100 for an interpretor that doubles and triples for other purposes. They buy office furniture that has a 600% price range for the same item. Price only has 'some' correlation to quality. Top quality is about 20% of the retail price in officeMAX

Wild West capitalism like only the chinese know how.

oh yea they are guys that will take your money and run :) for the newbies start online[alibaba], insist on paypal [lol], insist again on paypal, ..oh yea after the excuses still insist on paypal. Then order in custom clearable quantities for VERO and larger qty for non-vero.

All of the above is hours and hours of work.

taoboa is for advanced buyers but greenbean posted a a very good 'toaboa' service i intend on trying soon

Is going through a taobao agent the only way to buy stuff from taobao?
taobao seem to only accept payment via alipay and alipay doesn't accept credit card payment and they only accept their local china bank? And does the taobao seller shipped overseas? I find it hard to justify paying extra to taobao agent... anyone of you using a taobao agent?

Is anything on that site authentic? I would like to order some shoes from there and I see some sellers accept credit card. Would it be safe to pay them through credit card?

Can anyone help me confirm if the sellers are legit and translate their currency?

Only unbranded goods are authentic. Or those chinese products with chinese names.

Imagine literally a chinese version of eBay with no rules regarding copyright, vero, pakes, etc. and there you go. So my answer is if 90% of eBay is already full of trash, then TaoBao's authenticity percentage would be near 99% (not an exaggeration) for branded items. Of course there are unbranded items on there, but not really many foreigners enter TaoBao for unbranded items. Regardless, unless you get an 'agent' or friend that physically lives in China you have no way of guarding against scams (take money and go tactics).

:(

taobao & alibaba are somewhere you could buy most made in china bargain on these website, taobao is the chinese number one C2C and alibaba is the number one small B2B in the world. but you need to be careful much scam also in there!

Awesome!


And that's ture.Most of sellers in taobao wouldn't speak English well,and also in order to use the system you have to know chinese yourself as well as chinese currency payment method.Though you are qualified for all of these things,you will have to find a seller who would like to ship item to oversea.


Are there any works I could get here?:bounce:

There is a payment system works almost the same as paypal called zhifubao,www.alipay.com

But unfortunately.alipay only can be used by chinese cuz they have identity system that needs you to provide douments as Chinese ID card,bank account.etc..

Hi everybody, I am a chinese. If you guys need help on taobao, I can help. But stuff on taobao is not too cheap. If you get a large quantity, I can help you get it with a cheaper price. If you want, please let me know. :)