Online Shopping Reviews

Editor’s Pick: Color-block Style Shoes and Dresses for Women

Sorry for the late update as I was enjoying my trip…Now, I am back on track again!

I have two girl friends crazily obsessed with color-block style shoes and have many pairs of such shoes for all seasons in their closets. When I saw a few color-blocked shoes on-sale at Milanoo.com early this morning, I thought of the girls immediately. The shoes look fabulous and fit those who like bold colors. Besides, color-block fashion is definitely one of the hottest trends this summer. Then it occurred to me that it might be a good idea to pick some statement pairs in case some of my readers are interested in.

In order to find the best-valued color-block shoes as well as dresses, I scoured all online shops I am familiar with. Below you will find my picks from a few popular shopping websites, including Milanoo.com, Lightinthebox.com, Dinodirect.com and Aliexpress.com. The four stores seem to be never missed out when I talk about fashion products offered direct from China. If you want more detailed information about any of them, you can search related reviews at this site.

Color Block Criss-Cross Cowhide Women’s Clogs, $40.99, available at Milanoo.com, click here for details.

In addition to this pair (which I believe is the best of all), Milanoo.com also possess a range of other styles:

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Hollow Out Color Blocking Platform Sandals, $34.99, free shipping, offered by a seller with high positive feedback score at Aliexpress.com, click here for details.

Aliexpress.com is one of the best wholesale transaction websites in the world. It provides escrow service to ensure that the transactions made between sellers and buyers are fair and safe. They charge no service fees on buyers. Then how do they make money? No secret: they have already added a certain percentage of commission to each price set by the sellers. However, the site is still the best place to find products that are for sale at the lowest prices possible.

I got over 160 results for color block shoes at the site, see all styles available here.

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Folded Collar Patched Color-block Women’s Dress, $8.99 for anniversary sale, free shipping, available at Dinodirect.com, see details here.

Continue reading Editor’s Pick: Color-block Style Shoes and Dresses for Women

Wholesale4ever.com Review: Wholesaler or Retailer?

Confusing Store Name

When you see the website domain name, you may, like me, think that it is definitely a wholesale website, no matter what it sells. However, the site states clearly in its company info introduction: ”wholesale4ever.com is a B2C e-Commerce website serving Chinese sellers and global buyers.” This is really confusing! I was wondering how the Wholesale4ever.com staff could use such a weird name while the site is intended for retail business. The only explanation is: they are not professional.

Anyway, today on the Chinese international e-commerce arena, it is very common for websites to do wholesale and retail business at the same time. Many famous online shops do this way too: Lightinthebox.com, Dinodirect.com, Milanoo.com, Chinavasion.com, Focalprice.com, to name just a few. The only difference is: they won’t use such a confusing domain name or store name for their business! If I were the boss of Wholesale4ever.com, I would at least revise the company description in order not to mislead potential buyers.

Legitimate or A Scammer?

I searched Google as well as Baidu (the biggest Chinese search engine) for related information about Wholesale4ever but found almost nothing. The site is ranked globally 2,463,050 at Alex, which means it is a small site with few visits. Like Fangtrade.com (click to see review), it should be owned by an individual businessman instead of a company, if it is legitimate.

Based on my research, Wholesale4ever has set up a store at Aliexpress.com, the famous Chinese international trading platform connecting countless suppliers and buyers. This further proves that the site is an individual-owned shopping website. In China, such websites can be found everywhere. While a few of them are scammers selling nothing or crap quality products to steal people’s money, most are doing serious business with global buyers by offering products whose quality is worth or even exceeds the pricing.

Continue reading Wholesale4ever.com Review: Wholesaler or Retailer?

Hottest Deals on Beach Dresses for Summer 2012

A chic and cool dress is a necessity for a beach trip, isn’t it? Every year when the summer is approaching, beach dresses become crazily hot selling among both fashion store merchants and individual consumers. If you are looking for latest styles in beach dresses, you may be interested in the hottest deals on beach dresses for summer 2012 below, which are all collected from the most popular Chinese international online shops.

See more beach dresses for summer 2012 at Dinodirect.com >>

These beach dresses are now on sale with up to 50% off at Dinodirect.com. The after-discount price is as low as $9.99 plus free shipping to any destination around the world. Their collection of beach girls’ hot picks also includes a variety of trendy jumpsuits, beach shoes and swimsuits. Dinodirect is particularly well known for offering authentic Chinese branded products at reasonable prices. The company is rather huge with over 1,000 employees and they have good reputation on the global market. Read the full review of Dinodirect.com >>

See more beach dresses for summer 2012 at Milanoo.com >>

Look at the beautiful beach dresses! At Milanoo.com, I find more than 300 styles in dresses for the beach. The prices for the dresses range from $7.99 to $24.99. Continue reading Hottest Deals on Beach Dresses for Summer 2012

Review of Aliexpress Wedding Dresses

If you have read my review of Milanoo wedding dresses or review of Lightinthebox wedding dresses, you might also be interested in this review of wedding gowns available on another popular sites based in China. Also, if you want to buy wedding dresses from Aliexpress.com, this post is definitely worth reading.

By “Aliexpress wedding dresses”, I mean the bridal gowns offered by various sellers who have registered with Aliexpress and sell their products there. Note that Aliexpress.com is a trading platform, not a super big supplier like Lightinthebox.com or Milanoo.com. Technically, when you buy something at Aliexpress.com, you trade directly with some specific seller instead of the site while the whole transaction process is under the supervision as well as protection (escrow service) provided by Aliexpress staff.

Alibaba Office Building — Aliexpress Head Offices

Although all sellers have been verified in terms of qualifications when they apply for the membership, they may vary significantly in all aspects. In particular, the prices they offer can be rather different between similar or even the same goods. And most importantly, while most suppliers there are trustworthy and honest, some may be scammers who intend to make use of their Aliexpress account to rip people off. Anyway, you can avoid such risks by sticking to a few useful tips. Read the full review of Aliexpress.com >>

Manufacturers & Quality Control

As I mentioned above, the wedding dresses at Aliexpress.com are listed and offered by different suppliers, who can also be the manufacturers. Overall, the dresses are mostly made by small or medium-sized factories or family-own workshops. The majority comes from the biggest manufacturing hub of wedding apparel in China: Suzhou and Guangzhou. So I would personally suggest you choose sellers from either of the cities. Also, you can chat with the sellers to confirm whether they are manufacturers or simply middle-men. Buying direct from manufacturers can usually save you even more money. Remember to ask them to provide you with some evidence which can prove that they themselves make the dresses.

As a third party, Aliexpess has no way to control the quality of any product listed on the site. This is probably one of the biggest disadvantages of buying wedding dresses there. The quality standards all depend on whether the sellers are honest with their product descriptions or not. To confirm with the quality condition of the dresses you are interested in, you have no choice but to do more research on customer reviews in addition to consulting their sales representatives who may lie to you though.

Continue reading Review of Aliexpress Wedding Dresses

Best Online Stores to Buy Wedding Dresses under $100

Recently I am writing a series of reviews of wedding dresses offered by the most popular online suppliers (already posted: Review of Milanoo Wedding Dresses; Review of Lightinthebox Wedding Dresses). To present the most valuable information for my readers, I do a lot of research before I write a review of the wedding dresses available at a certain store. During the research, I noticed that there are quite a great number of lovely wedding dresses that are priced at $100. I know may brides-to-be are looking for best styles in wedding dresses on a budget and I thought it would be a good idea to share the resources in case somebody need them.

When I said “best online stores to buy wedding dresses under $100”, I meant “reliable stores which carry the widest selection of wedding dresses that are as cheap as no more than $100 USD”. In particular, all sites I am going to introduce below are based in China. If you only want to shop for extremely cheap wedding dresses from a local online store, the following information may be nothing useful for you. Anyway, you are still encouraged to read on as you might change your mind after! For those who are hunting for easily affordable wedding dresses from international online shops especially Chinese online shops, this is exactly the right place to get related knowledge.

Lightinthebox.com

I find 64 results for wedding dresses under $100 on Lightinthebox.com, most of which are between $80 and $100. You can hardly find any dress that is under $50 there though. That makes senses considering that the site is best known for high-end wedding apparel with better designs as well as superior quality. The wedding dresses within this pricing range there are mostly mini wedding dresses or short wedding dresses with less complicated embellishments or adornments, best fitting those who love wedding dresses with simple looks.

Wedding Dresses Under 100 at Lightinthebox — Images courtesy of Lightinthebox.com

See more styles >>

Why do I recommend it?
1. The site has established a big name on the global market in the wholesale as well as retail arena of wedding dresses.
2. The designs are great. The styles are so amazing that you may find it hard to make a decision on purchasing which one.
3. The fabrics used in making the dresses are better quality.
4. With years of successful experience, they are very professional in designing, tailoring and selling wedding dresses.
5. Customer service provided by them is prompt and helpful.
6. Each and every wedding dress is showcased by the models the company hires. On the product page you can find several pictures of how the finished dress looks on the model. Besides, you can also see the detailed sizes of the models which may help you better understand the fit of the dresses and avoid sizing problems.

Dinodirect.com

Unlike Lightinthebox.com, Dinodirect.com is not so extensively known or mentioned by their Chinese competitors. However, the site is very famous among global buyers and their company size is unbeatable. There I find more than 10,000 styles in wedding dresses under $100, with only one maternity wedding dress priced at under $50. Most of them are for sale at between $60 and $100 while a few are between $50 and $60. Continue reading Best Online Stores to Buy Wedding Dresses under $100

Where to Buy Faucet Shaped Stand for New iPad, iPad 2 or iPhone

If you think the regular keyboard case stands are too boring for your new iPad, the novel faucet shaped stand may be a good choice. I saw this lovely device at my friend’s home. It was an embarrassing experience though. When I stepped into the living room of the friend’s, I suddenly saw the flowing water and rushed to turn it off. My friend stopped me gently with a big laugh, “Haha, you are cheated too. It is just a stand for iPhone or iPad!” I then looked closer at the cute stuff and was amazed by the creative design.

In case some of my readers are interested in this faucet-with-flowing-water-shaped stand, I did some research on the shopping sites which are most familiar to me. I noticed that this practical phone or tablet PC stand is offered at slightly different prices by various sellers. Besides prices, the stands also vary in brands, manufacturers or colors. Honestly, I don’t think they have any significant differences in quality although they are produced by different factories. Generally, small gadgets like this one require low technology and won’t differ much from each other in terms of quality standards. So my advice is: choose a reliable online shop and then stick to better prices when you decide to shop for a faucet-shape stand for your iPhone, iPad or any other tablet.

I discovered three legitimate Chinese shopping websites which sell this novelty stand: Aliexpress.com , Focalprice.com , Miniinthebox.com (or Lightinthebox.com). In particular, the wholesale trading website Aliexpress.com carries the widest selection of faucet-shaped iPad or iPhone stands. There the prices for the stands range from $3.93 to $10.70 per piece. Free shipping is offered by some of the suppliers. Although the site mainly serves merchants who purchase in bulk, most products are available with no MOQ while some may require a small MOQ. Even if you are a consumer looking for low priced products for your personal use, Aliexpress is worth taking a look. In addition, you have several colors to choose from there. Take a look >>

Continue reading Where to Buy Faucet Shaped Stand for New iPad, iPad 2 or iPhone