I heard of 1Sale (formally known as 1SaleADay) as a online retailer that offers huge discounts on brand name products. Apparently, they buy bulk amounts of surplus consumer goods and then resell these products on their
website for major discounts (Products are listed at up to 80-90% off retail prices).
Sounds great, who wants to pay overpriced markups for stuff you’re going to buy anyways, right?
So I spent a good amount of time reviewing 1Sale/1SaleADay and I figured out how their business model works.
I also discovered what their customer service is like as well as the quality of products they sell.
I put this review together to help online shoppers. I hate getting ripped off and/or being disappointed when it comes to purchasing products online.
I also have extensive experience buying discounted merchandise from online retailers and want to give you my take on 1Sale/1SaleADay. So without delay, let’s start the review.
The Basics
Product Name: 1Sale formally named 1SaleADay
Overall Ranking: 10/100
Website: www.1sale.com
Owner: Ben Federman
Verdict: Not Recommended
What Is 1Sale Supposed To Be?
1Sale is an online retailer established in 2007 as a revolutionary website offering deep discounts on brand name products.
The product range is quite vast. From fashion, jewelry, appliances, electronics, gift cards, you name it, they’ve got it.
They claim to offer new and refurbished merchandise that are supposedly restored by a manufacturer or manufacturer-approved vendor. They also offer free shipping on all their heavily discounted items.
They offer a deal-a-day style selling platform that gives consumers daily deals that last for 24 hours. The deal’s supposedly come from their sister sites that specialize in electronics, watches, family and jewelry.
Through 2010 to 2012, 1Sale was well received and highly praised from multiple media sources…
U.S News & World Report, Wall Street Journal, PBS Nightly Business Report
New York Times, The View, Fox Business Report, ABC News, Yahoo News, and CNBC
Sounds to good to be true, doesn’t it? See below for how their business really functions.
What Is 1Sale Really?
Is 1Sale an awesome website that offers big discounts on brand name goods, or just a sham?
Here’s what you’ve been waiting for – It’s mostly a sham.
I would have said a complete scam, but they also practice affiliate marketing with real companies like eBay, Lowe’s, American Express, and other well established businesses.
But the bulk discount products that 1Sale offers on their sister sites, are nothing but junk. Here’s a couple of reviews from 1Sale/1SaleADay customers.
1Sale is no different than the once heavily praised Aliexpress.com, a sister company of the powerhouse wholesale import/export site, Alibaba.com.
Now days, Aliexpress is well known as a company from China that sells cheap knockoffs to individual consumers. And 1Sale is getting the exact same reputation.
Read my review of Aliexpress.com to learn more about how this process works.
1Sale is no different than Aliexpress. The reason they can offer free shipping and 80% – 90% discounts is because they are buying and shipping the majority of their products from Chinese factories that make counterfeit goods.
This is also why their products take so long to ship to their customers (Usually between 3 – 6 weeks).
The Chinese government subsidizes the delivery costs of exported goods. This gives Chinese export businesses an advantage in the exportation industry. Because of this, products are inexpensive to ship to the United States, or really to any country for that matter.
When 1Sale delivers individual retail products, one product at a time, it’s easy to get them to pass through US Customs. It’s only when you import larger quantities of a product that US Customs starts to snoop around.
How do I know? I sold 1,000’s of these types of products that I bought from companies like Aliexpress.com. I’d buy the product and resell it on sites like eBay and Amazon.
If you label the products correctly and don’t break any copyright laws, it’s perfectly acceptable to sell generic products on selling platforms like eBay and/or Amazon.
Check out my article about how Amazon allows 3rd Party Sellers to sell fake products right here.
The Only Reason 1Sale is Not a Complete Scam
As mentioned above, the 1Sale website acts as an affiliate website. So they have real relationships with authentic companies. You can see this when you visit their website and click on their daily deals.
Actually, it seems like most of 1Sale’s merchandise is from eBay listings – maybe their trying to get rid of their horrid reputation (see more personal customer reviews below).
For example, here’s one of their products listed below on 1Sale.com.
Screen Capture From 1Sale.com
Now when you click on this link to purchase the US Traveler Luggage Set, you’ll be taken to eBay.com. See below.
The Exact Same Product Offered by 1Sale Linked to eBay
Here’s another example of a daily deal that is just another affiliate of eBay.
Screen Capture From 1Sale.com
Click on this product and again, you’re sent back to eBay to make the purchase.
The Exact Same Product Offered by 1Sale Linked to eBay
Now don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with this type of affiliate marketing. I show this to express that the majority of the sales items from the 1Sale website are products from eBay.
However, I finally found an advertisement that went to a different website. I assume this is a sister website of 1Sale and what the customer Carol (in the customer review above) was referring to, beautifully advertised earrings that are really just cheap pieces of junk.
What I didn’t like about this particular product was that it’s listed on 1Sale for $499 dollars with a 90% discount, but when you click on the product photo, you’re taken to the affiliate site diamondstuds.com. There it’s listed for $1,239 dollars with a 76% discount. Marked down from $4,959 dollars.
Here’s the advertisement from 1Sale below.
And once you click on this beautiful set of Blue Diamond Stud Earrings, you get taken to diamondstuds.com.
Now maybe this is a glitch in their affiliate system, or maybe it’s a bait and switch tactic. You make the call.
Regardless of this, if I really wanted these earrings for Christmas, I’d be disappointed to realize that they’re going to cost me two and a half times the originally advertised price.
Which leads me to my next point about 1Sale, customer service and product quality.
What is 1Sale’s Customer Service and Quality Control Like?
From my experience with buying discounted goods from online retailers like 1Sale, this is the biggest problem you’ll find. You have no control over the quality of the products you purchase.
What’s worse about 1Sale, besides their low quality merchandise, is their POOR customer service. Don’t take my word for it, check out what 1Sale customers have to say.
Final Thoughts on 1Sale
1Sale.com is nothing more than a website that sells counterfeit goods that they label as “Refurbished” brand name products. They also act as an affiliate website to “real” online retailers.
Most all the 1Sale products I looked at were simply affiliate links to real online retail stores.
1Sale has a nice website that’s easy to navigate, their ads are attractive, but the majority of their ads are not from 1Sale’s sister sites. They are simple directing internet traffic from their website to real online stores like eBay, NewBalance, MasterCard, Lowe’s, etc.
In this way, 1Sale is really just an affiliate website. And again, there’s nothing wrong with that, they are receiving a commission from when you go to their site, click on the sales link or photo, and then go on to buy something from the real online retailer.
But unless you recognize the true retail store (like NewBalance for example), you can’t trust the quality of the product you are going to get when you purchase something directly from 1Sale.com’s sister websites.
Based on customer reviews, you’ll receive poor customer service, delayed shipping, and cheap merchandise.
On a more personal note, do you really want to reward a dishonest website by giving them affiliate commissions?
I know I don’t. I want a site that is honest in how they approach business, and 1Sale is anything but that.
Based on all the my research, the worst aspect about 1Sale is their atrocious customer service. I’d avoid buying anything from these guys and stick to eBay and/or Amazon.
Recommendations for Buying from Discounted Retail Stores like 1Sale
In general, if you buy from online discount retailers and you’re getting an 80% – 90% discount, you shouldn’t expect to receive real brand name merchandise. You also should expect high quality goods, but that’s not always the case.
China is awesome about taking pretty much any consumer product and duplicating it.
There are literally thousands of factories in China that produce counterfeit goods. This isn’t always a bad thing, especially if the product is of high quality, sometimes you can pay a fraction of the retail price. But it really depends on who you are buying from and you have to do some research.
If you want to buy discounted counterfeits, stay away from anything too expensive. Also, avoid buying electronics or gadgets. Stick with low cost simple products that are easy to reproduce. And make sure you can contact the seller and do a little research on them before committing to the purchase.
At least with Aliexpress.com, you can look at the seller’s ratings and communicate with the individual seller before you purchase anything.
I bought over a 1,000 “Generic” iPhone 4/5 cases from a Chinese factory (that I found on Alibaba.com) and the quality was excellent. But I sold them as generic cases.
And when one of my customers received a faulty case, I provided good customer service and sent them a new case or refunded their money without all the hassles that occur with 1Sale.
Summarized Overview
Product Name: 1Sale formally named 1SaleADay
Overall Ranking: 10/100
Website: www.1sale.com
Owner: Ben Federman
Verdict: Not Recommended
I started working in importation as a way to be able to work from anywhere. I’m a traveler by heart and love the idea of working online. I spent 5 years trying to figure out how to make a good living online only to find tons of online scams.
If you have any inclination to do the same, learn how I finally accomplished my goals and I am now earning a living while traveling.
If you have bought anything from 1Sale, please leave a comment below to share your experience. Hopefully, you now have a better understanding of what is 1Sale and why you should avoid buying anything from this company.
Best,
Todd
The post What Is 1Sale – Awesome Discounts or Cheap Counterfeits? appeared first on Welcome To Learn To Grow Wealth Online.