For Father's Day 2020, Charlotte has taken the plunge.
The young mother, usually conscientious when she makes purchases on the Internet, was tempted by a small portable projector after seeing an influencer, Tiffany Gounin, former candidate of Koh Lanta and Angels of reality TV, in promote on Instagram and offer a discount code.
After all, if an influencer talks about it on video to her 760,000 subscribers, she's a good projector, right?
“I was looking for a product like this, but I didn't want to put 500 euros into it.
It was portable, it answered everything I wanted.
I saw the reduction, I said to myself, great the good plan.
In addition, I had seen him on several occasions with influencers, ”recalls Charlotte.
But the package, which was to be a gift for her husband, was never delivered to Rouen, where she lives with her family.
Worse: it took him nearly eight months, as well as long discussions with the brand (DymioHD) and La Poste, to obtain a reimbursement of 80 euros.
Without realizing it, Charlotte, like many Internet consumers, made an order from a dropshipping site, a very controversial online sales practice.
Concretely, it is a form of e-commerce, where the dropshipper (the creator of the site) does not have any stock of the products put forward.
Its role is to receive orders from buyers and replicate those orders to a supplier, most often based in Asia, who must ship the item themselves.
In passing, the dropshipper recovers a margin, which he sets himself, and which can reach significant amounts, compared to the original prices of the products.
Dropshipping is that: pic.twitter.com/COMxEg7SU9
- Seb Iscariote (@SebIscariote) March 3, 2021
Impossible to make a definitive list of dropshipping sites that abound on the net: their lifespan is often limited to a few months, and the products they resell are very diverse, according to the trends highlighted on social networks.
Daily tools, high-tech, beauty products, reusable accessories stamped "green": whatever the demand, dropshippers meet it.
These salespeople, who are trained using YouTube videos, free guides on the Internet or paid online training, know how to follow the trends.
“Last December, the product that worked was reversible octopus cuddly toys that were smiling or not.
I had also seen LED ribbons that you stick under the stairs and light up when you walk on them.
Or even fake Swiss watches, ”remembers Jimmy Fayolle, creator of the Antidrop site, which is used to examine whether an item sold online corresponds to dropshipping.
“You have to find a product that answers a problem.
I have seen shops with blackhead devices or which sell magnetic eyelashes, ”develops Ryan Gault, at the head of Eole Agency, which trains people to set up their dropshipping business, but promotes methods "In accordance with European law and standards".
Up to 100,000 euros in sales
Dropshippers also follow the news.
At the start of the Covid-19 pandemic in March, when most states faced shortages of protective equipment, many sites offering masks appeared on the Internet.
Masks whose standards were not necessarily verified, and which had even been promoted by a very popular influencer.
The DGCCRF then announced that it was exercising "enhanced surveillance" of dropshipping sites in times of pandemic.
To sell their products, the most seasoned mainly praise two methods.
The first is advertising on social networks (Facebook, in particular), targeting very specific audiences identified in advance.
A technique that can be very profitable.
“What we will gain will depend on our investment.
If we put 100 euros per month in the ad, we can make 1000 or 2000 euros in turnover.
If we put 10,000 euros, it can go up to 100,000 euros, depending on the quality of the advertisements.
But obviously, you can't always predict the return on investment in advance, ”says Ryan Gault.
Magneticsl: misuse of trustpilot by giving false positive opinions!
On google many other negative opinions!
The same magnetic eyelashes on Aliexpress!
#manonmarsault #dropshipping #Jazztvshow #EscrocsDeDubai pic.twitter.com/A33o7Cs8i3
- 💵 Dubai crooks💵 (@melindavanhuis) October 27, 2020
Another, more effective method: partnerships with influencers who are very popular on Instagram or Snapchat.
"They often target former reality TV candidates, who have 1 to 3 million subscribers," says Coumba, one of the managers of the Instagram account Stop Arnaque, followed by nearly 100,000 people.
With her sidekick Leiyla, she works to educate Internet users, sometimes a little too gullible, to the scams that flood social networks.
Acting as whistleblowers, many Twitter and Instagram accounts are indeed trying to track down influencers who promote dropshipping products.
"Those who follow these influencers are young people who are not going to have the reflex to check if the site is reliable, if there is a person against whom to turn," comments Coumba.
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The problem is however well known in the community.
"We did some
(Editor's note
: the promotion of dropshipping)
without knowing it and we started to have a lot of problems", recently confided the famous agent of the stars of reality TV, Magali Berdah, of Shauna Events, at Vanity Fair.
She assures the magazine that it has set up a legal service dedicated to the detection of deceptive sites, while continuing to work with “own dropshipping” brands validated by the same service, without specifying the meaning of this name.
None of the stars we contacted for this survey, nor their agents, responded to our repeated requests for an interview.
A legal method, but which has its drifts
In essence, dropshipping, absent from legal texts, remains legal.
But many practices linked to these sites can be illegal or, at the very least, unfair.
The DGCCRF estimates “at several thousand the number of reports or complaints related to this practice overall each year”.
First pitfall: packages that do not arrive at their destination or arrive with extremely long delays, the site manager having no access or means of controlling his stocks.
Not to mention the absence of quality guarantees or compliance with standards.
Second concern: inflated prices, without justification.
Often, products sold for several tens of euros on dropshipping sites appear on other online sales platforms, such as AliExpress, for a few euros, or even a few tens of cents.
“Multiplying prices by two, three, four is not at all moral.
Sometimes, I was sent links where the price of the articles was multiplied by ten, or fifteen ", alarms Jimmy Fayolle, Antidrop.
I am shocked at the level of scamming of some reality TV stars.
Maddy Burciaga who dropshipping by selling the pallet at the price of real brand pallets.
no work provided get richer on the backs of subscribers.
# LMvsMonde4 # LaBatailleDesCouples2 pic.twitter.com/w6o8h1MrUV
- D💕🇸🇳 (@Dalandadiall) November 15, 2019
There is also the issue of the impact on the environment.
Well aware of new consumer demands, dropshipping sites are often advertised as eco-responsible, ethical or even made in France.
Without being able to prove it too much.
“I saw a jewelry brand that said they planted trees with every new purchase.
It is a technique to touch the customer to the heart and tell him that he is doing a good deed, ”says Jimmy Fayolle.
The Instagram account Mr. and Mrs. Recycling lists many alleged dropshipping brands, for example, reselling reusable period panties, but findable for a few dollars on AliExpress.
It is indeed difficult to consider these underwear, manufactured on the other side of the world under different standards, in materials of uncontrolled origin, as totally "green".
Misleading discounts and fake reviews
To avoid abuses, it is therefore better to adopt some good habits when buying online.
"To locate these sites, we look at the content, the legal notices, its creation date, if it is listed in France, if we can easily reach the after-sales service", details Coumba, who recommends being wary if the legal notices are unclear.
Mistakes can also creep into the legal notices, with creators copying texts from one dropshipping site to another, as they often edit several at a time.
Under an often refined design (they are often created via the Shopify platform, very easy to use), they display constant discounts, always surprising (a massage gun at 159.90 euros mysteriously sold at 79.90 euros or a brush smoothing from 139.90 to 114.90 euros), and always more important if you buy in batches.
"If a product is 100 euros, it already has a 50% promotion, and in addition, an influencer gives an additional discount code, there is a chance that it is dropshipping", judge Coumba, of Stop Arnaque.
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Often, these sites only sell one model of the same item.
These platforms also highlight opinions from consumers that are difficult to identify - and potentially false.
“By copying them to Google, you can see that they are being used on other sites.
Sometimes, they are directly imported from AliExpress, ”says Jimmy Fayolle.
The computer science student recommends staying vigilant about the alerts flashing on these sites.
"We often have notifications on the site that say that 150,000 people are connected at the same time as you to encourage you to buy, which is false when you check yourself", adds Jimmy Fayolle.
Several online tools, such as reverse image search, also allow you to search, in a few clicks, for the product on AliExpress, sometimes with the same visual.
Be careful, this method is not infallible: it happens that it is the manufacturers of the platform who copy original products from designers.
A society already doomed
Beware of those who would be tempted to embark on the adventure of dropshipping with bad intentions.
In February, an investigation carried out by the DGCCRF thus led to the conviction of the company Disinfluence, which had to pay a fine of 10,000 euros.
It marketed a filtering shower head and its replacement stones, displaying “misleading information about the substantial qualities of the product and the expected results of its use in terms of water saving and health benefits.
In addition, the opinions on the site were falsely presented as certified by a third party, ”underlines the authority.
The reseller "also deceived the consumer on the reference price of the product which had never been practiced and did not correspond to the market price" and "on the period of the promotional offer by the use of a countdown fictitious end of operation, ”adds the DGCCRF.
Most dropshippers are also relatively discreet.
Several brands displaying characteristics specific to this practice did not respond to our multiple interview requests.
On the sites of those who deign to display full legal notices (which is required by law), there are often addresses based abroad, making it even more difficult to make contact.
For supporters of this new form of e-commerce, such as Ryan Gault, who trains entrepreneurs to get started in this business, the problems and scams exposed online are not representative of the world of dropshipping.
“Drifts are everywhere, but it's not something common.
This mainly comes from resellers who do not pay attention to European Union directives, CE marking, who do not test products directly.
When my clients come to see me, I advise them to contact the supplier or to have an agent, to test the products before starting, ”says the young entrepreneur, who also manages a brand of organic and made in France t-shirts. .
And the massive margins garnered by resellers?
A non-problem, according to Ryan Gault.
“Department stores do the same.
It is logistics above all, it just means:
I am an intermediary between the supplier and my client
, like the business introducers in large companies.
Whether it comes from China does not change anything: everything comes from China today, ”he puts into perspective.
If lawmakers want to tackle these practices, they have to be quick.
The sector is already changing, according to Alain Briez, an entrepreneur presented as having made 350,000 euros in turnover thanks to dropshipping on YouTube, where there are hundreds of content dedicated to this business.
“Dropshipping a few years ago was sending a bogus product that flickers all over the place and explodes after three days, it was really an industry.
People are starting to understand this pattern, so we send products that really meet a expectation, ”he defends.
According to him, dropshipping can mainly serve as a way to found a business without capital, before moving forward and building a real brand, with better controlled products.
A somewhat obscure approach, before gaining lasting credibility on the Internet, therefore.
However, it is not certain that consumers who are already aggrieved by these sites will allow themselves to be tempted again.
Since her troubles with the DymioHD projector, Charlotte has promised herself to buy only from trusted sites.
“From a certain amount, I will go through Amazon, Fnac, La Redoute, Darty or Boulanger.
In short, sites that I know, ”she says.
“I know there is reliable customer service that I can turn to.
"
