Wish is an online e-commerce platform based in California, USA, that primarily sells cheap products made in China. ContextLogic is the parent company of Wish, an American company registered in Delaware and headquartered in California.
Even though Wish has similarities with Amazon and eBay, there are also many differences.
Amazon primarily sells products themselves. They also allow third-party resellers to list their items on the Amazon platform. Moreover, Amazon stores, handles, ships, and processes returns of all the products that sell on its platform. They also process payments. However, except for the payment processing, Wish does nothing. They don’t sell, store, handle or ship any products. They also don’t process returns.
Wish has copied its business model from Uber. Uber doesn’t own or operate any car. They only provide a technology connecting individual drivers (known as contractors) to riders. Uber only provides the platform to connect drivers and riders and handles the payment.
Similarly, Wish is primarily focused on the Wish App and its platform. It doesn’t sell or ship any products. Wish only connects the buyers with sellers and manufacturers and handles the payments. In return, Wish gets a commission from the sellers.
Most Chinese companies copy American businesses; however, Wish has copied a Chinese online e-commerce platform — Taobao.
Taobao is a Chinese e-commerce platform selling cheap products through third-party manufacturers. But Taobao only operates inside China. ContextLogic copied the Taobao platform and made it international.
There are primarily two types of products that sell on Wish.
- Fake
- Cheap Off-brand products
Be extra careful about whatever you buy on the Wish app.
Fake Products on Wish
Wish isn’t competing with Amazon or eBay. It’s filling a gap that Amazon isn’t serving. Wish itself doesn’t sell anything on its platform. They allow third-party manufacturers to list their products cheaply on the Wish App.
A Chinese manufacturer can easily become a seller on the Wish; however, a manufacturer that resides outside of China will have difficulty becoming a Wish seller. As most sellers on the Wish platform are from China, it’s full of cheaply made fake Chinese products.
China is famous for counterfeit products. They copied everything possible under the sun, from food to clothing, technology to architecture; the Chinese copied everything.
They also fake many successful brands’ products. It includes sneakers, clothes, perfumes, headphones, jewelry, phones, electronics, etc. All the brand products that sell on Wish are fake. Therefore, if you buy from Wish and if it ships from China, it’s highly likely that the product is counterfeit.
In November 2021, The French government forced Google and Apple to remove Wish App from its French app store. Moreover, they also forced Google, Bing, Yahoo, and other major search engines to delist Wish.com from search results because the French government found that most products sold on Wish are fake, illegal, unsafe, and dangerous.
Moreover, the french authority also found that most electronics and perfumes that sell on Wish don’t follow EU regulations and contain hazardous and harmful chemicals. It’s why Wish is banned in French.
Except for France, no other government authority has investigated Wish. Therefore, it’s still operating in many countries.
When asked why — Wish — allows fake products to be listed on its platform, Wish replied, “under no legal obligation, we have to carry out checks on the 150 million products offered for sale on our platform because it’s a marketplace.” Wish.com argues that, as they are simply providing a place to sell products, it’s not their responsibility to check whether a product is fake or not. They take no legal obligation.
The majority of products that we consume in the US come from China. Most big companies produce their products in Chinese factories, bring those to the US, and sell them here.
In China, there are no rights for a foreign company for its Intellectual Property (IP). Therefore, even if an American company does all its R&D and spends millions of dollars to develop a product, the moment this company goes to China to manufacture the products, they lose all the product blueprints.
The Chinese companies that make the products for the American companies also create more products for themselves with different branding but at a lower quality to save costs. Then they go to Aliexpress, eBay, and Wish to sell the same products at lower prices. This way, the Chinese companies spend $0 on R&D but reap all the benefits by stealing IP from other foreign companies.
China runs on Nationalism. Moreover, the Chinese care more about money than honesty. In the name of Nationalism, stealing IP from other nations and companies is not only accepted but also encouraged. Therefore, when Chinese companies make fake products, the Chinese authorities do nothing to prevent it.
Cheap Off-brand products
Never buy anything from Wish that shows a brand logo. However, purchasing an off-brand product from Wish isn’t that problematic.
However, most products that sell on Wish are not only cheap, but their quality is also inferior.
Most of the product photos and descriptions on the Wish platform are misleading. Chinese manufacturers falsify photos to advertise their products. Moreover, most of the time, the item shown online has no resemblance with the actual product sold. Product misrepresentation is rampant on Wish.com.
Whatever the price of the product, it always has poor quality. These products will not last long compared to those you can buy in the US.
Be extra careful while purchasing clothes and electronics from the Wish App.
Chinese clothes sizes are different from American clothes sizes. Sometimes, the size also varies depending on the manufacturer. Therefore, if you order clothes, always try to order several sizes bigger products. Remember, most products come from China, and Wish doesn’t process returns. Therefore, if you end up with the wrong size clothes, it will be impossible for you to return the item to the seller.
Wish is full of counterfeit electronics. Everything is cheaply made or refurbished items. Never buy a memory card on Wish. The sellers manipulate the memory card software to make them appear as big storage. For example, they will manipulate the software of an 8GB SD card to make it appear 256GB. Initially, you will not be able to tell the difference, but when you try to copy a file bigger than 8GB, the SD card will throw an error message.
How does Wish.com get away with selling fake products?
The Wish platform is rife with counterfeit products. However, due to legal issues, Wish can get away with it.
As Wish is only a platform and they don’t sell those products, legally, they are not responsible for the fake products that are sold on the platform. However, the real reason is no government has ever bothered to investigate Wish (except for French).
Why Are Wish.com Products So Cheap?
Wish is primarily known for selling cheap and inexpensive products.
Wish.com products are so cheap because these products come directly from Chinese manufacturers, the China to US shipping cost is low, there’s no China export tax or US import tax for most products, and most items are on sale on Wish is Fake and have horrible quality.
Read more here: Actual Reasons Why Wish.com Products are So Cheap
