Yikes! Ever scrolled through Facebook and been tempted to buy trending clothing at too-good-to-be-true prices? You may want to think twice after seeing what the actual dresses, tops and more look like.
Dozens of women who shopped at websites like RoseGal, DressLily, NastyDress, TrendsGal, Zaful, Fashion Mia and more are creating Facebook pages complete with photographic evidence of their bad experiences.
Members of groups like “Knock Off Nightmares” claim that the companies are scamming customers with false advertising and even infringing on design copyrights of other brands.
Though, they’re not doing the latter very well. Photos of the items on the site vary drastically from what arrived in the mail. Members of “Knock Off Nightmares” received clothing that looked somewhat close to what they ordered (if you squint), but is a far cry from what they thought they’d paid for.
One side-by-side image of a taupe sheath dress proves the point. A caption over the received frock reads, “Some kind of plastic, definitely not cotton!”
Jasmine Griffeth, 31, an online content and marketing consultant in Calgary bought a DressLily coat in fall 2015 after seeing a Facebook ad. “Six weeks later, she received a thin, cheap garment in a lighter color that was ‘way smaller,'” Buzzfeed News reports. After months of talks with the company’s hard-to-reach costumer service specialists in China and separate discussions with PayPal, she was able to get her money back.
The sites have been reported on online forums Trustpilot, SiteJabber and even the Better Business Bureau. According to Buzzfeed, at least eight of these companies are connected to one Chinese e-commerce conglomerate that made more than $200 million in sales in 2014.
Would you shop at one of these sites?
