I recently started shopping at AliExpress. It’s a retail arm of the wholesale Alibaba website. They both let you shop directly from the manufacturers in Asia (primarily China), the difference is in the minimum quantities. The main draw, obviously, is low prices. Plus, at AliExpress most items are offered with free shipping.

The upside.

• Really really low prices
• Huge selection
• Shipping to over 200 countries
• Buyer protection guarantee

The downside.

• Long delivery times
• All shipments require signature, can be annoying if you shop a lot
• Sub-par item quality, descriptions are often misleading
• Time suck – much like with Amazon, large product selection is great, but it takes a lot of time to find what to Finally Buy! I suppose it’s still less time than going out to the mall to shop, but to me the mental strain is just huge.

I have so far received 4 items from four different sellers. I threw away 2 of these as they were unusable: one was advertised as leather but turned out to be polyurethane, the other was just ugly and smelled like burnt rubber tires. Of the remaining two items, one is “sort of OK” and one is great (love my tiny neodymium magnets). So the ratio so far is 50/50, or 25/75 if you’re really picky. Their buyer protection guarantee sounds good, but I haven’t taken advantage of it since the two items I discarded cost about $10 together. It wouldn’t be worth the time to fill out the complaint form, take pictures etc. Since I can’t whole-heartedly recommend the website, I’m not linking to it. Clean conscience and all. Here’s an example of an item that didn’t live up to my expectations. These sell at a local store for around $8-10. They are exactly as pictured: nice and plump, with no mold lines, and without any funky smell. This is also the photo that was used on the listing I fell for.

This is what I actually received from one AliExpress seller for about $2 including shipping – thin, badly made from a knocked off mold. In addition, visualize the most foul rubber smell that stays on your hands for the entire day, you can’t rinse it off. And, I got 2 white, 2 black, and 2 red ones although the listing pictured white, brown and green, which is what I wanted for my office.

How dare I expect more for two dollars? Well, the logic was that the “$8 one was made in China anyway. This is probably the same.” It wasn’t.

Business idea!

Click the images below to enlarge I came across a retail site with the office located in Canada. They sell these symbolic bracelet sets. Guess where I saw these first! Yep, at AliExpress. That’s a great markup. But I’m not tempted to open up a store of my own, that’s why I so willingly share with you my source I’ve been down that road before, 12 years ago. It was waaaay harder to find low cost items, but on the other hand it was easier to sell. Sometimes I can’t believe the stuff we were able to “move”. There wasn’t such a glut of items out there, not as much selection, not as much fatigue, and buyers weren’t as savvy.

Anyway, that’s the story. Caveat emptor.

The post Ali Express: Buyer Beware appeared first on Phantasmix.com.

The foot pad on my Macbook Pro Retina fell off the other day. The Apple Store didn’t have a replacement part but an eBay seller in Shenzhen, China did. For $3 with free shipping. The cheapest international shipping option with Canada Post is $5.35 for up to 100g (without tracking). How can a store in China sell me anything for $3, including shipping?

https://www.cameronhuff.com/blog/free-shipping-from-china/index.html

The post Free Shipping from Shenzhen to Toronto: How? appeared first on Phantasmix.com.

If you are into yoga, or would like to try it out, get a Passport to Prana. They issue them for 12 US, 7 Canadian, and 1 Australian cities. It’s only $30 (per city) and gives you access to a ton of yoga studios.

“The Passport to Prana entitles you to one class at each of the participating yoga studios for 1 year from the date of activation of your card. ”

The Toronto card covers the entire GTA, with over 100 participating studios!

Link: Passport to Prana (non-affiliate)

The post Yoga Pass appeared first on Phantasmix.com.

At first I thought it was pretty funny (ha ha, who are the dummies buying this – I’m all for expensive tea, but when it’s good), but then realized – this is 3 times cheaper than buying a cup of tea at the Starbucks :-/

Starbucks: [[SBUX]]

The post Teaconomics appeared first on Phantasmix.com.

By Sandra Aamodt and Sam Wang

DECLINING house prices, rising job layoffs, skyrocketing oil costs and a major credit crunch have brought consumer confidence to its lowest point in five years. With a relatively long recession looking increasingly likely, many American families may be planning to tighten their belts.

Interestingly, restraining our consumer spending, in the short term, may cause us to actually loosen the belts around our waists. What’s the connection? The brain has a limited capacity for self-regulation, so exerting willpower in one area often leads to backsliding in others. The good news, however, is that practice increases willpower capacity, so that in the long run, buying less now may improve our ability to achieve future goals — like losing those 10 pounds we gained when we weren’t out shopping.

The brain’s store of willpower is depleted when people control their thoughts, feelings or impulses, or when they modify their behavior in pursuit of goals. Psychologist Roy Baumeister and others have found that people who successfully accomplish one task requiring self-control are less persistent on a second, seemingly unrelated task.

In one pioneering study, some people were asked to eat radishes while others received freshly baked chocolate chip cookies before trying to solve an impossible puzzle. The radish-eaters abandoned the puzzle in eight minutes on average, working less than half as long as people who got cookies or those who were excused from eating radishes. Similarly, people who were asked to circle every “e” on a page of text then showed less persistence in watching a video of an unchanging table and wall.

Other activities that deplete willpower include resisting food or drink, suppressing emotional responses, restraining aggressive or sexual impulses, taking exams and trying to impress someone. Task persistence is also reduced when people are stressed or tired from exertion or lack of sleep.

What limits willpower? Some have suggested that it is blood sugar, which brain cells use as their main energy source and cannot do without for even a few minutes. Most cognitive functions are unaffected by minor blood sugar fluctuations over the course of a day, but planning and self-control are sensitive to such small changes. Exerting self-control lowers blood sugar, which reduces the capacity for further self-control. People who drink a glass of lemonade between completing one task requiring self-control and beginning a second one perform equally well on both tasks, while people who drink sugarless diet lemonade make more errors on the second task than on the first. Foods that persistently elevate blood sugar, like those containing protein or complex carbohydrates, might enhance willpower for longer periods.

In the short term, you should spend your limited willpower budget wisely. For example, if you do not want to drink too much at a party, then on the way to the festivities, you should not deplete your willpower by window shopping for items you cannot afford. Taking an alternative route to avoid passing the store would be a better strategy.

On the other hand, if you need to study for a big exam, it might be smart to let the housecleaning slide to conserve your willpower for the more important job. Similarly, it can be counterproductive to work toward multiple goals at the same time if your willpower cannot cover all the efforts that are required. Concentrating your effort on one or at most a few goals at a time increases the odds of success.

Focusing on success is important because willpower can grow in the long term. Like a muscle, willpower seems to become stronger with use. The idea of exercising willpower is seen in military boot camp, where recruits are trained to overcome one challenge after another.

In psychological studies, even something as simple as using your non-dominant hand to brush your teeth for two weeks can increase willpower capacity. People who stick to an exercise program for two months report reducing their impulsive spending, junk food intake, alcohol use and smoking. They also study more, watch less television and do more housework. Other forms of willpower training, like money-management classes, work as well.

No one knows why willpower can grow with practice but it must reflect some biological change in the brain. Perhaps neurons in the frontal cortex, which is responsible for planning behavior, or in the anterior cingulate cortex, which is associated with cognitive control, use blood sugar more efficiently after repeated challenges. Or maybe one of the chemical messengers that neurons use to communicate with one another is produced in larger quantities after it has been used up repeatedly, thereby improving the brain’s willpower capacity.

Whatever the explanation, consistently doing any activity that requires self-control seems to increase willpower — and the ability to resist impulses and delay gratification is highly associated with success in life.

The post Tighten Your Belt, Strengthen Your Mind (Building Discipline) appeared first on Phantasmix.com.

New York Times

The post $$WMT, H&M Merchandise Thrown Away Wasteful! appeared first on Phantasmix.com.

Sobeys is the most expensive grocery store in the entire Toronto. We shop for the bulk of our food at the Whole Foods store and the local market, but Sobeys is the closest, so sometimes we go there for convenience. Even the Whole Foods, known for its ‘not very low prices’ beat Sobeys, by a wide margin, on organic and regular products.

Sobeys prices are outrageous as it is, and 2 out of 3 times we go there, we end up getting stiffed! They overcharge on their already ridiculous sticker prices by 20 to 50 cents. So I buy 4 items, and 2 of them scan wrong, and I end up “gifting” $0.50-$1 Sobeys? Not so fast.

I’m very tired of having to dispute the prices, then wait for the cashier take the time to slowly check if I’m lying. Then, she looks down on me like I’m such a loser for not overpaying. I especially “enjoy” this attitude from a bright-pink-haired girl with about 8 piercings in her face. She probably thinks “Even I can afford to overpay to this wonderful corporation”.

I understand that they assume I want the item for free, but I always insist that I just want to pay the correct price. (In Ontario there’s a law that says if an item’s scanned price is higher than the posted shelf price, you get the item for free, up to $10.)

It’s not that I can’t afford an extra 20 to 50 cents (let me remind you – on the already highly inflated prices). It’s a matter of the principle.

Since it’s happened about 50 times since spring – no exaggeration! – I’m confident it’s their corporate policy. I have noticed that Canadians are generally very shy, and even if they do dispute something at the cash, they blush and apologize to everyone in the line. It must not happen very often and worth an occasional free item. Just think how much more they pull in by scalping off a few cents here and there.

I just feel mad, not embarrassed, when this happens.

Also, briefly, they’re definitely not “fresh obsessed” (I know it’s the Dominion’s slogan, just saying that Sobeys is not like that – at all). Stuff is allowed to go bad right on the shelves.

I avoid going to the Sobeys stores unless I absolutely have to. Oh, and Sobeys – you suck.

The post Rant on Sobeys appeared first on Phantasmix.com.

• Last year I dyed my hair at home, and had to pay the hair dresser to have the color fixed. Color corrections cost more than a simple dye job. Have I learned the lesson? You bet.
• We bought a fairly expensive item ($1,300) last year from a small store. The owner gave us a discount, but his return policy is “no returns”. The item turned out to be not what we wanted and we ended up having to re-sell it on Ebay, taking a monetary hit, of course. In the end we lost more than we saved, not to mention all the time and worry of selling on Ebay.

The post The Greedy Pay Twice appeared first on Phantasmix.com.

This post was prompted by a late run to the grocery store.

P.S. How about that snow! Lovin’ it.

The post Healthy Snack Tip appeared first on Phantasmix.com.

In March (first contract month) they added on $17.10 activation fee, so our total bill came to $44.56, about $5 less than before. It was supposed to have been around $30-35. This was most likely a computer error – they assumed since we signed a new contract, we must be a new customer (not so!), so they or it charged us an activation fee.

Of course I called them the minute I noticed it on the credit card statement, and they graciously removed the charge, but I spent yet another 15 minutes straightening this out. Really hoping next month it’ll go as planned.

The post Sympatico Overcharged appeared first on Phantasmix.com.