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Never underestimate Americans’ love of bargains.
You may have seen the Super Bowl commercial from Temu, the latest Chinese shopping app to grab attention in the US. Temu sells a grab bag of inexpensive products that are sometimes practical and sometimes whimsical.
I’ve seen Temu’s online ads selling products like cycling shorts with plush padding, a mustachioed troll with a coffee bag head, and oddities like this creepy garden gnome for $10.79.
If you haven’t already, it’s time for you to meet Temu and Shein, another popular shopping app from China that, like clothing retailer H&M, is on steroids.
Temu could be a flash in the pan. But Es and Shein are among the retail innovations that allow you to buy directly from Chinese factories in transactions brokered by Chinese tech companies. This is new territory. These Chinese apps are transforming your shopping, whether you use them or not.
Temu is owned by PDD Holdings, formerly Pinduoduo, an online shopping company in China that started out as something like Groupon plus eBay. PDD Holdings has a market value of $120 billion – more than the combined value of Ford and General Motors.
Pinduoduo had mainly operated in his home country. Then in September, the company launched Temu as its first global e-commerce site. Since then, Temu has at times been the most downloaded shopping app in the United States, according to research firm Sensor Tower.
Like Wish, the Chinese shopping site that was very popular a few years ago, Temu offers products sold from factories or warehouses in China. You can imagine Temu and Shein copying Amazon’s blueprint, but faster, cheaper, and with whims. (The apps are pronounced Tee-MOO and SHE-in, by the way.)
“Temu and Shein are disrupting the boring US e-commerce market more than anyone else,” said Juozas Kaziukenas, founder of e-commerce research firm Marketplace Pulse. “Check out the rest of the top 100 apps – they’ve been around for 10+ years and how fun were they?”
As with Wish, some people who have bought stuff from Temu have complained that the products they bought were poorly made or delivered late.
News organizations and environmental groups have reported abusive conditions in factories that make products for Shein and other retailers in the past. Some Shein buyers have also said the company addicts people to unsustainable clothing.
What is special about Temu?
Temu and Shein are the newest and loudest Chinese shopping company to enter your life.
Unlike most Chinese e-commerce or app companies — and that includes PDD and TikTok owner ByteDance — Temu and Shein are primarily interested in people outside of China. The whole point of these apps is that Chinese manufacturers and retailers are selling them to the rest of the world. Other Chinese shopping firms, including e-commerce titan Alibaba, haven’t been as successful outside of their home country.
Many products on the Walmart or Best Buy shelves are made in China by American or Chinese manufacturers like Hisense. A large portion of merchants selling products on Amazon in the United States are based in China. But never before have so many Americans bought products from Chinese manufacturers and through Chinese apps.
The next phase of globalized shopping
This is the end of the first era of global retail and the potential beginning of a new unknown in your consumer life.
For decades companies like Black & Decker, Old Navy and Nike manufactured their products in countries like China or Vietnam. These factories also likely made power tools, sweatshirts, and shoes for many other brands.
But now a factory in China can sell what it makes directly to buyers like you. It works partly because we’ve gotten used to buying stuff on Amazon or Instagram without caring which company made the product.
If factories and suppliers in China shut out stores and brands and sell products to us, it could mean Amazon, Walmart, Old Navy, and Black & Decker all lose importance.
Temu takes this no-name trend to the extreme. TikTok wants you to buy products directly from videos in the app too. And Shein won over many young shoppers with clever social media marketing and trendy clothes. Shein’s temporary physical stores have drawn big lines in San Antonio and sparked fistfights in São Paulo.
This next phase of globalized shopping can be both glorious and risky for you.
Much like when China became a manufacturing hub, when apps sell you items straight from Chinese factories, you can buy products you might not otherwise be able to afford.
The downside is that if brands or retailers aren’t having their reputations at stake, there may be less quality control. It will be even more difficult for you to separate the shopping waste from the treasure.
Perhaps. We fall in love with shopping novelties all the time.
Temu’s commercial and ubiquitous online ads for the Super Bowl are a business strategy to get your attention, and Temu offers free merchandise to people who refer their friends to the app. These tactics can mean that an app’s popularity is a mirage. Wish also bought tons of ads on Facebook, but when it scaled back, people lost interest.
What should Americans think of another popular app made in China?
American politicians are concerned that TikTok could be a channel for the Chinese government to soak up information about Americans or spread propaganda. The focus on TikTok overshadows all other Chinese digital influences in your life.
Lenovo computers from China are top sellers in the United States, and smartphones from Chinese brands Xiaomi and Oppo are popular in many countries outside America. Chinese tech giant Tencent is behind video games like League of Legends. Shein is a phenomenon in Brazil, Mexico, parts of Europe and the United States. Temu is hot.
I’m not saying you should worry about all the technology from China. But the attention on TikTok has largely left out the big question of what we plan to do with the tech from China that’s in your homes and pockets right now — and what might come next.
Shein and Temu won’t be the last of the purchasing techs to link you directly to Chinese factories. Electric vehicle technology or cars made in China are coming to America.
We haven’t really had an honest discussion about where to draw the line between protecting American security and protecting against useful inventions that didn’t come from this country.
This is one more moment to warn you that any product you see online could be junk or a scam.
Or the glass half-full version: every product you see online could be an opportunity to find a great deal on something you love. The Internet! It contains a variety.
My colleague Heather Kelly put together a guide to avoid falling for products that aren’t what they say they are, whether you’re buying from Temu, Amazon, Walmart, Google, or Instagram. One of their strategies is to scan online customer reviews like a skeptical pro.
Watch out for the scathing reviews, which may be more informative than the glowing ones. And look at the date of the oldest review to see if the product you’re eyeing has been getting a lot of reviews unusually fast. That could be a red flag.
Now tell me about YOUR smartest shopping tactics by email or this form. We might feature your advice in a future issue of The Tech Friend.