Taobao Shopping Tips

Ever encounter buying from taobao and ended up paying very expensive EMS freight costs in the end for your single purchase? Look here for tips and tricks to buy from taobao that helps you to mend the hole in your pocket!

Tip 1
Always try to buy more than 1 item as you are paying a fixed cost for the 1st 500g. E.g 7 person in a spree, you are already paying RMB190/7 = RMB27.14 = S$6.24
If you buy 1 item at 200g, your share for remaining weight charges est to be S$4.00. Your total payable is S$10.24
If you buy 5 items maybe 1kg in total and your share for the remaining weight est S$20.00. Your total payable is S$26.24

You see the calculation? The more you buy, the cheaper it is...

Tip 2
Buy items that are not too heavy to ship unless you are willing to bear the freight charges.. You can be buying a canvas material bag that weighs approx 300g and a rubber material bag that weighs you approx 800g - 1kg.

Take into consideration of your items weight and work out roughly how much your items will cost you.

Tip 3
More spree-ers means lower cost for the share of your items. Make sure your spree organizer shows you how many spree-ers there are, do not be tricked by those who do not reveal the contacts of the fellow spree-ers. Some organizers put up fake contacts and orders to attract more participants, however when they bought the items, they claim to spree-ers that they only have 3 person's order out of 5.. Then you are at the risk of being tricked to pay higher freight costs as each of you guys will be bearing a higher portion of the 1st 500g charges.

Participate with popular spree organizers who are transparent with the no. of spree-ers they have.

Tip 4
Note that by EMS, ignoring the 1st 500g charges, subsequent 500g charges is only at RMB45 approx S$10.35 and 1kg would cost only $20.70
Some organizers claim that they charge at a fixed rate of $24/kg.

Don't participate in sprees who charge more than this amount if they charge base on a fixed rate.

With these 4 handy tips in hand, I hope spree-ers have a happier time spreeing from taobao.