25-50% mark is only like 10-20 dollars a piece on most dhgate stuff and probably not worth it for resellers to keep a piece in stock and then take it to the post office plus deal with messages from customers. When I think about how much it would take for me to do that I would probably want to be making at least $50 an order profit. Then if you are actually being legit well taxes will eat up like half so I don't fault anyone for slapping a 1 in front of the dhgate price.
I could see resellers sticking around for a while as lots of instagram users don't seem super net savvy, though I have noticed more of the "top-tier" headshops talking down DHGate in attempts at humor so they are sort of spreading awareness. If not for that it is pretty easy for resellers to police their posts and block people who try to blow up their spot.
I dunno..... I think the markups we usually see on Chinese stuff is usually much higher than 100-200%. Sure Walmart, Target, Home Depot, etc, etc. all buy in large bulk orders and often play games to put Chinese vendors in a tight spot - but you know they're not designing, shipping overseas, shipping all over US, and putting anything on the shelf for $0.01 less than they think they can get for it. But, we don't see how that $4 bottle brush we pick up for cleaning glass only cost them $0.15 from China. With the glass we do see the starting price and some feel cheated. That's just business. Claiming something is different from what it is is of course wrong. But, from what I've seen the resellers usually don't even get into whether it came from China, US or mars.
If I were reselling retail I'd be charging as much as people are willing to pay. When sales slow down, have a special sale on whatever items just like every other successful retailer.
I've often wondered how worthwhile it would be to become the middle man for US headshops. Buy your pieces in bulk from China, rebox, and send to headshops for 50 - 75% markup. They'd still double the price and get what they needed. Would guess you could work out some good deals if going with just a few choice Chinese vendors and do OK without having to resell every piece individually.
Sorry.... but people that gripe about taxes and don't seem too certain on what they're talking about kind of get my goat. Taxes wouldn't eat up half. It would depend on how much you're making, and would be based on your profit (after cost, shipping in & out, internet expenses, etc) and no where near 50%. I guess it could if you don't know what you're doing. But, if you're paying someone like me to do your taxes you'd probably be damned close to a loss if not "losing" money and taking those amounts off your other taxable income.
