Why Purchasing From Reputable Vendors Can Still Result In Counterfeit Products On Amazon

What you also may not know, is just how easily they can end up in your home. Furthermore, the risks are more than just then getting ripped off. Unregulated, dirty conditions, harmful ingredients, traces of bacteria, horse urine, and poisons such as lead and mercury, have all been found in counterfeit products.

Just go to Alibaba and see how huge the counterfeit industry is. Everything from Vaseline to Chanel dupes along with popular medical grade skincare can be bought on Alibaba—and boy or boy, aren’t those counterfeits impressive? They’ve mastered texture and fragrance. Many times they’ll just eliminate the costly active ingredients that you think you’re paying for. They’ll replace healthy oils with some form of mineral oil that could cause all sorts of havoc to the skin.

If a product is a popular commodity, China is going to find a way to replicate it and sell it for profit, and many of the purchasers, who make a business online through FBA (Fulfilled by Amazon) may or may not even realize how harmful these products are.

I run a medical aesthetics practice in Michigan, and I’ve seen all sorts of skin conditions. One of the first things I ask a patient is “Where are you purchasing your skincare and supplements ?” I remember s lady told me she suddenly developed warts all over her face, and it took her over a year with a dermatologist to get back her healthy skin again. She had been buying skincare off Amazon. It was a nightmare.

Sometimes these dangers aren’t so obvious. Not only are you paying for products that simply don’t work the way they’re supposed to, but there could be a slow, undetectable effect on your body—increased inflammation, redness, acne, sluggishness. You would never think this is brought on because of the designer or medical grade skincare you just bought online or the supplements you’ve used for years that you recently discovered to be on Amazon from a reputable vendor.

Here’s the thing, the problem isn’t whether or not a vendor is reputable, the problem lies with how Fulfilled By Amazon works. When a vendor sends their products to an Amazon fulfillment center, Amazon puts their shipment in with the other vendors who are selling the same item in the same bin. Amazon cannot possibly give each vendor who’s selling L’Oreal shampoo their own bin. When an order is placed, through either a vendor selling authentic or counterfeit products, the product is fulfilled out of that mixed bin.

So that skin expert on Instagram who’s fulfilling through Amazon, whose reputation is intact and you completely trust? He or she may not realize it, but their legitimate product is mixed in with Hank’s, who’s running his FBA business online and getting all of his stock from Alibaba. So, every time you’re placing an order, you don’t know where that product was originally sourced from if it’s Fulfilled By Amazon.

When it comes to what you’re putting onto your skin, your largest organ, and what you’re putting into your body through supplements, the risk isn’t worth it.

This is not just Amazon either, but any third-party online vendor—Walmart online included.

I’m not going to go through all the risks of counterfeit cosmetics, that’s a whole deep-dive topic. My goal is to let you know how, regardless of who the vendor is, these counterfeits can end up in your home. So, if you must order through Amazon, make sure you scroll down to the bottom to see who is fulfilling that order. If it’s Fullfilled by Amazon, you’re taking a gamble. Only purchase from a vendor you trust who is also fulfilling the order themselves.

But who do you really trust?

Your best bet is to order products directly from a company website. It might take a little longer for delivery and you might pay a bit more for shipping, but you won’t be paying for counterfeit when sourced straight from the manufacturer.

In a world where people are making big money delivering products that can’t be traced back to the vendor, it’s not worth your time to become a counterfeit detection expert.

But it is worth your time to just avoid it altogether.

Written by Jennifer Puzsar