Would your conscience be clear if you were this woman? Did she exploit the e-bay seller?

Question

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1038368/Here-comes-bargain-bride-In-2-50-bespoke-wedding-dress-bought-eBay.html

She won a handmade imitation designer wedding dress on e-bay for a last minute 2.50 bid.

The dressmaker based in China had to honour the bid and make the dress .

Fantastic bargain for her.

But if you read the comments below the story a lot of people think she was wrong not to pay the seller a bit more as someone in a sweatshop somewhere would have been forced to make that dress at a loss. Many people say she should have offered more money .

Did she exploit the seller?

What would you have done?

Answer 1

It's not exploitation because she did not demand it for that price. He should have set a reserve, the dress is obviously worth far more than that, but she did nothing wrong in bidding on it.

Answer 2

My conscious would be completely clear.  Only a complete idiot of a seller would not ensure that their costs are covered by either raising the starting bid or, placing a reserve on the same price.  Two very simple things to do to avoid this circumstance.

Answer 3

She did not exploit the seller. She placed a bid on eBay and won the auction. There is no evidence to suggest that the dress was made in a sweatshop, only people's vivid imagination and unwarranted stereotyping because the seller was in China.

Answer 4

I agree with a few of the comments made in that the guy who honoured the bid and made the dress for a pittance should get some publicity. The £2.50 wouldn't have covered the cost of the diamante stones on the bodice, never mind anything else!  And if she DOES sell it back on eBay, what about sending the Chinese guy a few quid as a "thank you" for making her day.

Answer 5

If thats what the person put the dress on ebay for then thats fine. The seller has the option of making the lowest bid as high or low as she wants. She also had the choice of making it so that the highest bidder had to be at a certain price point before the dress could be sold, so its not the buyers fault, and the buyer got extremely lucky! Good for her!!

Answer 6

Now I've immediately seen the con here and I don't work for Trading Standards.

The seller has actually exploited her; massive publicity for his product and a top sellers rating.

How many hits is he going to get in the six to 8 weeks before he has to deliver a dress?

They are hand made imitation, do really think they will be the same quality as the lead product?

Simplest easiest con in the book make the buyer think they are ripping you off. How many brides looking for a cheap wedding are going to fall for this.

Answer 7

I couldnt have let someone make that for such a small price, but then they should have put a reserve price so they must have been willing to make it for nothing. Scandal.

Answer 8

I dont think she exploited the seller.  Everyone on Ebay is away of the rules when you put items on for sale and when you bid on items to purchase, therefore the seller would have been aware of the consequences of not putting a reserve price on his item - and although he didnt put a reserve price he could have set the start price for higher than what he did, meaning that for e.g. he could of put that start price at £100 no reserve meaning a guarenteed £100 for him, but he didnt.  As judge Judy would say you dont get paid for stupidity. Sorry... you just dont.

Answer 9

Well, to me, that's what E-bay is.  It's an auction, and items may sell for more or less than what some people consider the "fair" price.    Should all the sellers of belly button lint and old shoes refund the buyer's money?

Then too, the dress may be one that has been sitting around, and they have been unable to sell it.  So $2.50 may be better than nothing.

I don't know what the dressmaker is charging for shipping the wedding dress.  They may not be as badly off as you think.  They get a certain amount of publicity out of it..

Answer 10

The seller decided to sell on ebay, and they didn't get as much as they expected.  The girl got a good deal on a beautiful dress.

In all fairness though, that $2.50 is probably more than the chinese guy makes in a week anyhow if he's sellin local.

Answer 11

The inhabitants of the Daily Mail comments board can be a bunch of nasty, mean-spirited, sniping individuals at the best of times.

One or two of the comments under that story are frankly abhorrent - pure, unadulterated bile - and would result in a punch in the face if said in real life. No doubt the people making these comments consider themselves to be fine, upstanding members of society.

We aren't in a position to know the conditions under which the dress was made, or the financial position of the dressmaker or proprietor, so all the talk of "sweatshops" and exploitation is idle speculation at best.

The seller clearly made a mistake with his pricing and could very, very easily have said "no" but instead he chose to honour it. No doubt he can afford to take the loss. And the young bride had no way of knowing, before receiving the dress, that the seller was genuine, so sending this guy more money (such as £100 as one person suggested!) before actually taking receipt of the goods would have been foolish in the extreme.

Answer 12

She won it fair and square. Good on her.

I wont tell you what i have paid for goods from China off eBay, but suffice to say they were bargains and tbh Chinese sellers are more reliable and honest than many sellers from the UK

If she had sent more money, where do they think the money would have gone? To the seamstrees? I think not.

Answer 13

No she didn't exploit the seller.

You have options when selling on E Bay to set minimum bids or Buy It Now so that was his problem.

Good on the seller for going through with it, the dress looks beautiful.

Answer 14

Who said anything about sweatshops? That man is one of MANY dressmakes from Asia who make and sell their wares on Ebay......there are loads of them and they make a good profit usually...he started the price too low.