Thredup! To Canada? Duties, Taxes & Everything a Canadian Needs to Know.

I have thought long and hard about how I wanted to write this post. And while breaking down the positives and negatives seems logical, I feel like this leans very negative. So I will start by saying I really like Thredup and will order from them again. There are a lot of issues I have with the site. But please do not take that for this being a negative review. I will break this guide so to speak in to the following catagories; shopping the site, shipping options, customs, duty and taxes, and finally if I think the items received matched descriptions as well as condition.

SHOPPING THE SITE

So Thredup has A TON of selection. Which is great. But when I say a ton, I really mean it. You can be sucked in to the vortex of shopping their site for hours. For me this is great. But it can be overwhelming to many.

PROS:

1. As stated, very large selection
   
2. The ability to favourite or like the items you are interested in to be saved. This is super helpful when you are looking through pages and pages of items.
   
3. Ability to both save your favourite searches, as well as save your sizes to your profile. If you save your sizes to your profile, it will automatically show only the sizes that "fit you".
   
4. You can keep something in your shopping cart for up to 24 hours (12 hours until you make your first purchase, but after that, 24 hours!). Its a virtual hold of sorts that ensures no one buys it out from under you while deciding. 

CONS

1. The search options are very limited. You can search by blouse or button up tops within the blouses, but things that come up do not always make sense and things that should come up are often excluded. Multiple ballgown skirts, cocktail dresses and an amazing sequin pencil skirt I fell in love with (and bought) all come up listed as casual??? Aside from very illogical and often simply wrong labeling, its (at least for me) super frustrating that I cant search for long sleeves separately, or short sleeves.
   
2. No measurements given. No skirt has a waist size. It has a length (usually), though of the 2 dresses I purchased, one was 2 inches shorter than listed. 2 inches can make a BIG difference if you are like me and do not wear things that go above the knee. Also, of the 6 shirts I bought, 3 had incorrect sizing. Which only gives one measurement: the bust.
    
3. Very limited levels or options supplied for condition. They give new with tags (great! sign me up!!), This item is in excellent condition. You might mistake it for brand new! (also great. No false advertisement in that department yet), This item is gently used with minor signs of wear (minor{either fading, or piling}) and the last option is that the item is majorly discounted due to a stain, or piling, or wear, etc.
   
   The truth is my experience is that the few items I got that say gently worn with minor fading (only times I have ever bought the gently  used is minor fading. Wont buy piling, etc.) is that the fading was 100% not noticeable and could have easily been marked Excellent Condition.
   
4. The pricing is very often VERY OFF. Take this dress for example. Its not a Sachin + Babi, its a Sachin + Babi for Anthropologie and the retail on it was only $98. 

 

Now that being said, I actually really like Thredup. I say that with 100% sincerity. I have gotten some AMAZING deals. Take this Noir Sachin & Babi Hanabi skirt for example. The retail on it was $595. I managed to score this piece for just under $80. 

This $248 silk Trina Turk blouse I managed to grab for just $24.50! The Club Monaco skirt I paired it with was new with the $198 price tag still attached and I managed to grab it for $23.99. 

This Maeve Garden Glitz solid sequin skirt also had its $148 price tag still attached and was mine for the price of $21.99. 

And while used shoes creep me out (just a personal thing, no judgement on those who score amazing used shoe deals), if they are brand new and never worn you can sign me up ANY day. And these Loeffler Randall espadrilles for $33.15 were fantastic! Far better than the original $195 pricetag still attached to the sole of the shoe. 

But I guess if I were to discuss the best find, it would not be the most expensive piece I got for best price, but this. My winter jacket I wore literally all winter. And am still wearing today because apparently winter will never end here in Toronto this season. The retail on it is around the $400 price. Its DKNY and for only $34.99 it was my go to winter coat. Fully lined, in pristine condition, and while the picture is terrible, its a gorgeous green colour that gets me regularly stopped on the streets and asked about it. 

Now the question I desperately wanted to know before ordering the first time was the question we Canadians ALWAYS ask ourselves. "Will I get hit with duty and customs?" The answer is yes. And the answer is no. If your bill stays under the $35 mark before shipping you are 100% good to go and no duties. But if after converted to Canadian funds the total tops the $50 mark, assume yes. Not terrible though. I have an order that will be arriving today, that before shipping was $198 (don't worry, its more than 10 pieces with a retail price of over $2200) and the customs fees were $36.00. 

I have had parcels shipped both FEDEX and the standard USPS. The faster shipping is usually the cheaper option once you get more than 4 or 5 pieces, so always try to change the shipping to see if your total goes down. The duties owed have been the same with both methods and having gotten about 9 orders now, I can safely say the method makes no difference, though FEDEX is for sure the more reliable and faster option. So yes, you will get hit with duties most likely. But yes, its absolutely worth it still and I still highly recommend it. 

How To Successfully Shop Ali Express And Avoid Being Scammed

This is going to be another LOOOOONG post. So grab a drink! I will go over shipping, payments, sizing, and everything else here so that you can hopefully learn from my mistakes and have success from the start!

WHAT IS ALIEXPRESS??
I often here people ask questions such as "what is the sizing on AliExpress like?", "What is the quality of the merchandise like?" or "How safe is shopping on the site?". And lets just get this straight. There is no answer to any of those questions. Replace the word AliExpress with Ebay and you can understand those questions don't have singular answers. You can find a great Ebay seller that has fantastic merchandise at a great price just as easily as you can be scammed and end up with a piece of crap. Well, AliExpress is the essentially the Chinese version of Ebay. So all the rules of ebay apply. Each store is pretty much its own unique entity that is simply using the Aliexpress platform to host their business. And to the answer of sizing, lets be honest, brands are all different even if shopping in a department store. My two favourite brands for skirts and dresses are Tory Burch (I wear an 8) and Alice and Olivia (the largest size which is a 12 sometimes fits perfectly and sometimes is too snug) So sizing is a gamble anywhere.

OK, ON TO THE GOODS
Now that the nitty gritty of WHAT the site is has been established, what about the actual merchandise? Lets start with the basics. Now, as we have already established, AliExpress is the Chinese version of Ebay. And as such, its core consumers are mostly Chinese. Which means the majority of the clothing is going to be geared towards that consumer. I say majority because not all of it is. So myself, a size 8/10 can translate into and XL or even an XXL for some items. Now that is not to say that I have not purchased M or L items that has fit me perfectly. As to quality, for the purpose of this post I will stick to my clothing experiences.

I have never received any article of clothing that was spectacular in quality. That doesn't mean bad, but certainly not high end. A skirt I get a thousand compliments on each time I wear it came with one hanger loop properly sewn on the inside of the waist and one sewn on the OUTSIDE. Literally OUTSIDE the skirt!! A pair of nail clippers allowed me to remove it and its not noticeable, but still... I have gotten crooked sewing and sometimes slightly off proportions. In the last two years since I have found my groove on the site though, 99% of the time I have had no issue that is not easily corrected though.  It took a LOT of trial and error though before I started to get consistently acceptable items that I could actually make work.  So below I will go in to all the ways to make sure the items you get are what you expect and will fit you.

I would say there are 2 major rules to getting something that actually fits and is what you expected in terms of quality and sizing and length etc.

RULE ONE
FOLLOW THE SIZING GUIDELINES!!!!!!!! This one seems obvious but you would be surprised. Put your pride away and go with the sizing. You normally wear a size 4 and its telling you to buy an XL? Buy the XL. Seriously. Do not just buy a size because "it's your size". Now most of the time the sizing is in CM. Remember, everyone in the world outside the USA is on the metric system. So if you aren't familiar with CM and M, google is your friend. Google "40 inches in cm" or "100cm in inches" and google will happily spit out the translation. Once you find the size that fits you best, also check the next size up. If your perfect size says it should be a M but the large is only an inch or so bigger in each measurement, I go up a size. For the low cost I often find it better to purposely by a size too big now knowing I can have my tailor do easy adjustments if need be.

RULE TWO
READ the feedback. Seriously. Don't just see it says average 4 out of 5 stars and buy. There might not be a single review written. So what if it says 6353 purchased. What if everyone purchased at the same time and only 2 people have gotten the item so far? I insist on seeing at least 3 legit reviews and at least one actual picture of the merchandise. Odds are the pictures people post will look night and day different than the actual website pictures. That doesn't mean the item will be bad.

Take this cute swing dress for example. Comments say its shorter than expected, but otherwise they like it. It has GREAT reviews. It is not until you see the picture posted below that you realize just what it is you are getting. Its cut straight down. No swing to it. And you can see a big difference in what the material looks like in reality compared to what I would have otherwise expected.

I ordered this dress that had only one picture. It was this Eli Saab dress pictured. It had 40 or 50 reviews all positive.

It was the only picture in the listing when I ordered it. The listing has now been changed to have the real images of this dress. Mine was ordered more than a year ago.  I laughed out loud when I saw the picture and the price. I looked at the reviews just to see the suckers who thought they were getting this gorgeous Eli Saab gown for $50. But I actually really liked the pictures of the dress and since it looked NOTHING like the original I felt ok buying the knockoff. Had I not seen the pictures though I would have been livid since they are night and day different and all the written reviews of it were great. So once more, the pictures tell you far more than anything else. They have since replaced the above picture with the one below. Underneath it I will post a picture of me wearing it. AND YOU CAN CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE OR CHECK OUT THIS DRESS ON ALIEXPRESS. I purchased it in an XL and it fits great. I had to get about 3 inches cut off just to be able to wear it with 3 inch heels.

Here is a dress that got fairly good reviews. Average was about 3.5. The first two are the stock photos and the third is a picture from one of the actual reviews. When you read the reviews it turns out many people complain it is sheer and very different than the listing suggests.

So again, LOOK AT PHOTOS. If you love an item but there are no photos at all what do you do? It depends. I then weigh the price along with how much I want to try it. And if I still want to try the item, I first go to the store selling the item and organize the items based on the amount of purchases. I then look at the photo reviews of their most purchased items to get a sense of how accurate their photos are and how their quality seems to be.

CAN I PAY WITH PAYPAL?

Now again I will compare them to Ebay. Just as Ebay forces you to use PayPal, Aliexpress forces and insists you use something called AliPay. Now dont worry, you automatically create the account when you pay. And while I hear some say that its not secure and that your cc info can be stolen, your cc info can be stolen anywhere. And in 50 plus purchases I have never had an issue. That being said, I have had my PayPal account hacked once before, so as far as I am concerned, online shopping is a risk in itself.

WHAT IF MY ITEM DOESN'T COME/ISN'T WANT I THOUGHT/DOESN'T FIT?

I kind of want to simply say you are SOL. But that really isn't accurate. You can file a dispute. There are some cases where you will automatically win .First is if you get an illegal knockoff. You have to upload pictures but you will automatically win. That being said, the odds of the stores actually listing its a brand item are slim to none now a days so its a rare situation these days. Sellers have gotten smarter and dont list it as a Kate Spade bag anymore, they tend to now say "KS" or famous brand and therefor they aren't actually claiming its Kate Spade. So lets move on.

If your item doesn't arrive in its guaranteed time. Its usually 45 or 60 days and trust me, it sometimes DOES take that long. But if they cant prove tracking says delivered you win.

Most every other scenario, I have to say, good luck, You can try and you can fight, and sometimes they will side with you for a partial, ridiculously small refund but its unto something to count on. So again, I go back to my golden rule of BE CAREFUL and look at photo reviews and size charts.

But the MOST IMPORTANT MOST IMPORTANT MOST IMPORTANT MOST IMPORTANT MOST IMPORTANT MOST IMPORTANT MOST IMPORTANT MOST IMPORTANT MOST IMPORTANT MOST IMPORTANT (have I made myself clear here?) point I can make is do NOT cancel a dispute. I mean, by all means, if they refund you or your item arrives, cancel. But do NOT cancel until the item or money is in your greasy little hands. Once you cancel a claim, its over. NO going back. And sellers are infamous for promising to resend or refund if you cancel. Then you cancel, and they ignore you and do nothing. Once you cancel, its OVER. DO not let them promise anything after you cancel. They fix or refund, and THEN you cancel.

SUMMARY

I really hope this post hasn't scared you out of trying it out. Here are just a few more of the pieces I purchased that are still available and have pictures and links. Let me know what you have ordered if you have ordered anything and what your experiences are!!!

Remember the skirt I said I got that had a hanger loop sewn on the OUTSIDE of the skirt? This is it. Below is my wearing it. The quality isn't great. The seems don't line up pattern wise at all. But I get a ton of compliments when I wear it and it works for an easy shabbos skirt when needed. Its $17 and I ordered it in the XL and it fits me just fine. For the price I cant complain. YOU CAN FIND IT HERE. 

This dress.... it came with a tear down the seam. It was right down the seam, an easy repair. My tailor told me it would cost $15 to fix and when I filed a dispute and asked for $15 back to cover the fix along with a picture of the tear the seller actually agreed immediately. Surprised me. Its an XL and the skirt part fits wonderfully. The top part is a knitted ribbed sweater (all one piece) and its far tighter on me than I prefer or that I feel comfortable with but it does fit. I use a big belt over it but it is without a belt but with pockets. I feel like if you are a size 8 or 10 the XL would be perfect. For $26 the quality is better than expected AND YOU CAN FIND IT HERE!! Pictures below:

This is the dress I was most surprised by. It is without a doubt the best quality item I have ever found on aliexpress and I am still kind of amazed. It is super snug on me (I got the XL but I probably need an XXL which they dont have) but it does fit and I can and have worn it. The material is lovely, the embroidery gorgeous and the length is good for me. The neckline is perfect and I love it. Same seller as the dress above with the metallic floral skirt. It is $39.99 and I cant recommend it enough. YOU CAN FIND IT HERE.

This skirt has since been given to a friend. It was an XXL, probably could and should have gotten an XL but truthfully its not my style or colour to start with. I had an event to go through where it said to wear a rose and I decided this skirt fit the bill.  Quality wise its fine. Not impressive at all, nothing to write home about or get excited about but for $16 it was worth what I paid. And the seller has tons of other listings for different patterns and designs. THIS VERSION CAN BE FOUND HERE. 

Online Shopping - Expectations VS Reality

The other day I showed you all a great deal on a Kendra Scott Necklace that was on sale at Neiman Marcus. It arrived quickly, but I have to say how let down I was.

Now don't get me wrong. I love the necklace. And for $40 instead of $295 I really can't complain. But on sale or not on sale, I expect when I buy items brand new from a department store that they will come in a certain condition. This came without the Kendra Scott pouch and not even in a Kendra Scott box. Just in a generic Neiman Marcus box.

Would this bother all of you? I have shopped flash sites before and when shopping at Gilt or Zulily or Beyond The Rack or any of those sites, they come with the brand packaging. I keep most of my jewelry in the pouches, and even those I don't I always keep them for travelling or the like. Would you guys be upset about a necklace coming this way?

A Little Kendra Scott Anyone?

I interrupt this barrage of Cyber Monday and Good Friday deals to tell you about a deal going on RIGHT NOW! I have to say I completely cracked and purchased this, and my only regret is that I maybe got the wrong colour?

Let me introduce you to the Kendra Scott Maddox Necklace. I have to say, I really do need some statement necklaces, but I can never seem to part with the money required to pick up ones that I like. This one, retailing for $295 (USD) was something I looked at, said "nice, but not for $400" and moved on with my life. But when it showed up on the Neiman Marcus Last Call website for $50 yesterday I had to have it! Now its only $40! BAH! I did use the code NOVWLC10 to get an additional $10 off meaning you can now get this necklace for only $30!!! (I think you may need a $50 min to use the coupon, but with the holidays coming up, you can easily find something else to get! one for me, one for you!).

I am obsessing over the Harlow necklace below (either shade) but at $120 I just can't justify right now. That being said, if it goes down in price anymore I will likely cave! If you want the Maddox necklace you can pick it up HERE!!

My Name Is Shayna And I Think I Have A Problem!

So yes, I am obsessed with nail polish. And makeup. And clothes. And unfortunately shoes. And just like with nail polish and makeup, I tend to have expensive taste. I wish I didn't. And while I do love me some Zara and Topshop, neither have stores where I live. That makes it kind of hard. And while I do have a tendency to lean towards the luxury over mass market, I do love me a bargain. I am all about thrift shopping. If I buy most of my pieces for under $5 a piece I don't feel guilty when I do splurge on something big! (like this amazing Ella Moss Cooper jacket I obsessed over which you can see here but ultimately passed on. Could not justify $400 Cdn on it. I found it at the goodwill, Neiman Marcus tags still attached. Oh yeah, it was $2!!).

Anyways, I am always looking for a deal. I was on ebay looking for a specific pair of shoes (Rebecca Minkoff Reed heels in blue) and came across a store called apparelsave. I did some googling, and it seemed to not have the greatest reviews on websites. But when I looked at the actual FEEDBACK, I liked what I saw. 32 THOUSAND positive reviews in the last month alone. About 200 neutral and 300 negative. Now normally 300 negative would be an automatic no. But I read the reviews. And 95% of the bad reviews were people who were charged duty on their purchases. You buy things from the USA, you have to expect duty. Basically all the negative reviews told me that I should either not order multiple pairs in one order (large price means duty) and that they were a fairly honest company (would rather have lots of negatives than cheat on customs forms). So I decided to take a risk and make an order.

But, if you know me, you also know I am totally inpatient and totally unable to order one of anything. So I did two things. The first thing I did was order the Rebecca Minkoff Reed heels. They retail for $275 and cost me $33.99. Brand new in box. But how would they ship them? Would they list them on the customs form as being $33.99 or for being $275USD? Well, it turns out they were listed as $33.99! SCORE! Means if you order one at a time we dont have to pay duty here!

Yeah, I ended up getting them in red instead of blue. As much as I LOVE LOVE LOVE the blue ones (and I really do) I did just get the multi coloured lace up sandals from Zara a few months back and thought that since I had just gotten them, I would get these in red instead! I know as you can see they are totally different, but both are kind of statement-y time shoes and both are HIGH!

But, again, I can not order just one pair. So I also ordered the Via Spiga Ife pumps with white toe for $28.99 instead of the retail of $225. And a pair of Pour La Victoire Belz sandals that I had been dying to get from shopbop but didn't want to pay $275 ($370 Canadian). Oh yeah, I paid $37.99!!! I also got a pair of Nanette Lapore Sweet Revenge Pumps for $32.99 instead of $330. Coach Daylan purple suede sandals with gold trim? Not for $260 but for $29.99 they also went in my cart. And then I accidentally somehow ended up buying these Dolce Vita Burgundy sandals for $9.99 by mistake? Not at all a bad deal since they retail for $98 but they are 4.5 inch and 3.5-4 is my limit for comfort. But they are cute and I can see myself wearing them for short periods. So yes, if you were keeping track, that was 5 more pairs. But again, I wasn't sure how they would be listed on the customs form, and the retail was $1200. After shipping I paid $150 for those 5 pairs and had them shipped directly to my post office box in the USA. Ok, in case my mother or father happens to read this, THEIR post office box. But thats never stopped me before from using it.

Yeah, how did that happen? Does it help justify things that I had a $75USD paypal gift card that payed for more than half of this?

I didn't think so. But yeah. Now the store itself, would I recommend shopping here? YES! 1000X over yes! The shipping was fast. Shipped within a day, arrived ahead of schedule, both the pair coming to Canada and the ones shipped to the USA. Canadian shipping is $14.99 for the first pair and though it doesnt say so, each additional pair is either $8.99 or $6.99 or something like that. American shipping was $8.99 for the first pair and $3.99 for each additional pair. The store has TONS AND TONS AND TONS of shoes, and both used, new and flawed ones. I immediately limited my search to brand new in box options. And the pairs were all as described. Some were floor models and had a bit of scuffs or marks on the bottom. But all completely as described in each listing. And those that SHOULD come with dust bags did come with dust bags. Overall, I am over the moon and very happy. Here are the shoe pictures below of the other 5 pairs.

I LOVE the chain detail on these Pour Le Victoire ones and now REALLY want them in blue! So comfortable! Will possibly have to make another order.......

I swear, I have no idea how or why I ordered these! But they are super cute! Just not comfy!

These Coach ones are amazing. Kind of remind me of YSL Tributes. Not sure why since they are not at all similar. But they still do. And while these look more on the blue side, they are a royal purple. And not at all blue.

I am a pretty consistent size 8.5 US or 39 Euro but these 8.5 ones are a tad tight. I will have to try to stretch them out. If ordering Nanette Lapore shoes, I highly recommend half sizing up!

An amazing purpley-silvery-grey colour with white grains!

Now the biggest problem Where on earth to put them all!! So a trip to Ikea was in order.  A Billy Bookcase and 5 extra shelves solved that problem! And all of the shoes now fit! With a bit of room to spare!