Some products look like a steal on 1688: shockingly cheap, good-looking, glossy photos. But once you add up the real cost and risk, they quietly eat your margin or bury your capital. Here are five groups that new sellers import and then lose money on, with the signs to spot each and how to avoid them if you still want in.
1. Fragile goods
Glassware, ceramics, thin decor, screens, electronics with sensitive parts. They are cheap on 1688, but the trip to Vietnam runs 20 to 40 days through several handling points, and the real breakage rate can hit 5 to 15 percent depending on packing.
The damage is double: you lose the broken units, then you lose again when customers receive a broken item, return it, and leave a bad review. A 10 percent breakage rate is enough to turn a thin-margin product into a loss.
If you still go for it: ask the supplier for multi-layer shock packing and add that cost to your landed cost, order a small batch first to measure the real breakage rate, and favor routes with fewer transfers.
2. Bulky, lightweight goods
Freight to Vietnam is usually charged by weight or by volume, whichever is larger. Items that are big but light (flat-pack furniture, large plastic goods, pillows, foam boxes) get charged by volume, so freight eats hard into landed cost.
A product at 30 yuan on 1688 sounds cheap, but if it takes up a lot of volume, the freight can equal or exceed the product price. At that point real landed cost is two or three times the number you first saw, and the margin is gone.
The sign: a large product at a low price, or a high size-to-value ratio. How to avoid: ask for the carton dimensions and weight before ordering, then compute the volumetric freight yourself to find the real landed cost.
3. Brand-infringing goods
Items printed with real logos of major brands, copies of registered designs, licensed cartoon characters. 1688 is full of them, but this is the highest-risk group on both the legal and the platform-policy side.
The cost is not just lost stock. The platform can pull the listing, fine the shop, or even ban the storefront for IP infringement. The goods can be held at customs. Months of work building a shop can sink because of one batch that looked like a winner.
How to avoid: stay away from anything carrying a major brand logo or a licensed character. If you want to sell in the same segment, pick unbranded goods and build your own brand instead. It is safer and far more durable.
4. Short-season goods
Occasion decor (Halloween, Christmas, Valentine's), products riding one specific trend, merchandise tied to a film in theaters. Demand is very high for a few weeks, then close to zero.
The risk is timing. Stock takes 20 to 40 days to arrive. If you order when the trend is already hot, it lands after the season has passed, and you are holding a warehouse nobody will buy at full price. Most season-goods losses come from arriving late, not from picking the wrong product.
If you still go for it: order early, ahead of the season, in a measured quantity, count backward from the sell-by date minus shipping time, and accept that you may have to clear leftover stock at the end.
5. Goods that need certification or declaration
Cosmetics, supplements, children's toys, electrical devices that touch the user. Many of these need product declaration, quality certification, or compliant secondary labeling before they can be sold legally.
New sellers skip this because the goods still sell at first. By the time an inspection or a customer complaint hits, the cost of dealing with it dwarfs the profit already made. This group loses money in a "small gain now, big loss later" pattern.
How to avoid: if you do not know the rules yet, do not rush into this group. When you do commit, learn the declaration and labeling requirements first and treat them as a mandatory part of landed cost.
What all five share
All five share one trait: the 1688 price does not reflect the true cost and risk. Fragile goods hide the cost in the damage rate. Bulky goods hide it in freight. Infringing and regulated goods hide it in legal risk. Season goods hide it in time.
A simple rule to avoid them: before you fall for a low price, ask "where is the real cost and risk of this item that the price has not shown yet." Answer that, and you sidestep most of the batches that turn into losses.
Bottom line
Avoiding the wrong pick matters more than nailing the right one, because one heavy loss can wipe out the profit from several good batches. These five groups are not absolute bans, but you need a full count of hidden cost before you commit capital.
This is why Ordinex Scout puts real landed cost and margin up front while you filter, so a cheap 1688 price does not pull you into a losing decision. Take a look at ordinex.cc.