[quote=briansd1]My Chinese-American friends tell me that when going back to China, cheap American gifts won’t do anymore.
They have to buy expensive Japanese gifts such as Sisheido cosmetics or French perfume.
What gifts to bring to a nation that makes everything?
When Chinese Americans visit family and friends in their homeland, gifts from the U.S. are a must. But TVs and fashionable clothes aren’t rare anymore, and anything ‘Made in China’ won’t do.
Well, folks really don’t want american goods…What they really want is goods that cost a fortune overseas but are cheap(er) here in the U.S.
Because we are Consumerica, high end goods still cost considerably less than overseas, I guess because a lot of the companies end up “dumping” products in the U.S. for a lot les than elsewhere, including electronics…
So it’s not uncommon for folks that come from asia to go on a shopping spree here and take stuff back….I had a friend from TW who wanted me to buy a designer bags from here and bring it back because it the price difference is about 35%… I have another friend who purchases about 3 E90 M3’s spread out over a year and half, drives them for a few months and puts about 2000 miles on them, and ships them back to Taiwan to resell..even after freight, customs, etc, he still comes out ahead. about $10k per car. :(partly because he has a connection in a shipping company….As you can imagine, freight going outbound from U.S. to overseas is much cheaper than reverse, because the cargo vessels are a lot emptier going from U.S. to asia than the other way around…So he gets pretty good rates…That in itself should be pretty telling about the state of our trade….Usually the cars go back along with containers containing recyclable trash…)
There’s really no point giving “gifts” anymore, even if there ornamental/etc…Most of the crap is made in china anyway. All those touristy souveniors are most likely made in PRC…even the post cards.
