I saw a program several days ago, I think it might have been Dateline, and they showed FBI agents doing sting operations around the country in which they were busting folks that were selling counterfeit products, such as medicine and tooth paste.
I buy tooth paste and eye drops and floss … at one of the .99-cent stores around here and I’m now wondering if the stuff is safe. I’d like to know what you Dopers think about buying stuff from such stores? (I ain’t gifted with the most brain cells in the world, and while I’m dirt poor, I really don’t want to kill any off if I can help it and/or get cancer.)
There have been a number of discussions here on this topic. I’m not good at digging them up and listing links; maybe someone with better Dope-fu will do so.
I won’t buy any food or personal-care products at these mass salvage stores for precisely those reasons. For every case of toothpaste there because it’s got outdated markings or obsolete promotional information, evidence is that others come through shadowy conduits. We know that megabuttloads of counterfeit goods are shipped here every day, because some percentage of them are found and destroyed every day. So where are the rest going? Not likely into legitimate distribution channels. Much more likely into small-jobber chains where saving five bucks on a case means more than its provenance… or into salvage/deep discount chain stores that have to keep their shelves full of dollar items and still make a profit.
What, precisely, do you think the point of counterfeiting is? You think there are really stupid and nefarious types out there “counterfeiting” low-end, no-name stuff? (Packaging and selling such substandard junk is not “counterfeiting.”)
In this case, counterfeiting is passing off those low-end, ambiguous-source, possibly hazardous products as trustworthy name brands, and I assure you there are counterfeit Hershey bars, Starkist tuna, Kraft Mac N Cheese and other old familiars within ten miles of you. The stuff floods in and it’s tacitly understood it can be stopped no more easily than drugs - i.e., for show purposes only.
They’re all over Texas. ETA: Pretty much any cheapie type item you can imagine. But some good stuff as well, like a stylus for your phone, gift bags, name brand close-out items (shampoo, decorative stuff). And some older bestsellers.
As for the OP? As long as the particulars on the package are written in a language I can read, they’re unopened, they don’t look like they are “new, old stock” from the 60s, then I’m okay. The thing I watch out for is paying more (EG: you get more Halls cough drops at Walmart for .97¢ than you do there for a buck). Lots of smaller packaging per price.
As quite a few of them have been found with graymarket, salvage and counterfeit products on their shelves, I’d take that statement at the same face value as everything else on the internet. Of *course *they’re going to claim that, but they’re dancing around the fact that they buy from a “manufacturer-direct obsolete products” re-vendor, not from Kraft’s own shipping dock.
More than 20 years ago it was observed that the chains were having trouble expanding because the relatively small supplies of surplus, salvage, outdated and other “seconds” goods was limited, and about filling that pipeline. The number of chains and stores has increased dramatically since then. Just where do you think this corresponding increase in “salvage” goods has come from? Are P&G and Kraft and Cargill all pumping out scads of product to sell at a loss in this arena?
Or do they all do their buying from “ask me no questions and you can tell everyone I’m an authorized reseller/broker” sources with strong connections to the cargo docks?
They carry off-brands and budget versions of bigger brands (my favorite: “Non-Ultra Dawn” dish soap. And apparently soda comes in 3-liter bottles). They are intentionally designed to be cheap. It’s not like the stuff fell off a truck or is an expired product approved by the Mexican Council of Food.
It always amuses me when people worry about nonsense like this. I mean really - the $1 bottle of allergy medicine I get there is going to make my nose stop running and then pass out on the couch just like the $3 bottle I get at Jewel. The $1 brownie mix from Dollar Tree is no better or worse than the $3 box at Jewel, and frankly, I have more important things to worry about than whether my tube of Pepsodent is "counterfeit ".
In the whole grand scheme of things, this is laughable. It’s Family Dollar - it ain’t like you’re buying life saving insulin off the docks on the Barbary Coast from guys wearing eyepatches and have a hook for an arrm - it’s cheap condiments, hairspray, and generic aspirin. :rolleyes:
I work for a large personal goods manufacturer. I’ll go out on a limb and speak for all major American manufacturers in assuring you that our products are perfectly safe if you find them in a major discount retailer, such as Dollar General. Manufacturerers have a relationship with these retailers just like we do with non-discount retailers. Quality standards do not change based on distribution channel, nor can we ever disregard expiration dates. Most often, what is sold is discounters is the exact same product sold elsewhere, just in a smaller package so that it’s more in line with the price point expected at a Dollar store.
If any of our distributors even dreamt of selling counterfeit knockoffs of a known brands, esp something that actually caused harm, major players have Legal departments that would cheerfully sue them out of business. Similarly, if Manufacturerers ever deliberately distributed a product that was harmful, or past expiration date, the FDA would cheerfully shut us down.
I cannot speak to non-major discounters, such as Tom’s 99 cent store. I cannot speak to the quality of imported goods, other than those from trusted companies. Personally, I wouldn’t ingest or slather on my face any product that was obviously ifrom a minor company. If I saw a facial cream with poorly translated English, I couldn’t be confident about its safety testing, and wouldn’t put in near my eyes.
Especially with the larger dollar store chains. The mom & pop ones you might want to give a more cautious eye to, especially if the packaging on a product would tend to indicate it was produced for another country. I’ve heard that toothpaste can have too MUCH fluoride in some countries, for example. But really, I think it’s not even worth worrying about.
I shop at dollar stores pretty often and I’ve never gotten anything unsafe. None of my friends or family has ever reported anything untoward. I might draw the line at buying, say… baby formula at a dollar store.
Like other people have said, the dollar price point is usually accomplished by packaging smaller amounts than typical. Like, a dollar-sized box of ziplock bags might have only 10 or 12 bags inside, instead of the expected 24 or 32 that’ll cost you $3 or $4 at Walmart.
It can be entertaining to see how far they’ll go to put SOMETHING on the shelf for categories of items that can be fairly pricey. Packages of 4 diapers. Packages of 2 ice cream bars in the frozen food section.
I did some work in Salinas (home of “Grapes of Wrath”). The local strip mall had an anchor of a deep-discount store (I still have my $10 “factory refurbished” toaster). Since food canners now open date much of their stuff, this place was awash in expired fruits and veggies.
They had a sign “We have letters form the producers stating that the produce is safe long after the expiration date”.
Unless it is a strong acid in a can, a volatile chemical (bleach, baking soda, others), I wouldn’t worry.
I have prepared a cake mix and found the result a bit “off” - it was expired by a year or so.
Eggs are good for a month or more (if refrigerated, in my experience) - a bowl of water is a cheap and easy test.
Name-brand (and Wal-Mart house brand) is 6% per gallon*. The cheap stuff STARTS at 3%, and deteriorates.
Wal-Mart and others have noted that shipping water is a waste - they now sell bleach in less than a full gallon, but at 8 1/4% concentration.
You people are so bright, knowledgeable, generous and amazing! Thanks so much for helping me figure things out with my concerns about the issue in question. I can now feel a little better when I use the eye drops and the rest of it, THANKS MUCH!
