Hello @arlettemsalase thank you for getting back to me so soon. I will get back to you in parts myself. I do like your format. I will start by your last part and move up.
Unlike a good part of the witnesses or you, I have my name and surname in all this, from the beginning, I am not anonymous
blanchy is my real name by the way.
If you attended the Hive Fest, you will surely have one or more than one in your hands right now because I sent some of them from Colombia.
No I didn't attend Hivefest this year. I had a planned trip to New York in October so I could not make it to Croatia. The tickets were expensive also. Did you attend?
No, I have not been scammed. I think I would be scammed a hell of a lot faster by Alibaba since I don't shop through those places. The bracelets were bought from a direct supplier here in Venezuela with the intention of reducing costs, shipping, taxes and other things that come with buying things outside of Venezuela. Although it is not the same to buy from the USA, I didn't look for them on Amazon, to be honest. But I did an exhaustive search within the Venezuelan suppliers and I managed to get the best price because most of them charge 1 USD or more for each unit of product.
Alibaba is one of the best sites in the world to but goods straight from manufacturers. I actually cannot believe the prices you paid for these bracelets. They are out of this world. As I said a quick look on this site and these bracelets could be got for 4 cent per unit. There are other websites if Alibaba is not for you. I think you purchased these from a retailer for reasons that I saw in a later comment which I will go into later and the retailer probably did what I did and sourced from a manufacturer. This is the only way they could charge this much for the bracelets. The world is a very small place now @arlettemsalase and 11,000 customisable bracelets should not cost over 8,800 HBD. The prices here are crazy even if you live in the most expensive place on earth.
Venezuela is an expensive country, if you didn't know. Due to dollarization and the exchange rate differential, everything can go up. Talking about the country situation is too long, you have to give too much context for you to understand how deteriorated a country that has been in the same for more than 25 years can be.
I live in Europe. It is expensive here also. However I do not see this as an excuse to pay excess amounts for simple rubber products. You would not pay those prices in Manhattan. I get this alot from people in my business but I looked up your taxes and import duties to your country. You know more than me that there are US sanctions on some goods coming into your country. I do not know which state you reside in so I cannot be entirely accurate on the SENIAT taxes. But the maximum import tax is 25% that were introduced in May 2024 so it's not too bad if say you are importing a product from abroad that are far and away undercutting your local supplier by 15 times the price. I will have a search for some Venezualan manufacturers myself this month. I think there are even many of these suppliers on Alibaba. Don't look on Amazon by the way. Those are retail prices.
As I explained above, every time we are going to make a purchase, inside or outside Venezuela, for any country where we are going to represent Hive, a study of suppliers is made in order to create the most optimal budget. It is not about magic money but if you get 1 bracelet for 20 dollars for shipping, how much do you think it would be to ship 11,000 bracelets? That weighs more than 20 kilograms, approximately. Believe me it wouldn't come out to $20.
It's quite funny but this comment made me realise that you have never imported goods from abroad. No problem. I will explain how it works. If you want to buy a product in bulk. You give the suppler a design of the product and the supplier will manufacturer 5-10 samples and send you these sample. Now in order to decrease the lead time , the supplier will always air freight the sample so you have it in less than 7 days. Thus the 20$ delivery charge. If you are happy with the sample then you put in the order for the bulk. At this stage you can hire a shipping company to ship your products or the supplier may offer to ship on your behalf. It depends on their location and their services. Shipping 11,000 rubber bracelets would not cost that much by the way. The box would be quite light. Even a 20 kg box would not cost that much. I estimate around $50 -$70. Even if you air freight this box it would cost $200 - $250.
There is something that is worth more than all the money you are talking about and that is: Reputation.
Oh I totally agree with you here @arlettemsalase . I really do. But this looks bad.
I am not anonymous, and believe me I have more to lose than 50 USD which is what my account could be worth today.
Tell me what more do you have to lose? Did you not say you were volunteering?
Do you think if I were a bad person I would have a job at the oldest exchange of all time? If I were irresponsible, unfulfilled, etc.
The oldest exchange? Crypto exchange? Do you work for Bitstamp? Very nice. Do they spend $8800 on 11,000 bracelets?, because if they did , they would not be the oldest exchange in the world. They would be bankrupt ;-D