Goodbye Gearbest - parent company files for bankruptcy

Clear on 26/06/2021 - 20:02

Interesting article confirming what many of us have known for a very long time - the company behind Gearbest has gone bankrupt and soon Gearbest will be closed down. Patozon has been sold off with new investors, so their brands like Mpow will continue (albeit crippled with the Amazon ban), while their clothing brands like Zaful have gone independent.

Last year they had suppliers protesting at their HQ due to outstanding money, followed by affiliates no longer getting paid and finally droves of staff leaving a couple months ago after not getting paid for months. Those of you who remember Sunny (the old Gearbest AU manager) also left earlier in the year for the same reasons.

Many of you can probably remember years ago when Gearbest were dominating OzBargain with their crazy low prices on all sorts of gadgets, followed by their 12 month ban due to no one receiving any of their orders and finally their unban with more crazy low price deals.

Their loss leading strategy was never sustainable so in 2018 their parent company cut off the money that allowed them to have these crazy prices and everything started to increase in price. Then it got worse for us when they started enforcing the new GST changes in July 2018, followed by the removal of free shipping. Gearbest at the time said only the "Top 10 Countries" would receive free shipping and Australia was ranked 12th. After that it was all downhill.

So in short if you're planning on buying from Gearbest at this time - don't! They've filed for bankruptcy and you may not get your order. We can also add them to the list of others who have also recently closed, like Tmart and Coolicool to name a few.

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Comments

  • AdamFury on 26/06/2021 - 20:04
    +6

    I'll never forget the endless deals of $1 LED lights and USB fans.

    • Clear on 26/06/2021 - 20:04
      +5

      Yup and they were the quality Xiaomi/ZMI ones too!

      • Icecold5000 on 26/06/2021 - 23:35
        -6

        LOL @ quality and Xiaomi being in the same sentence.

        • Clear on 26/06/2021 - 23:55
          +4

          Yes I should have said high quality.

  • DASHCAM NOW DUDE on 26/06/2021 - 20:09

    while their clothing brands like Zaful have gone independent.

    Thank god! Youtube try-on hauls must go on!

    • Clear on 26/06/2021 - 20:12

      Back in 2016 they literally had 100 domains registered with dozens of clothing stores. Pretty much all social media clothing ads from China were them. Considering the parent company of Globalegrow is a clothing empire that had supplied Target/Kmart US it's no surprise they'll continue on.

  • tightarse on 26/06/2021 - 20:35
    +4

    followed by affiliates no longer getting paid

    Yep, true story.

  • djones145 on 26/06/2021 - 20:59

    they got banned due to me hehehe

    https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/211479

    • Clear on 26/06/2021 - 21:16

      Ah yes that's right. As the GeekBuying rep that was a good day for me as we could finally win 🤣

  • [Deactivated] on 26/06/2021 - 21:18
    -1

    :(. Hope the same won't happen with Banggood, Geekbuying etc.

    Probably the original/one of the first overseas ecommerce sites to sell good value tech to oz.

    • Clear on 26/06/2021 - 21:20

      Besides the marketplaces like AliExpress, Banggood are probably the biggest and they have no signs of slowing down.

      GeekBuying is also really profitable on Amazon and AliExpress right now. Even the subsidiary physical stores in Spain, Barcelona and SE Asia are profitable.

    • Puglife on 27/06/2021 - 00:24
      +1

      Good value? Bought 1 thing from Geekbuying once. Cheap trash that broke within a few weeks. I learnt my lesson quickly. You get what you pay for.
      Banggood, Ali Express, Kogan. I have no idea why these stores get so much traction here.

      • [Deactivated] on 27/06/2021 - 17:48

        Geekbuying is only an ecommerce platform.

        Blame it on the manufacturer…

  • Hybroid on 26/06/2021 - 21:19
    +2

    Meh, one less junk product site. Another 5 will pop up though.

    • [Deactivated] on 26/06/2021 - 21:23
      +2

      …….

      Not everything was junk.

      They didn't force junk upon you, you had the choice to sieve out the "junk"

  • scotty on 26/06/2021 - 21:24
    +6

    Saw a GearBest ex-staff's farewell post on WeChat a few weeks ago, and I took it as just a typical job changing post. I guess it was actually an SOS from a sinking ship.

    • Clear on 27/06/2021 - 16:33
      +1

      Hopefully that person received their paycheck. There's been a few on my feed who have been fighting hard to get theirs. It's always a real shame to have so many lose their jobs.

  • nedski on 26/06/2021 - 22:08
    +1

    Oh I was worried there for a second, thought we were talking about Gearbite

    • Clear on 27/06/2021 - 11:01
      +1

      Local stores like Gearbite are what put them out of business. Selling Xiaomi locally at competitive prices.

    • DoctorCalculon on 28/06/2021 - 00:31

      I also panicked when I misread the title as I had recently placed a order with Gearbite. Phew!

  • nfr on 26/06/2021 - 22:21

    Thanks for the story. I know I've bought from Gearbest and Tmall before I just can't remember what.

    • SF3 on 27/06/2021 - 00:42

      So it you wouldn’t know if it arrived or not?

  • stirlo on 26/06/2021 - 23:58

    Damn. They were still offering reasonable deals occasionally. Lucky I don’t have anything outstanding with them.

  • Indomietable on 28/06/2021 - 07:32

    RIP Gearbest.
    It was good while it last.

  • Richfield on 28/06/2021 - 08:13
    -1

    Interesting article(gizmochina.com) confirming what many of us have known for a very long time - the company behind Gearbest has gone bankrupt and soon Gearbest will be closed down.

    I’m struggling to see where the article says that.

  • CyrusL on 12/08/2021 - 12:06

    Is this real?
    I had an order with them on Nitecore items.
    No wonder I got no shipment for 3 months and most of the Nitecore items on Gearbest were no stock.
    Probably Nitecore is one of the suppliers got unpaid checks from Gearbest.

    • Clear on 12/08/2021 - 12:31

      Their website will continue to operate as it's a source of income for them to attempt to pay the outstanding bills. Have you managed a refund?

  • Chickenleg on 13/08/2021 - 16:35

    Just logged into Gearbest for the first time in ages. 5 pages of orders mostly things like $1 bicycle lights and thermometers haha. The only substantial thing I bought from there was a Jumper Ezbook laptop to use on a holiday in 2017.

  • Clear on 03/09/2021 - 17:28

    Here's some insider info. About 160 staff from the parent company have been laid off and staff haven't been paid since July. There were supposed to receive their pay on August 15th but that deadline has long gone. Apparently everything should be wrapped up by the end of the month.

    Also seems Gearbest.com isn't working either. Though not offline and likely a DNS issue.

  • Ultraman on 19/09/2021 - 12:55

    Only just saw this post because I was thinking of buying from Gearbite and did a search to ensure they are not the same company! I have avoided anything to do with Gearbest ever since 2018 when I got the run around from their "Customer service" because they were never going to admit they sold fake Xiaomi stuff - https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/394465.

  • k0ka2 on 30/09/2021 - 20:10

    Looks like the gearbest website is back up again.

  • Clear on 12/04/2022 - 00:19
    -1

    So my insider goss is that Zaful who became an independent company from Globalegrow quite a while ago have bailed out Gearbest and have taken over the management of the website. Those who made Gearbest a well known name with their loss leading deals and advertising have jumped ship to another store, so it'll be interesting to see how it goes.

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