For example, if you insist on buying Advil instead of store brand ibuprofen. I mean, you’d be wasting your money in that example, but you do you
Coffee and tea. Otherwise I always buy store brand because it comes from the same factory.
Coffee and tea doesn’t?
oh I’m sure it does but in my experience tea and coffee are the only products where you can cut corners by reducing costs of production and it’s actually tangible, and not merely abstract like removing brand name logo from the box
My dad always bought the no-name cookies for us, according to him every major brand had a deal with discount supermarkets to sell their brand name product under a cheaper no-name alias.
That might be true in some cases but the stuff he bought was mostly just cheap knock-offs that didn’t even come close to the original.
This is true for household appliances, rather than letting the factories go idle during slow sales they pump out the same machine under “generic” brand names. QC isn’t as stringent I suppose.
Clancy’s Cheese Curls. I dislike all other brands of cheese curls.
holy shit i thought i was the only one
all other cheese curls taste greasy and overseasoned in comparisonCheeto’s brand tastes kind of stale too
Debian. All those off-brand derivatives just add cruft and instability.
But debian is the generic.
Zoop zoop!
Debian for the server, Fedora for the desktop. 💪
Tech products. It’s not worth the risk of getting some Chinese spying crap. Even chargers and cables have the risk of damaging your hardware.
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Lots of them, yes. But most of them aren’t designed there. And yes, I am aware that there are reputable Chinese brands, but the Chinese genetics are not those.
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Now, is all these news nothing but propaganda?
Literally yes, not because chinese companies don’t spy on you, literally all companies spy on you. You prove it by linking a video about samsung. Google and Apple do the same shit. The fact that software is riddled with spyware has nothing to do with the hardware being manufactured in China. China isn’t some big bad, moving production elsewhere will change nothing. Lastly you should be far more concerned about western companies spying on you, the ones that cooperate with your local government and leave backdoors in their OS for NSA and the like. What do you think the CCP is gonna do to you? You’re outside of their jurisdiction completely.
So yes it js just propaganda, in a sense that it’s trying to make you think this kind of behavior is somehow unique to Chinese companies or a result of tech being manufactured in China.
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especially when you know that that country is heavily invested in cyberwarfare, espionage and censorship.
Which country isn’t? The US does more spying on its own citizens than China could ever dream of doing. The UK is currently trying to pass a bill to break e2ee.
Even their constitution states that every Chinese product ( software or hardware ), must send data it collects to the government.
This is false as far as I know, can you provide a source? China has some of the strictest laws on data protection, you can read more about it here: https://academic.oup.com/idpl/article/12/2/75/6537091?login=false
This is like Apple saying your Android spies on you… lol ( I believe they did say that )
Not sure where you were going with this. My point is you don’t hear any of these concerns raised about any other and as we both agree it’s not something unique to China.
The real reason why you hear a lot of talk about moving production out of China lately is simply because Chinese manufacurers have narrowed the the gap a lot in terms of chip designs and are becoming an actual threat to western comanies’ profit margins.
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I’m hoping you’re a victim of spellcheck and meant generics.
Yes, I meant generics. Spelling on phone keyboards is rather difficult when your thumbs are as wide as mine…
Certain skin products for me. It makes such a big difference to get some well recommended brands rather than risk it with a random one.
Cetaphil and Cerave are usually solid, and otherwise I refer to the CDA when unsure:
https://dermatology.ca/recognized-products/skincare/ (note that you can scroll within the list to see everything)
The list is for stuff that is
- Low potential for irritation
- Fragrance free or unscented
- Do not contain the most common allergens
- Non-comedogenic
But I specifically look for non-comedogenic and fragrance free. The latter because my old workplace had this as a requirement, and now I prefer it
If you like Cetaphil and Cerave, you will also like Vanicream and Eucerin.
I’ve seen Eucerin around, I’ll have to look into Vanicream
If you’re looking for stuff for your face, I also recommend the following Korean beauty items. Nows a good time to buy them from kbeauty online retailers because most are doing deals and free shipping (November 11 is a Korean holiday):
- Illyoon Ato Ceramide Concentrate Cream
- Etude House Soon Jung 2x Barrier Intensive Cream
Condoms
Not me. I ordered a pallet of Sam’s Choice when I hit puberty and should be set for life. Got so many I double them up sometimes.
Ivan is clearly joking, but for those that don’t know, condoms DO expire, and will be more likely to break the more times passes. Similarly, doubling condoms makes them more likely to break.
Shit.
That’s why Ivan should triple up. In case one fails he stays doubled up. It’s fool proof.
Pro-tip: if the third won’t fit easily, you can preheat them in the oven to make them more pliable (and it feels nice, as a bonus)!
😬
Nutella,
I only buy it once or twice a year but no other chocolate spread tastes nearly as good.
no other chocolate spread tastes nearly as good
That’s because it isn’t a chocolate spread, but rather a nut and nougat spread.
It has 13% hazelnut, the same as many other brands, but also the lowest amount I can buy. There’s a really pricy one that has 30%
no other chocolate spread tastes nearly as good.
I could eat that as the fucking Whine Poo eats the honey ngl.
I live in France and there are lots of brands that are exactly like Nutella, or even more tasty. Nutella is cheaper yet.
I used to agree but after finding Kirkland hazelnut spread at costco i’ve switched to that. Its palm oil free and every bit as delicious as nutella.
The Kraft one isn’t half bad
But then note I said “isn’t half bad”, not that it’s great. But I’d say it works in a pinch, or if it’s on sale…
This is very true.
For nougat, the Milka stuff is better. If you want real chocolate, take Caotina.
It actually has very little chocolate in it, that’s why. It was made (i think) during WW2 when chocolate was in short supply, so they came up with a way to stretch it, by mixing a bunch of hazelnuts (and w/e else is in there) with it.
The Kirklands one is good, but doesn’t hold an emulsion. And trying to stir a 3000 litre tub of “hazelnut spread” to re-emulsify it isn’t on my list of desirable morning activities.
Davines shampoo
Braun S9 Pro electric razor
Cola Zero / Pepsi Max (generic alternatives rarely have sugarless options anyway)
Lipton probably but I can let it slip sometimes. Many alternatives just don’t taste right, but they are at least drinkable.
Used to be Heinz but now they’ve replaced tomato with more brown sugar or something so it tastes bland.
Try the Heinz Simply line. Personally, I find it tastes better than the classic which has turned bland.
Cottage Cheese. Prairie Farms is my go to
Old Bay seasoning
batteries (when I have to use disposables)
Command hooksPeanut butter. Generic peanut butter is downright nasty. Skippy or Jiff for me.
Skippy or Jiff
I thought Skippy and Jiff were generic, isn’t good peanut butter the stuff that only has one ingredient: peanuts?
Most foods. Store brands are (nearly) always lacking in something. Be it tiny sized canned beans, or jam whose only flavour is ‘sweet’. That shit is cheap for a reason.
Doesn’t apply to everything (depending on where you live), some things you can’t cut corners on without advertising it. 2% Milk is 2% milk.
But largely, low cost food has been made low cost via haircuts and shortcuts.
Or just bulk purchasing.
Knew a fellow that worked for a food company - juices, nectars, preserved fruits, jams and compotes, baked goods with fruit, etc - that has a name brand. Most of the production is exported for so called “premium markets”.
The largest supermarket chain here aproaches the company to have a few products made under their label. Not waterdowned versions of their recipes but completely new recipes or variations on the producers recipes.
Final product is as expensive or more to produce than name brand, which implies lower margins but still good money.
Supermarket product is not a waterdowned version but a completely separate product. If the end product is garbage, the supermarket gets the bad record.
I was comparing frozen diced veggies a couple of years back (in Australia) and noticed that the store-brand version was approximately 1/3 broccoli stems by volume, which certainly explained the cost difference.
I think Dawn dish soap gets mentioned in these often.
Dawn Powerwash is pretty great for general cleaning too, not just dishes. It’s great at removing soap scum. You can technically DIY it with dish soap, isopropyl alcohol, water, and a spray bottle, but the bottles they sell last a while and are cheap.
That’s not enough to do what powerwash does. Normal dishsoap has to maintain a consistency so certain additives are just not feasible. This allows powerwash to have a higher ph, stuff that goes after calcium deposits and stuff that hydrates stuck on food.
Personally I really really like powerwash but the amount of plastic it needs is too much for me. They did to come out with bulk refills.
Stop pissing on my bonfire
I use an Aldi version of Dawn. There is no difference.
Well Costco brand is absolutely shit. Smells horrrrrible. Bought it and did my best to convince myself it wasn’t that bad I’d just finish the bottle, ended up tossing the whole thing
At Costco, I decided to get the Dawn Ultra Advanced Power, and man it knocks the socks off of grease, with just a small dollop on a sponge. While my cooking is simplistic and I wash sparingly in large batches, I don’t eat out often and I’ve only used a 10th of the 2.66L bottle in 2 months.
If you don’t use a sponge then I think any dishsoap will do, so long as you can tolerate the smell.
Choice Australia did a test of different washing liquid recently and found the Aldi stuff to be one of the best and a bunch of expensive brands to be no better than plain hot water.
