Beware of China. Several customers have reported that they have been ripped off by Chinese companies. The way it usually works is that they offer you what seems to be an amazing deal, but they require that you send them the money to China up front, either by Western Union or by wire transfer (T/T). Once you send the money, you can never recover it. What typically happens when you "buy" directly from China is that you send your money and never receive anything. That's right, it's fraud and they just keep your money and move on to the next victim. In the rare occasions in which you do receive product, often it is different than what they showed you in the picture and/or the quality is so poor that you usually wind up throwing the lamp in the garbage. They will even offer you a warranty, but how do you enforce it when you need to?

One of the big problems in China right now is that thousands of factories are closing every month due to the global economic crisis, but they keep any advance payments they have received from customers before they go out of business. Also, many sales people continue to sell even after the factory has closed, and when someone decides to buy they have the money sent to their personal account and you never receive anything. This article talks about the large and increasing number of factory closings in China:

http://www.boston.com/news/world/asia/articles/2008/11/06/as_chinas_economy_stalls_ some_business_owners_run_away/

This doesn't mean that all lamps made in China are of poor quality. The Futura 2400 and the Futura 2000 are made in China, but under our supervision. They are designed by us in the US and we have a very close working relationship with the factory that makes them for us. Someone from our company flies to the factory to supervise every production run and rejects all the ones that don't pass our quality control. You cannot get our lamps from any source other than us or one of our legitimate distributors. If someone offers you one of these lamps or one significantly similar, it is either a scam and you won't receive anything or they will send you a shoddy imitation that you won't like. Leave buying from China to large, experienced companies like Beaming White. With us you get an American warranty and US or European laws that will protect you.

Beware of the Chinese gel trap too. Gel made in China is quite poor (it dries up, causes a lot of gum irritation, and just doesn't give you the results you want). Also, you can never be really sure what ingredients they put in the gel, so if they put a harmful ingredient in there you could cause a lot of harm to your customers, which would in turn spell a world of legal trouble for you. However, Chinese companies cannot legally export peroxide gel. On the other hand, US customs requires FDA registration for teeth whitening gel that is to be imported into the US, so even if they manage to smuggle it out of China, US Customs will usually seize it. Some will even tell you that they have FDA approval and will even send you fake documents. Any way you look at it, getting gel in China is not an option.

Since the teeth whitening industry is booming in North America, unscrupulous Chinese companies are praying on trusting Americans and Europeans. Be especially careful of Chinese companies that have nice web sites or that have Western owners because the #1 company defrauding foreigners is actually owned by a pair of British nationals (and they have a very nice web site and they are very smooth).

Adhere to the wise saying that says that "if a deal seems too good to be true, it probably is." Don't be their next victim.