Hi All,
Like many products it’s important to understand there is a “grey market” for security products.
Marketing 101: the price of any product is what the local market will bear (tolerate )
So let’s assume the local trade price of a Dahua DVR in the local security distributor in downtown Shenzhen China is $ X.00.
The trade price of the same (Dahua) QSee / Qvis/ ICrealtime or active and helpful IPVM member Sean at Nelly's Security with EYEsurv is $ X.00 + $ Y.00 = $ Z.00 The $ Y.00 bit is for their margin and local support and warranty. (Have you ever tried to return anything to mainland China under warranty?)
Many Chinese manufacturers supply the local Chinese market with Chinese language ONLY versions of the DVR at the lower price (what the local market will bear). But some smart Chinese guys figure they can install the multi-region firmware on the local Chinese versions and sell them online or through the “grey market”.
Now you can start to see the problems this presents, the North American Dahua rebrand companies are complaining to Dahua why can these (grey market) guys sell Dahua online at these low prices? Dahua is saying it’s not us, what can we do to stop this?
I cannot say for sure that the above is happening in Dahua’s case, but I have sourced security products from Taiwan, Korea and China for many years and their always was grey market products available for many brands. The internet and PayPal have made it easier for people to buy from these grey market guys and it does not take long now to find lower prices online.
Regards,
Jim