193Kviews
30 Terrible Products That Are Still Sold By The Millions, As Shared By This Online Group
Have you ever found yourself being angry at your printer that stops working out of nowhere and then spits out a dozen of the same copies? Or maybe you were disappointed by the game that you waited for for so long? Experiencing situations like these where people find some well-known product to be useless and irritating can make them wonder why these products are so popular and who still buys them.
Having this in mind, Reddit user @jezbez asked people online “What terrible product sells by the millions?” and besides receiving 57.1k upvotes, they also found out what products made someone a millionaire but are actually awful products.
Which one of these products do you find unnecessary or useless? Leave your thoughts in the comments down below!
More Info: Reddit
This post may include affiliate links.
Puppy mill puppies. Sorry to compare them to a product, but that’s how they’re treated. No one should purchase a puppy from a pet store, EVER. This now extends to online brokerage websites like greenfield and puppyspot. They’re like Amazon, a few clicks and a puppy will be sent to your door, and these puppies are coming from the exact same place as the pet store puppies. Because of people’s need for instant gratification, these facilities with hundreds to thousands of breeding animals persist. They are the best cash crop you could hope for.
Never believe a store who claims they only sell puppies from responsible breeders. No, not even if the owner has visited the breeders and “know” they’re good! By definition a responsible breeder would NEVER send their puppies to a pet store. Even pet stores that claim to only have rescues need to be scrutinized because some mills will use a shell rescue to “puppy launder”. “Licensed and certified breeders” should be a red flag - depending on the state, a breeder only needs to be licensed if they have a large number of dogs, are selling to brokers to go to pet stores, or to people “sight unseen” (online). YMMV depending on the state.
People sometimes justify their purchases as “saving” puppies from a pet store. But that is still investing in the industry and funding their operations by giving them profit. Legislation hasn’t stemmed the tide. Only a loss of profit will make mills move on to another hustle.
So please educate yourself and anyone you know who loves dogs and might ever be tempted to purchase a puppy from a pet store or online. Either adopt from a responsible rescue, or purchase from a responsible breeder.
Women’s pants/trousers which STILL have tiny pockets.
This is so horrible! I heard they do this to market the purse industry
Diamonds.
Diamonds are fu*king worthless and fuel a gigantic slavery trade business. We should have stopped digging for em.and just using lab made ones.
I feel like many are moving away from a diamond as an engagement stone.
I would rather a simple silver band with turquoise any day of the week
Load More Replies...
Sigh. Not all diamonds are "blood diamonds". There is a legitimate diamond mining industry in places like South Africa or the Canadian arctic and the adult miners are VERY well paid. Buy from a reputable shop and not some cheesy place offering suspiciously low prices and you'll be fine.
The price is still ridiculously high for something that's not genuinely rare.
Load More Replies...
Also common as hell, just the yearly sales (of natural diamonds) are heavily restricted to keep prices high.
Basically, ALL worth is dependent on someone wanting something. The ONLY item that is constantly valuable is land. Nothing else is as valuable. I, however, think that knowledge is as valuable, but, basically the ONLY thing that is worth anything all the time is land. You control land you control food, water and housing. The three basic needs.
I disagree that they're worthless - worth is culturally determined - but I do agree with the rest.
The DeBeers cartel had a lot to do with the cost of diamonds being as high as it is.
Load More Replies...
I love my engagement ring. It has a one carat diamond in the centre.
Exactly! I told my so do whatever you can afford, whatever metal as long as I'm not allergic. I don't need a gem, but if you want to get one, lab made is easy and cheap. But if they want to be "extravagant" then do research on the gem. Otherwise if I were to be absolutely picky with no guilt, a platinum band will be just fine. If there are bad things about it please lmk. I haven't found anything yet. My promise ring is white gold. I may be ignorant but if I. And I'm wrong and my research has been false, I have no problem taking the blame and rectifying the whole thing
I love my lab made diamonds; they look real and are much cheaper. Also, no mines or exploited workers are involved
This is the exact reason my engagement and wedding rings are created Sapphire (lab made). Better for the planet and much cheaper to replace.
Diamonds have no value and can be lab made now. Buy gold, silver, or anything that's actually traded on the stock market.
We claim to be intelligent beings yet people will routinely spend large sums of money for a tiny shiny rock.
The supply of diamonds is carefully rationed. There is a beach in Namibia with millions of them and it is only guarded.
get a zirconia instead... bypass the exploitation that goes on in diamond labs also
Zirconias can go cloudy unfortunately, they don't have the longevity. Natural zircons, mined not man made, are a very good diamond substitute (slightly less fire but doubly refractive) if a natural stone is desired. They come in colours as well.
Load More Replies... False. Not all diamonds are blood diamonds that come from Africa, and the entire industry is not tainted. If people want to wear diamonds and can afford them, then let them. It really isn't anyone else's business what kind of jewellery people prefer. Do we "stop digging" for other mined substances simply because some people don't like them? It's always people who can't afford them who seem to want them abolished.
You missed the point. The problem is the same as the drug trade. Make a product hard to get and artificially inflate the value through propaganda, and crime and death always follows.
Load More Replies...
Because the personal preference of others is not your business?
Load More Replies...
i thought diamonds were useful for lasers and such or maybe some kind of medical devices
I never understood why rare materials aren't solely dedicated to technology and research, but are abused and wasted on stuff like jewelry and even eaten ... and then, flushed down the John. Currywurst mit Blattgold, what a disgusting thing to do ... Currywurst in itself is by many means an atrocity, but this tops it, really...
Also I'm no expert and couldn't tell apart a diamond from glass, so why bother?
The Canadian diamond producers would argue the slavery point, I think.
Cannot remember which company it is, but I read an article the other day that said one of the largest jewelry companies is moving towards lab created diamonds only
Plus they virtually worthless. Years ago when gold first started spiking I worked armed security for an itinerant gold buyer. He came through my are 2 or 3 times a year. It would make me real sad to see older ladies coming in to sell their wedding set(which was usually high carat gold from before WW2) and a 1 to 2 carat diamond. The ladies would get real upset when gold buyer only wanted gold and tell him the diamond cost $x,000.00 when they were married. If they decided to sell the buyer would take the diamond from the setting and return it to them. He tell them check with a jeweler but to himthe diamond was worth near nothing.
Instead of giving my GF a ring, I showed my commitment by getting her name tattooed on my member. Lucky for me her name is Ada.
Read a bit about what British colonialist Cecil Rhodes was prepared to do to get his hands on the diamond-rich areas of Africa, and you'll never wear one again.
If we were to boycott all the goods that colonialists procured over a century ago and brought to Western civilizations, that would leave us with precious little, wouldn't it? Also, not all diamonds are blood diamonds or from Africa.
Load More Replies... 
Speaking as a European, Hershey bars are absolutely horrendous
Speaking as an American, about every 2 years, I order an 5kg block of Callebaut dark chocolate from Belgium. (We do have quality artisanal chocolate makers in the US, but Hershey is just disgusting. It's too sweet and the texture is off-putting.)
this should go without saying, but coffee pods
Regardless of what it may say on the label, they aren't actually recyclable. The ones that look like a little bag with a plastic ring at the top are just as bad, there's as much plastic in that ring as there is in an entire cup.
Detoxification miracle products.
"Get all the toxins out of your body!"
You have already have a pancreas and liver.
Edit: and kidney(s)Edit 2: Thanks for the silver!
Edit 2: Glad to see so many people actually are educated about their digestive systems. One of my favorite areas of study right now are the gut microbiome and it's ever increasing known impact on our overall health. So far it really seems like one of the most important factors (if not the most) is the quality of care you give your ol' poop machine. So yeah, don't consume garbage branded as detox products that f**k your colon.
GOOP
Never heard of it, had to google. Apparently not working well in Sweden.
Plastic water/soda bottles. Environmentally terrible
I am not 100% sure about that one. Yes plastic isn't easy to recycle. (Although HDPE (Lids) and PP (bottles) can be recycled quite well. IF you recycle).. but: It is a lot lighter than glass. Less weight means less energy/fuel for transport. And that means less CO2 (for transport). So.... if you look at the facts and add up the numbers (instead of just going: "Plastic is Evil) you might be surprised. Could be that, as enviromental bad as they are, they could still be better than glass
Any product where marketing is 95% of the production budget
Cheap toilet paper that your finger goes right through unless you fold it over several times.
Homeopathic “remedies” that are so diluted they might contain one molecule of what they purport to hold. And no, shaking them does not “activate” them. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/1800-studies-later-scientists-conclude-homeopathy-doesnt-work-180954534/
They are facing a problem im the EU now. They cant be labled by what they are working against (because they don't) and they can't be labled by what's suposed to be in it... because there is almost nothing of it left. So soon they will habe to be labled as what they are... sugar
Herbalife.
One of the techs at my dialysis unit just started this. She's only in her 20's and has no idea how long it's been around. She was going on and on about it and I just rolled my eyes.
Beats headphone, speakers etc. The headphones are so cheaply made that they put weights in them to make them feel higher quality
Edit: for those asking, you can't go wrong with JBL - they're invincible, affordable and unbelievably high quality for the price.
Edit 2: not saying weight = quality, I'm saying that people think weight = quality
Other excellent headphone manufacturers include Sennheiser, Klipsche, Audio Technica, Sony (they have a wide range including some very good stuff) and Bose (overpriced, but better than Beats).
Stuff with microbeads.
Seriously, how was this ever legal in the first place and why is it still legal?
Edit, apparently mictobeads were mostly banned in the US (where majority of redditors are from) in 2018 (enacted 2015) but I missed that. However, this is not a strict ban as they are still allowed in "non-rinse off" products such as make-up or pillow stuffing and you can order large quantities of them on Amazon. So while this is a step in the right direction, it is certainly not good enough. Furthermore, they should be banned worldwide like CFCs were as their environmental impact is equally as bad.
LOL surprise Toys or any such surprise toy , they sell like crazy and the whole idea is to buy them open the wrapper and see what you have got , once opened the toy is never used
Microtransactions in games.
The cosmetic ones I can understand, they can be fun, but the pay to win ones are terrible and yet they make millions every year.
Hartz brand pet flea treatments/medication. It's dangerous and has been the cause of death for many pets. IIRC it's a nerve agent that's supposed to make the pet's blood toxic to fleas.
I used some on my cat once and she started freaking out, then had trouble waking normally (her legs were twitching and kicking, clearly out of her control), and tears of brown thick liquid started streaming down her face. I picked her up and frantically gave her a bath hoping to wash any of the remaining chemicals off the back of her neck before any more of that poison seeped into her skin.
Cable TV (from major providers)
They made money f*****g people over and then when streaming services changed the game they decided to continue finding new ways to f**k you over. God help you if you live in a rural area.
There is absolutely no reason to have cable anymore. I have Netflix, Disney+, Amazon prime, Hulu and Funimation subscriptions and all of them combined cost a fraction what cable does,. Include limitless on demand content (much of which is better than anything on cable) and without 30% of the air time being commercials. Cable is dead. It died a horrible and well disserved death and it will not be missed.
There's an old IT joke about being in a room with three truly despicable people and a printer and a gun with two bullets. Who would you shoot? The answer for IT people is you would shoot the printer twice.
My data
Note: this post originally had 40 images. It’s been shortened to the top 30 images based on user votes.
And commercials that pop up every two minutes on non-premium! Everyone hates those commercials no one wants them, no one watches them.
Load More Replies...
Commercials on cable TV or streaming services you pay for. Why am I paying if you're already being paid for by commercials?!
Load More Replies...
Why in blue blazes does BP truncate every thread? I can understand showing only the top 50 of 100+ items - but showing only the top 30 of 40? Seems absurd.
The more interacting a website has from the public the higher it ranks in search engines. If you're compelled to click again in order to see the full article, the article ranks higher and its more likely to be seen in a search engine.
Load More Replies...
2 Threads with exact the same content in one day. Do you guys at BP don’t talk to each other?
Easy. It's still better than random cat pics all the time.
Load More Replies...
Hearing aids for most old people. It's like putting more petrol in your car and expecting it to go faster.
Or glasses for asinine commenters. They shouldn't be allowed to see!
Load More Replies... 
And commercials that pop up every two minutes on non-premium! Everyone hates those commercials no one wants them, no one watches them.
Load More Replies... Commercials on cable TV or streaming services you pay for. Why am I paying if you're already being paid for by commercials?!
Load More Replies... Why in blue blazes does BP truncate every thread? I can understand showing only the top 50 of 100+ items - but showing only the top 30 of 40? Seems absurd.
The more interacting a website has from the public the higher it ranks in search engines. If you're compelled to click again in order to see the full article, the article ranks higher and its more likely to be seen in a search engine.
Load More Replies... 2 Threads with exact the same content in one day. Do you guys at BP don’t talk to each other?
Easy. It's still better than random cat pics all the time.
Load More Replies... Hearing aids for most old people. It's like putting more petrol in your car and expecting it to go faster.
Or glasses for asinine commenters. They shouldn't be allowed to see!
Load More Replies... 
