Reason why I can never be a tai tai….

As you all know, I have been making a living (just kidding, I am still holding on to my full-time job) by helping friends’ friends buy Coach bags…

I typically charge a nominal fee for buying the bags as a lot of time and effort are spent in getting the products; from coordinating with friends (many emails to and fro), consolidating the list of items to buy (some people can be fickle-minded), actual purchasing of the bags (this is the most tedious as the sales staff are not used to such huge purchase, go figure…), checking off the items from the list to ensure the right purchases, getting payment from these people I don’t know, to lugging the stuff all the way back to Singapore and in the process bearing the risk of losing the bags. As such, I feel that the so called service fee that I charge, between US$20 to US$25, is pretty reasonable. This is especially so since those people that are buying the bags receive a huge discount because of the “VIP” status I received for buying so many.

Without even taking the discount into consideration, the bags are already so much cheaper compared to Singapore. So this explains why when Tim told his friends that there is a Coach sale, many of his friends got him to buy the bags for him. Being the kind soul that he is, of course he did not charge his friends any service fee since those are his friends.

Well, that I feel is fine since I don’t ask my close friends to pay the service fee if they were buying the bags for themselves either. In any case, my friends only bought 1 item each unlike his friends who bought at least 2 each (seriously, I think his friends are uber rich. I certainly hope they give us fat ang pows for our wedding too. keke...). That I feel is still ok until I saw that there are people who bought bags of similar designs for themselves which set me wondering if the bags are really for themselves or are those for their friends or family. Why would anyone buy bags of the same design and not only that, buy more than just that 2 bags even if the bags are really that cheap.

So I guess I can never become a tai tai since my hubby-to-be, being such a good natured person, does not mind helping his friends get these bags at his own expense (in terms of the time, effort, and risk). But has he wondered if he had been taken advantage of? I'm sure his friends have no intention of taking advantage of him but I think some self control should be exercised here when getting someone to buy stuff for you.

Anyway, on a lighter note, check out this red t-shirt which I will never have a chance to wear:

http://www.localbrand.net/

I like the tshirts from this website. I feel that a lot of thoughts had gone into designing the tshirts. What do you think?