Romwe Review!

So I recently made my first purchase at Romwe.com, a China-based online clothing store, and this is my 100% honest review on the company 🙂

Before I begin, here is the 'about us' section of their website, so you can get to know them a little better. I first heard about Romwe from a YouTube video a few years ago (here) and kind of just forgot about them, until I saw a link to their website through a sponsored Facebook ad.

As always before buying online from a site I've not used before, I did a quick review search on Google. It's always best to do this if you've not ordered from a site before, as it'll give you an idea of whether it's safe, legit and good quality. I saw a couple people complaining about shipping times but as I didn't need the items for a specific event, I decided to give them a try & be patient. 

Finally, don't forget that you may have to pay customs charges depending on where you live. In my case (although my order cost a lot & the package was reasonably heavy), I didn't have to pay any, which is probably due to the fact that the shipping cost was free - but I have ordered from a different online store in America before and did have to pay customs on that occasion when I paid for shipping, so just be aware of that before you place an order because they could be expensive 💸 You don't have to pay customs charges if you feel like they are too much- in this case, your parcel will be returned to the sender.

Using the website:

Their site is easy to use so you can find what you're looking for easily & quickly. With drop-down menus at the top, you can choose your desired language & currency, as well as searching for specific items.

Let's say you want to find a patchwork, short sleeve, cotton t-shirt: you'd choose T-Shirts from the clothing drop down menu and then narrow down your options from the further drop downs that appear in that category- simple! For example, this is one of the tees that showed up when I searched for those specifics 👍🏻

Verdict: a site that is easy to navigate, with little-to-no faffing about! 👍🏻

Cost:

This is a site that boasts constant sales & cheap prices- definitely a combination that is hard to resist! You can just search generally for clothing and they let you know if they're in the sale, but there is also a drop down sale menu with the options; under $10 (£7.64), 70% off & 80% off. They also offer extra discounts sometimes on top of your order and if it is your first order, you are eligible for an extra 60% off (as long as your items aren't already reduced too much) 👌🏻

Be wary though- because the items are cheap, it's easy to add a TON to your basket, but these will quickly add up & you may need to part ways with some items to save yourself being poor for the rest of the month! 😝

Finally, like I said above, remember that customs may charge you so make sure you are prepared to pay them if you still want your items.

Verdict: cheap and cheerful items that are often unique in their style. Just don't do what I did & be sucked in to adding too many items to your basket that you can't bear to sacrifice! 👍🏻

Sizing:

The sizing options in this site aren't traditional in the sense of being specific sizes, like in the UK where they are size 6, 8, 10, 12 etc. The options on Romwe are XS, S, M, L, XL and they provide you with body measurements so you can determine which size is best for your body size. I don't have an appropriate tape measure, so I just guessed that I'd need either an extra small (XS) or small (S) as in UK sizes, I'm a size 6 for tops & size 6 or 8 for bottoms depending on the stretch of the fabric (so for example I wear a size 6 in leggings but in jeans I'm often a size 8). Some items also come in a 'one size fits all' kind of deal, so just keep in mind that they may be too big or small for you depending on your size and shape.

So when I received my items, the majority of them I'd ordered in a small since they were out of stock in extra small, but a couple of the items I did manage to get in an XS. The extra small items did fit me, but many of the small items were too big, so I'll be sending some of them back and getting the rest tailored for my body. However, don't be discouraged by that statement- this is true by the standards of all clothing stores whether they're online or not. Sizing comes up different in all stores, except with online shopping you don't get the luxury of trying on the items before you buy them; but of course you can return them if required.

With the swimsuits/bikinis I ordered, 80% of them didn't fit me correctly at all. Now I'm only 5ft tall (not even 5ft 1 🙈) and don't have a very defined waist at all so although I ordered them in small sizes, they didn't fit right and there were all kinds of nip-slips and issues going on. Just be wary when ordering swimsuits, bikinis and underwear from their site, as you aren't allowed to return them (more on what you can't return to Romwe will be listed later).

If I do order from Romwe in the future I now know that I'll need to order XS's and if they are out of stock in that size I won't order a small unless I'm dying to have it!

Verdict: will be difficult to determine what size you require without your body measurements which is a shame, so I would recommend you find out before placing an order 👍🏻👎🏻

Shipping:

Shipping costs depend on which country you are shipping to, but they do offer free shipping on orders over a certain amount (they list the specifics here) and also offer free express delivery if your order is over a certain amount.

Be aware that the shipping times they list are just the shipping times, this doesn't include the amount of processing time required to get your order together. Once you place your order, they may take up to 7 days (I think) to process your order and then it will be shipped, so be patient. Updates will be available to you in the 'my orders' menu so will see when your order has been processed and you will be provided with tracking updates here also. However if you do believe that too much time has passed, do send them a 'ticket' (a message) politely asking them the status of your package.

In my experience, I was granted free express shipping because I spent more than $99 (£75.68). I placed my order on the 26th of August and received the bulk of my order on the 13th of September, so 18 days later. Some of my items were eligible for shipping within 24hrs, so when they were processed I received them on the 2nd of August (7 days after I placed my order). Those items were delivered by the company GLS and the bulk of my parcel was delivered by UPS.

Furthermore, one of my items I am still waiting for so hopefully I will receive that soon; and finally, once I placed my order, I received a notice that one of the items was out of stock so I was given a refund on that.

Verdict: can take a little while to receive your order, so be patient & don't place any orders if you have a time constraint such as an upcoming event that is less than a month away 👍🏻👎🏻

Communication:

Romwe has a 'ticket' system which is basically just a message that you send to them via their website. You can ask them anything about orders before/after you place them and they will get back to you within 24hrs. I sent them two tickets overall, one about my payment & one about the shipping status of my items as UPS hadn't updated their tracking for a few days.

They did reply within 24hrs and were very polite in their response, so do feel free to contact them if your have any questions, comments, feedback or complaints.

When I placed my order, because I ordered in bulk, I received an email from them asking for proof of my identity. They asked for a picture of my name on both my payment card and ID, so after I sent them a ticket asking if the email was definitely sent by them (which it was- I don't wanna get scammed!), I sent them a picture of my payment card and my *cough* provisional.. driving license. I made sure to edit out all the other info from the picture except from my name. This was a good security measure on their part to check that I was in fact the person who placed the order and not someone who had stolen my card/card details 👍🏻

Verdict: it was easy to communicate with them as they were polite and quick to respond as well as able to provide the information I needed. Also they had a good security measure in place as I was spending a lot of money buying in bulk 👍🏻

Quality of Items:

When I received my items and tried them on, I thought the quality of the items were decent- room for improvement but not exactly the worst. Remember to keep in mind just how cheap these items are- they're not terrible but you definitely shouldn't expect anything special.

I don't normally pay attention to what material clothing items are before I buy them (unless it's inhumane like real fur, then I won't buy it), so I was surprised by the material of some of the items I received. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't that they were really bad or anything, just in some cases I hadn't read the material listed so I just assumed they'd be something different. For example, the cape blazers I purchased I presumed would be cotton but were actually polyester- nothing to complain about, just an observation you might want to keep in mind when ordering.

One of the pairs of shoes I ordered were slightly broken (one of the studs had popped off in the box), however it's uncertain whether that is a fault of Romwe or it happened during shipping.

Verdict: not the best quality but satisfactory. I don't really have any complaints and I'm not sending anything back because of poor quality 👍🏻

Returns & Exchanges:

The full description Romwe provides about their return/exchange policy is here, so you can read that for more information, but I will list some key things to remember when buying from them.

They don't provide a free returns label so you will have to pay the fee to return your package to them and must be returned to them within 30 days of you receiving the order. The also don't provide anything to fill out about your returns so you will have to put a bit of paper in the box when you return the items describing what you are returning (this is described in more detail in the link I shared above about their returns policy).

You cannot return tights, lingerie, socks, swimsuits, bikinis, bodysuits, jewellery, beauty products, sunglasses or accessories (unless they are broken or damaged when you receive them) so in my case this is very annoying since 8 out of 13 of the swimsuits/bikinis plus 1 bra that I purchased did not fit so I will have to sell them to other people 👎🏻

Exchanges are available but since return shipping may take a while, the item you want to exchange might not be available any longer so in that case you'll just get a refund. 

Verdict: tedious and annoying to make returns as there is no returns form to fill out and no free returns label like some other online stores provide. Also they don't let you return certain items so in my case I won't receive a refund on 8 items unless I can sell them to other people 👎🏻

Final Thoughts:

Overall, I had a positive experience with Romwe. As this was my first purchase, I ran into some hurdles (as I would with any online store I'm purchasing from for the first time), but now I know what I'll need to change about my orders in the future, I am happy to purchase from them again in the future.

Things to Remember:

1. When ordering anything online, make sure you do your research on the company- look up reviews & navigate their website links to find out more information about the company, shipping, costs & returns etc.

2. Keep in mind that you may have to pay customs charges, so make sure you are prepared to pay those or prepared to be happy to send back the items to the sender.

3. Remember that you are buying products before you've tried them out, so try not to be too disappointed if the items aren't suitable for you.

I hope that this review was helpful for you & if you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment on this post & I will get back to you as soon as I can!

Laura xo
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Below are pictures of some of the items I purchased from Romwe & links to where you can buy them on their website:

Moon Crop - Red Playsuit - Striped Dress - Orange Playsuit - Printed Swimsuit - Ripped Jeans - Low Back Swimsuit - Mass Effect N7 Swimsuit - Cape Blazer - Sheer Panel Bodysuit - Red Gown - Denim Jacket - Platform Boots