Some people are prudent when shopping online and request samples of the items they wish to buy so that they can make an informed decision whether the items are worth the cost. However, some concerns send good samples and then follow up with substandard goods and then go off the radar. Is it worth the trouble?
I believe that samples can give you a good idea of what you should expect when you buy a product. As most business people want to retain all their customers I'm certain that customer satisfaction will be their top priority. Of course there could be times the samples will be of higher quality than the product you'll buy but it's quite a rare occurrence.
That would be highly unlikely as samples cost a lot of money to produce and it would be counter productive to do so. The problem lies in that people sample things and make an emotional decision, and then when they buy the product it is more of a practical one.
Over here, requesting samples are unheard of. You can only get that if the company offers their products to be sampled for free, like in supermarkets for example, I see offers for free wine tastes or free giveaways of their products.
Brands could lie in advertisements and gimmicky promotions, but when it comes to handing out samples, there is not need to lies. Samples actually can give you a good idea of what you should expect when you buy a product. I'm also certain that customer satisfaction will be their highest priority.
There are some companies that usually produce excellent samples, however, when you get the actual item you may find that they are flaws which did not show up in the samples. Therefore, I don't believe in trusting samples alone because sometimes they are misleading. I believe in backing up the samples with some research and reviews.
When I used to buy a lot of cosmetics and beauty products on this huge Canadian online stores, depending on how much I spent, they'd include a few nice samples with my order. The more I spent, the better the samples. I mean some of them were near enough regular sized bottles and pots. I loved it because the samples were always well known and very expensive brands. And I never had to ask ever, they were just automatically added to my order. So yes, depending on where you get them, samples can be very reliable.
I don't think quality of sample and the real product is same. Since the businesses try to attract customers by offering free samples, quality of samples is better that the actual product. Some businesses even reduce the quality of product when they manufacture the second batch. I cannot verify my statement because it is just a thought.
I haven't experienced any brand that sent out samples that were different from the final product so I do trust them when I get them. I guess the closest to this would be when I taste something that may have variations in preparation so he hen I prepare it myself it might not come out exactly the same but I understand that as I don't think it is the company's fault. There are also times when certain conditions make for some variations like how long the product has been sitting out or even what mood I was in that day but that's about it.
