Looking in to purchasing a larger roasting machine but good gosh ...it is so much more in the US than buying direct from China . Is that safe ? I can save about 8-10000.00 if I buy direct on Alibaba for the same china built machine that you can get in US . I realize the service would be better here but dam... Can not swing the cost difference . Guess I would rather take the 10,000 savings chance .If I could get a used 6 KG it would be nice but even those are around 12- 14000 in the US .Anyone deal with a reputable Alibaba company ?

I did buy one expensive item from Alibaba a few years ago. I did it with Paypal so I got some protection if I needed it. I paid the PayPal fees.

You might find that the total cost to your door is much higher.

If you stick with a relatively known manufacturer, Bideli or BlueKing for example, there's a good chance you'll get some after-sale support.

Halfway between western brands and chinese ones you'll find the Turkish roasters. Some of them are represented stateside.

I am in Guangdong, China, I use Bideli 1KG electric coffee roast.
It is generally safe to buy a coffee roaster in Alibaba.
I think the biggest problem is transportation.

I'd stick to facebook on this one, although I have helped folks with both Taiwan and Chinese roasters. There's a learning curve to the terminology with importing anything, hooking up with a good freight forwarder or local customs agent is educational.

I've poked around Alibaba for coffee roasters. It is a scary minefield of misinformation. The headline says 1kg roaster, but the picture shows a 10kg. If you sift through the pictures you see many different configurations which look like completely different roasters. Maybe 10-year old pictures combined with newer ones? Maybe even pictures of other company's roasters gleaned from other websites? Prices don't line up with what the listing is stating. $500 for a 10kg roaster?

Clarity of ads aside, you would need to contact someone on the ground that speaks the Queen's English to get remotely comfortable.

Shipping would likely be $1500 to a port near you. Then there are import duties and customs fees. Maybe another $1000. Some of these costs are one time set up fees, but you still have to pay them, even for only one roaster. Then you have to get it from the port to your door. $500 more, or rent a truck and buy a few friends some beer.

All in all, I'd bet the savings would not be nearly as much as you think. And then there is the roaster itself. That's what you are going to have to live with a long while. Does it have all the features you want? Or are you going to outgrow it in a year or two?

I was in the same position last year. I wasn't sure if drum roasting was for me, so I looked for months until I found a motivated seller unloading a 5kg Turkish roaster. We settled on $6K and I was on my way. It took another few months of modifications in my spare time until I got it to where I could reasonably control a roast. I had to contact the mfg a few times. He offered to sell me the same one I had for about $8K. At first I was bummed that I could have gotten a new one for a little more than I paid for a used 1-year old roaster, but then I found out that the guy I got it from paid $13K to get it to his door.

But now that I have learned how to get the most from this roaster, I'm finding that I need more to get further down the rabbit hole. I would love variable speed air and drum. I would love a magnehelic showing me exact air pressure. I would love if it communicated with Artisan better. I don't even want automation...I just want more data that I can use when cupping roasts.

My advise would be to compare anything you find over there with the new MCR 6kg machine. It is a really nice piece if kit. More bells and whistles than you need and local support. Also, Dan from USRC can build you almost anything you want for a very reasonable price.

Remember, you are not going to be able to call the Maytag repair man to work on your roaster when it develops an issue. You are going to have to figure it out and fix it yourself. IMHO, if you are not the handy kind, you need a partner that is. No one should be in the roasting business unless you know how to work on machinery.

It's been said: "The bitterness of poor quality remains long after the sweetness of low price is forgotten." Nowhere is that more true then when it comes to a piece of equipment for business...especially your main piece of equipment. If your venture is successful, the price will be long forgotten in short order. If not, it really does't matter anyway. And selling a quality machine will be much easier than an unrecognized name from somewhere over there.

You're talking about a project not just a purchase... so it's worth reflecting for a few moments in project management.

You can define the desired end state of the project (roaster installed and operating and producing a batch)

Then break down that end state into pieces (based on the ideal end state, what are all the interconnecting pieces, services, etc and operation look like?)

Then determine the A to B pathway from now to end state for each piece

Then identify the cost of the pathway for each option

And be sure to cost out time as well, shipping, insurance, fees, taxes, duties... always describe your end state and demand the final cost "all in". Some places dump an item at the end of your driveway. How do you get it from there I to the shop, set up, etc.?

This can be put into a simple spreadsheet with all the steps as rows and all the options as columns

I did this even to choose a place to live in a new city. Looking at total cost of rent, utilities, transit pass, and commuting time (converted to cost by multiplying with hourly wage) the "right" answer became obvious.

Yep, in the business world we call that a business plan. But everyone wants to buy a roaster before writing one.

I would suggest starting your search for that 5 - 6 Kg roaster on AliExpress as it is geared more to the single item buyer. As to import customs A roaster of that capacity should be considered as commercial restaurant equipment and enter duty free. This should be researched before ever buying something of that cost as a bad guess is going to really ruin the budget.