Temu doesnt make it's money on sales though. It makes its money on its userbase. For temu the point isn't the products it's the data. This has been a known thing for a while and it's not alone.
The author spent almost $50 buying junk on Temu just to try it out. Such profligate spending habits are why Americans' private data is worth so much in the first place, and Temu can tap into that directly. Hence also the constant reminder emails to hopefully trigger more impulse buys "because it's cheap." The goods are even cheaper than that at the factory gate...