Grey market gear can be a good decision as long as you realize before you buy and the value received is worth any additional risk, unfortunately some retailers and sellers do a good job of hiding the status of what they sell. Also realize that even authorized retailers will sometimes sell both "market authorized" and grey market products so just going by authorized retailer isn't always a guarantee however authorized retailers generally do a good job of clearly identifying grey market items.
I have bought a few grey market items over the years in various product categories, sometimes because the risk/return tradeoff made it a good decision and in other cases the product I wanted simply wasn't available through an authorized channel. True grey market items are simply items sold in a market and/or through a channel not authorized by the manufacturer or authorized importer. They aren't counterfeit, "seconds", or otherwise of lesser quality. But they won't come with a manufacturer's warranty through the authorized channel, they may not include all normal accessories or the accessories included may not be country appropriate (i.e. wrong power cord/adapter/charger), and information included may be in a language not typical for the country of sale. The least scrupulous of sellers may remove factory included accessories and either leave them out entirely or substitute third party items of lesser value (batteries, "kit" lens, etc.) So buyer beware applies even more when purchasing through an manufacturer unauthorized channel.
One of my 5DS R bodies is grey market, it works just like my other one and came with the same accessories. I still have and use a grey market Seiko watch I bought when I was in the PhD program and part of my doctoral dissertation was based upon grey market products and leakage between imperfectly sealed distribution channels 🙂
Rodger
EOS 1DX M3, 1DX M2, 1DX, 5DS R, M6 Mark II, 1D M2, EOS 650 (film), many lenses, XF400 video
