It also seems like Amazon now holds shipments until the last possible moment if you don't pay for Prime.

Meanwhile, my Target orders often arrive in 2 days or even overnight (in NYC) for free. Wal-Mart's prices for most items I reorder regularly are almost always lower than Amazon and the shipments regularly arrive in 3 days even though they estimate up to a week. The unfortunate thing about Wal-Mart is that they seem to be adopting a lot of the website clutter that has made Amazon so frustrating (e.g. 3rd party listings with shipping/pricing all over the map, and aggressive recommendations on product pages).