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Comment by londons_explore | Hacker News Reader

Small business near me never seem to have online catalogues or stock levels.

Hunting for a specific product (for example a washing line) might involve walking into 3 different shops and guessing which shop might sell what you need. When you arrive in the shop, they always arrange aisles differently so unless you have 20 minutes to hunt you might not find it either.

Whereas online it's a simple search and click "buy now". It's probably cheaper too.

Bricks and mortar shops need to do a lot of work on the shopping experience before they're competitive. The only time bricks and mortar shops win are when I need something right now or groceries.

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I've wanted to dive into FPV drone flying for some time. Finally pulled the trigger on the components I needed to get started...controller, transmitter, goggles, charger, battery, BNF drone. I did this online because it seemed impossible to sort out locally and the prices I did see were +30% or more in price.

Somehow in the process I goofed and ordered batteries with the wrong connector (xt60 v xt30). I spent this morning trying to find other batteries or an adapter in the local metro area.

- There are ~8 hobby stores within 50 miles

- None of them have any stock info online

- I called every one of them and nobody stocked the battery I need, nor an adapter.

- I can go on Amazon, GetFPV, HobbyKing, ReadyMadeRC, etc and find the exact parts I need.

In the same vein I've noticed is that many of the traditional sporting goods stores have basically become clothing stores with an online store for everything else.

Too bad I haven't figured out how to trust random extensions or I would consider using something like this.

All of this said I used to work at a local computer store back in the 90's and can imagine just how difficult it is to run a local store that competes with Internet-based stores.

> Somehow in the process I goofed and ordered batteries with the wrong connector (xt60 v xt30). I spent this morning trying to find other batteries or an adapter in the local metro area.

As someone with direct experience in this whole class of hardware (hobbyist grade UAS stuff), you're going to want to have a soldering setup and low cost consumables (heat shrink tubing, etc, extra connectors that cost a few dollars each) to have your own capability to do things like change out DC power connectors. It's totally normal to get a battery with a connector that you might not want.

If you stay in the hobby for the long run it will cost you a lot less money to have the capability to buy discrete parts and repair things yourself (example: buying a new $40 4-in-1 ESC) than buying bind and fly stuff.

For a lot of hobbies involving electronics having a decent soldering station (and possibly a decent hot air station) is extremely useful. A Hakko FX-888D isn’t terribly expensive, but even a Pinecil or TS-100 will get you far for cheap.

Indeed so, and even some $80 soldering stations sold on amazon are remarkably not terrible these days. Some even come with hot air guns. somewhat randomly chosen example:

https://www.amazon.com/YIHUA-Soldering-Conversion-Temperatur...

I’m always wary of no-name stations not because I think they’re inherently garbage or something, but that few people who really care about a quality station would give them a passing glance so reviews come from people who have no idea what even makes a quality station. I have seen tear downs of Hakko counterfeits that could be confused for the real thing and others that have serious reliability, consistency of safety issues - and these random Chinese direct-to-Amazon ones have the same problems.

Do they probably work most of the time? Sure. But I want the temperature display to mean 500C when it reads 500C and not 450C, and for my iron to be up to temperature just as quick as my FX-888D does without being a fire hazard or potentially let out the magic smoke because some cheap component died.

That said, if anybody is looking for a hot air station don’t buy from Hakko - they’re current models are overpriced and take forever to heat up. Atten (a Chinese brand) sells fantastic stations in the $250 price point that heat faster and have a saner interfaces. Point I’m trying to make here is don’t spend money for a well known brand if you don’t have to, but make sure whatever you buy is equipment you can trust instead and that means having reviews from trusted sources outside of Amazon customers.

This is fantastic advice. I actually have lots of the tools from tinkering with motor controllers but none of the parts lol. I have all that on order (of course, because it's not available locally) so I hopefully will not find myself in this spot again.

Being able to test clothes before you buy them to so if they fit is so much more convenient than ordering the wrong size online.

You can try them on in the local store and then buy the same size online. Works wonders for some products like brand sneakers or jeans.

Works worse when the store closes because you don’t buy stuff there.

I imagine a future in which brick and mortar stores offer the same prices as online (without having to price match), but charge an entry fee for the service of trying stuff on/out.

Won't happen until enough brick and mortar stores close that the remaining ones can get away with it, though.

Agreed. Doesn't anyone go out in their neighbourhood anymore. What's with wanting everything to come to you. I like going out and know the names of the bar managers and store staff at the places I shop....

I'm assuming you mean when there's not a global pandemic

FYI, things like jeans can have a lot of size variability between seemingly identical pairs (same brand, model, and nominal size).

My understanding is that this is because the denim is stacked and then die cut in the factory. Since denim is highly deformable, the cut outs from the top of the stack are not the same size as the cut out from the bottom of the stack. And this can lead to considerable size variance within the "same" pairs of pants.

That's why it's a good idea to try on two pairs of the exact "same" pants if the fit is close, but not quite right. YMMV.

I've only found differences for pants bought in different years.

If I buy two of the same pair, the match each other throughout their lifespan.

Interesting. I've noticed about a half size difference in both waist and leg length on one occasion. One pair didn't fit but it's twin was perfect. \_(ツ)_/

A lot of stores have a price match even for online prices to keep you from doing this. So if you're so cheap to do this, then you could at least reward the local store for providing you a service rather than cheating them out of a sale.

Kohls solves this by giving you 120 day returns so I disagree. Plus you don't have to sort through everything and check the prices in store. Just wait for it to show up, try it out. Keep it if it's good, ditch it if it's not.

You have to wait for shipping, package the return, etc. That doesn't seem as convenient as trying on in the store, even with the added burden of travel to the store and sifting through sizes.

Many online retailers have UPS pickup as part of the service. Amazon for sure, but I’ve used apps from clothing stores directly and some provided the option.

Unfortunately that was a while ago and I don’t have the apps installed to know which it was.

“Going shopping” is an asinine use of my time.

I don't know of any instance where my fashion style or an outfit needs to be fulfilled as fast as a fast food item in the drive through. Plus, I don't get why I got downvoted for posting an opinion on something that isn't even breaking any rules or coming off as any way negative or flaming.

I think it's pretty common for any clothing retailer, but I think the only people who don't mind the experience are people willing to drop hundreds of dollars at a time to buy many different things and then return most of it. I'd rather just go to a store and not have to front the money for anything I'm on the fence about.

As long as you can find your size. I'm tall and thin, so if I want to buy something as basic as Levi's jeans, I have to go to a ton of stores and have limited choices. Now I just get them on Amazon, problem solved.

This is a problem that should have been solved years ago. You should be able to measure yourself very accurately and thoroughly, keep it on some sort of file that you can share what you need, and then use tools on the online sites to learn exactly how their products will fit.

yeah, this is a problem i've solved by learning what brands are internally consistent with their sizing. i know my size in Levi's, and as long as they don't suddenly start making 36/32 jeans fit differently than they used to, i'll keep ordering from them without having to worry about fit.

Guy jeans are real easy because those numbers are actual measurements. Woman's jeans just change that to a single number that changes through the years. Uhg, so annoying.

The inseam is but the waist usually isn’t. It’s just standardized between brands much more than women’s jeans.

No they aren't. I got two pairs of jeans from the same (house) brand in the same store at the same time. I tried on one of them in the store, and naively assumed the other would fit too.

There was a 5 cm (2 inch) difference.

I don't think she was implying that the sizes are always correct. But they are actual dimensions, i.e. inches. As opposed to "size 8", which is relatively meaningless.

What really pisses me off too is the size drifts to make you think you're going down pant sizes. So every so years you need to try clothes on again to get your new number.

Pair that with covid not letting you try things on and it just plain sucks. Sometimes I have to try shotgunning it so I'm not making 3 trips to the store just to try a new number.

A Levi's "36" today is probably more like 39 inches. In fact, most companies have been "vanity sizing" to make people feel better.

The worst offender is "Old Navy" where a 36" is actually a whopping 41 inches. It seems like men won't buy pants that are labeled over 39 inches, so as sizes go up from 30 inches, the "vanity" excess goes up exponentially.

See: https://www.esquire.com/style/mens-fashion/a8386/pants-size-...

How is vanity sizing not false advertising?!

because they don't make any claim that a size 38 is 38 inches.

they used to be, but these days a "size 38" designation doesn't carry any more actual meaning than women's clothing sizes like "size 0"

No one is getting mad or feeling bad about fitting a smaller size than they've earned. It takes a complaint for it to be an issue.

Levi's is one of the worst offenders. There is such a massive sizing variance that I stopped buying them years ago unless I found them in a store.

Yeah, I've had Levi's in front of me where nominally "smaller" sizes of the exact same jeans were visibly bigger. For the life of me I don't understand why measuring jeans to better than an inch is so hard in the 21st century. How is there no incentive for them to fix this? Do they profit from giving people the wrong size?

i think i figured it out. they measure cut sew dye wash. the size changes during the wash, variably depending on the dye and randomness. it would be cost prohibitive to control for this so instead you get size variability which is fine because most people buy in store.

I'm not sure what wash you're referring to, but I'm talking about brand new jeans. Can't they measure whatever they want at the end of manufacture instead of the beginning? It's not like the consumer wears anything but the end product. The error bars are ridiculous.

brand new jeans are washed before you get them. it gives them the texture.

i noticed that a certain jean i buy fit consistently only within a given dye and wash. darker pair or different wash fit differently.

Yeah I get that they're washed, but I don't care if they're washed... can't they just measure something after the wash? Is what I'm asking.

I'm talking about the exact same dye btw. Like the same color, number, everything. Only difference is sizes. I've gotten smaller sizes an inch larger than the "larger" sizes for the exact same jeans. It's ridiculous.

Maybe they came out of different factories?

> can't they just measure something after the wash?

of course they can! those jeans cost double.

it’s not a matter of incompetence or don’t care. it’s a matter of production efficiency.

as for otherwise identical jeans being different sizes, that’s also a matter of consistency of the raw material. if you want high consistency it costs more. consumers aren’t willing to bear that cost.

heh. i guess i knew my size in Levis, it's been more than a few years since i actually bought a pair of their pants.

I gave up on pants sizes. You really have to go there and there is no system to it. Sometimes the numbers get bigger, sometimes smaller.

With shoes there is at least consistency because it seems like it became a penis enlargement thing there. On some brands my size grew from 43 to 47 in the recent years.

There's a company called True Fit (https://www.truefit.com/) which attempts to solve this.

True Fit partners with several stores. You go on a store's web site (for example, macys.com), and you tell True Fit about some clothing you already have that fits well (brand, size, style). Based on that, it refers to its database to recommend the best size of the product you're considering now, and it tells you whether it thinks it will be "snug", "true to you", or "loose".

Basically it just formalizes the kind of knowledge that shoppers use about how brand A tends to run small, brand B runs large, brand C is aimed at young people so its shirts are more tailored, brand D is aimed at older people and their shirts are more "generous" in the waist, etc.

Their web site calls it the "Fashion Genome™", which is a "comprehensive, normalized fashion graph".

How do I actually use this? I have to intentionally seek out brands and stores they've already partnered with?

There's not a directory or anything it seems like.

Looks like this is actually a B2B service that would sell it to existing retailers and/or tailers, not necessarily as something you yourself would sign up for.

Yeah, it doesn't seem set up to help you discover retailers where you can actually use it. Their site does have a list of retail client partners (https://www.truefit.com/Partners/Retail-Clients) which gives a starting point.

I tried visiting several sites and got these results:

Works for me: Macy's, J.Crew, JCPenney

Doesn't work: Kohl's, Dockers, Lands' End, Ralph Lauren

In all cases, I picked a random (except for avoiding store brands) men's casual shirt and looked on the details page near where you select a size.

True fit is more of a conversion boosting tool rather than a tool to help the consumer.

I worked at Levi’s Corp for 3 years and was surprised to learn that clothes have large tolerances in sizes to keep costs down.

True fit says you should select a size based on the size you wear in another brand. That won’t work because no brands have consistent sizing. Even if a brand used extremely tight size tolerances, brands actively size up and down their clothes based on the whims of merchants.

The solution is to just buy 3 sizes of each item you want and select the best fit and return the rest.

> large tolerances in sizes to keep costs down

Yeah, that's the main problem with this. If you're buying higher-end stuff with tighter tolerances, just providing a set of measurements can work. There's a whole industry of tailors in India and Hong Kong who sell made-to-measure dress shirts to Westerners over the internet.

Any links? Need to a get a suit and would love to save.

What happens to the returned items?

I have the same dimensions / issues finding jeans. Quality control on Levi's isn't fantastic and I'm always frustrated with how wide the leg openings are. Difficult to find any pants that fit well, really. Someone recommended I just buy jeans that roughly fit, and take them to a tailor. Such a game changer! For $12 I can basically get any pair of pairs to fit perfectly.

Also stores offer more services. When I buy a pair of jeans the person in the store will adjust the length so the jeans fit my odd lenght. I bought a watch yesterday and it cost me $60 more in store than online, but in the store they helped me change change the size and if I have issues with it I can drop it of in the store and they will send it for repairs. Just more convinient for me than figuring out how to safely submit it myself.

Plenty of online stores let to order stuff to fit them and return what doesn't fit.

who wants to return stuff

Most make it super easy. I think Amazon even includes a return label just in case. Waaay better than driving to a store with perfume masking stink, wait in line for fitting rooms, wait in line to pay. So many cons to going in store… most stores are stink boxes.

YES this. Cheap purfume is everywhere these days. I blame AXE commercials - because now men are wearing perfume more than women ever did.

point was that for clothing you can avoid returns by trying it on first

The real issue is: do you want to travel somewhere to try it on, or do you want to try it on in the comfort of your own home?

It's very subjective but personally, I enjoy going shopping for clothes. Unless I can't find the item in my city.

Stuff like electronics is different. Then I don't care about seeing and feeling the product beforehand. Instead I value that stuff is easy to findz search, price and availability. Though I still but stuff locally because I don't want to wait for shipping

To the store? Not me.

With a free UPS pickup because it was included with the purchase? Me.

i don’t buy clothes online but in the rare event i do i buy from amazon and super high end retailers where you just send it back without calling.

i order 2-3 sizes and send back the ones that don’t fit.

convenience of online with just the added small bump of a trip to the post office or UPS.

I find even the larger businesses have much poorer shopping experiences than Amazon. I wanted to buy a book last year. I found it on a major, non-amazon bookseller's website. However, no "Look-inside", not even a description, no reviews, no real information about it aside from the title and [very short] description. I ended up going to Amazon to find all this info and having a look at the "Look inside" first few pages, and then buying it from the other retailer. It worked, but not exactly great, people going to a competitor's website to research the product.

It sucks, because I want to support businesses other than Amazon and the like, ones that pay corporation tax and don't abuse their market position, but the other stores really have to raise their game. For better or worse, Amazon has definitely been a game-changer in retail and it's not enough to trade like it's the year 2000 any more. You have to be innovative and see software as a way to improve your offering.

Talking from the perspective of local business owner - it isn’t possible to compete with Amazon on ”online” features.

This needs two efforts - people have to be Ok with an inferior shopping experience to a certain extent. Can’t have cake and eat it.

Second, Software powered world needs a different kind of monopoly control - we shouldn’t talking about “breaking up Amazon” - that just creates busy work from yet another set of programmers to work on duplicating everything Amazon has. That is a waste of resources.

Instead regulation should force Amazon to share its “retail infra” and may be allow local business to relicense/partner with some of it.

As a software guy, rebuilding many of the features of Amazon that users love isn't awfully hard or expensive.

I think it's a unique combination of logistics and tech which few companies manage to successfully pursue. Things like hooking up the cash register system to the website so the website doesn't say "in stock" when someone has bought the last one. It's pretty easy for someone techy to do that, but there is rarely a sufficiently techy person on staff in a typical small business.

"Breaking up Amazon so that fulfilment is a separate business, which other companies besides may do business with" seems isomorphic to "force Amazon to share its infrastructure" to me.

> it isn’t possible to compete with Amazon on ”online” features.

I'm not sure that's a true statement. I've completely ceased buying computing equipment from Amazon because their search is so goddamned useless. Newegg's power search actually works and lets me find what I'm looking for.

I've been really curious why Amazon can't implement sort by exact price.

For computer hardware, I use PCPartPicker to find what I want, and follow their link.

Yes, I know that those will definitely be referral links, but I'm fine with that.

I'm ok paying NewEgg's (sometimes) slightly higher prices because they took the time to put together a good search.

I stopped buying from Newegg. Firstly when I made two identical orders once (I intended to get two hard drives, only got one, so ordered the second a few hours later when I noticed), they _silently_ deleted one of them with no indication of what happened, leaving no record of it in my account. This was _after_ I had a purchase confirmation email for both orders. CS was unwilling to apply the now-expired sale price to a new order when I contacted them. Secondly, when someone bought a $3000 camera on my account (had no credit cards attached, they used a gift card) Newegg closed my account when I reported it, and I now cannot use my primary email account with them, as there's an existing closed account with that address. I consider both of these to be their fault--yes, I could have checked my account more often, but I generally rely on email communications for online purchases; and my account could have been restored by resetting password and logging out existing sessions.

> It sucks, because I want to support businesses other than Amazon and the like, ones that pay corporation tax and don't abuse their market position, but the other stores really have to raise their game.

Amazon uses that money it saves from not paying tax to improve its website and service. That's why others aren't able to compete.

I don't understand how in 2021 small businesses have such a hard time with inventory / stock?

I've always tried to support local, but lately I've given up on local bike stores near me house. Went in looking for simple things, spokes, tube patches, quick links for chains. Only to be stared at blankly with confusion or told they don't have said items in stock. I went home an ordered off Amazon in 2 minutes, arrived next day.

Similar experiences with all types of things.

One thing I'm not sure about is if small businesses really care about surviving or competing with "the internet" I've not really seen much evidence to support this idea.

Bike stores might be a little unique given the huge crunch of new bikes going out the doors, and fewer parts readily available. But yes, thats surprising, and its strange they didnt just act as a proxy, ordering from, well, anywhere! To get you sorted.

I make an effort to route everything through my local bike shop; as the two who operate it are both skilled mechanics and actually ride, so are a body of knowledge. I dont find that with other chain based stores, who keep sales and mechanics separate. Its at the latter I get blank looks, usually from sales people, and I dislike it intensely

A small business is never going to be able to match the variety of an online store in terms of inventory.... they simply don't get enough customers to afford to hold every single possible variety of something like an online store. An online store can have customers from all across the country (and world), so obscure items will be bought by SOMEONE more often.

A small business isn't going to hold something in inventory that only one person every 5 years wants

A quick link for a shimano chain though...

I work for a large outdoor retailer and the difficulties fulfilling bicycles is not unique to -any- store, big or small, right now.

I’m sorry, I can’t help but point out that you could call the store before you left your house. And when in the store, you could ask a sales associate for help. Just sayin!

Calling a store is usually phone system menu hell, you will usually ultimately reach a 19 year old that doesn't care or someone in a call center.

What small/local store has a call center?

Well my most recent experience is trying to call the local number for the electric company office in my town which went to someone asking what state I live in.

Prepare to be on hold a very long time and be subjected to the person who answered the phone flagging down a coworker to go physically check the isle.

> I can’t help but point out that you could call the store before you left your house. And when in the store, you could ask a sales associate for help.

This is still worse than going to amazon and doing a quick search, seeing a ton of different products that satisfy your needs, and reading reviews from people that bought them. Then when you purchase it arrives in a day. Fake reviews aside, this is vastly superior.

And then possibly ending up with a counterfeit.

And mislead by fake reviews.

That is equally possible in a brick-and-mortar store. Even regulated shops such as pharmacies are suspected of selling counterfeits: https://www.deutsche-apotheker-zeitung.de/news/artikel/2017/...

I'd even argue that brick-and-mortar is more prone to counterfeits because control buying by the original producers is far harder.

That's hilarious!

Do you... try that regularly?

Stores are so understaffed, you're lucky to get them to pick up the phone at all, and if they do you often won't get accurate information. They'll never walk to an aisle to see if something is physically there, they'll tell you if it's "in the system", but frequently "the system" will show 3 in stock while the reality is zero on the shelf. Or 48 in stock but they're all on a pallet in the back they can't get to.

And good luck finding a sales associate in the store itself. Quite frequently there simply aren't any -- only cashiers, a security guard, and people restocking who don't have the knowledge to help you at all.

Actually my wife does this all the time and it works, especially for small businesses. Larger companies have websites, and small businesses care enough to do things like check the stock for you.

So I guess my anecdote cancels yours out?

This goes for San Francisco retail shops but also I'm sure other places: Some of the stores don't open till noon. Some are only open 3 days a week. Some stores are open the days the other stores are closed. I'm talking about some of the most popular retail storefronts in SF.

There are no good options. I went through this recently where I had to call different stores on 3 separate days, waiting till 10am, 11am, or 12pm. And you still don't know the product you are asking about is really the one you are after. There are so many versions of products and specific use cases nowadays.

The previous posters experience resonates much more with me than your experience.

Even when you do go to a shop you are often redirected online. That item isn't in stock on the computer. No attempt to upsell you or suggest an alternative which they might have in stock. It's no wonder high street stores are dying out.

To be fair, small specialist stores are usually much better. I even got a call back from a company the last time I was trying to buy a specific BBQ. Sadly they didn't have it in stock and a day or two later I found it online.

The underlying problem with these anecdotes is that All of these experiences depend on who is working that day.

It may even be influenced by who is working that week or that month or who runs the place this year.

Ecommerce is imperfect in many ways, but it is far more consistent in its imperfection than local retail.

W.C. Winks Hardware Inc. in Portland, Oregon has been around since 1909 and is amazing.

You can go in there with some odd piece of hardware and someone will personally wait on you, assess your request and find the exact item or closest likeness.

The staff is patient and friendly, in my experience it is ideal local retail. But Winks doesn’t do ecommerce at all, so I often must relegate it to unusual hard to figure HW needs, because not every project needs this level of service.

I’m in agreement that retail has some pretty serious work to do to stay in the running. It might not be fair or “right” but it has to happen nonetheless.

I live in a fairly small town. Almost every store is minimally staffed, often by a single person. Phones regularly go to voicemail. Calling up the local shoe store to ask whether they have something in my size will get an interesting response. I’m also thinner than average here, so entire pants racks at the local clothing stores just don’t carry a single piece in my size.

One store I frequented was owner operated with probably their daughter as an employee. They would walk around with a cordless phone on their hip so as to not miss a call. If there's enough interest, people find a way.

A phone without a cord? What is this magic?

Yes. Just tell the guy to get off his butt and go and see if the item is in stock. This has worked every time for me. I call walmart on a reg to see if an item is in stock before having to drive all the way there.

So my choice is to harass/insult a minimum wage employee and distract them from their already-overloaded and already-minmaxed job so that I can spend more, get in my vehicle and spew carbon into the atmosphere to......give money to a family of ultra-billionaires instead of one ultrabillionaire? And that's helping my local economy?

Why are you harassing and insulting them in the first place? Nobody taught you how to speak politely?

The GP said to tell the employee to get off his butt, which is usually interpreted as rude.

They didn't mean you should literally say those exact words. You could say something like "Would you mind checking it for me yourself? I'd really appreciate it."

Not sure I’d consider Walmart the kind of local business being discussed here...

Walmart is not a local shop. They have a pretty large software dept i house and you could probably check availability online yourself.

You sound like you're describing a Walmart or Target. I thought we were talking about local small businesses. All the niche small businesses around me, the store owner is often the one who takes the call and they know their inventory inside and out

I asked floor staff and manager about item that they had pile of in previous week, they said its all gone I even pointed on same item smaller size (slow cooker) went two aisle down found bunch of them there. Shop staff is not keeping track with items being sold unless you ask about bread and milk locations

In my experience, if i’m 10 mins away from a store, my end to end time is at least an hour if you don’t already know where the items is and if it is in stock. Then it’s 30-45 minutes. Driving, parking, walking into the store, check out, walking out, driving takes a surprising amount of time if you actually count it.

If I call, it’s often 5 to 10 minutes for the call to determine stock availability (often the clerk needs to go wander around to find it, or go to the far back of their lot to see how much they have). That’s assuming anyone knows what I’m talking about/I can adequately describe what I’m looking for without them getting confused, which isn’t always the case.

This adds up. For some things it’s worth it, or even essential. For other things, it is not. I’ve given up on in-person for computer/networking/IT equipment for instance. Too difficult to get a clear answer, local markups and stocking are too unpredictable, it’s so much faster doing a search and purchasing online.

I can also go online and buy it from any retailer living in 2021 for a similar or better price. It's really not practical to call up the store and ask about every single item I'm looking for.

You're not wrong that those are options, but those options are the exact reason brick and mortar stores are struggling to stay afloat. They offer an inferior service.

Tried this when I wanted a tool to help pick a tubular lock that was being difficult with the improvised stuff I was trying and which I didn't want to drill out. Of all the hardware stores and hobby shops I called, only one actually took me seriously and checked to be sure they didn't have it. All the rest falsely told me that lock picking was illegal and seemed to take offense.

Ended up buying some cheap shit off ebay that got the job done.

They might do that for the occasional person, but it wouldn't scale. They have to hire far more people.

So now I have to spend 5-10 minutes talking with someone and waiting on them just to find the price versus knowing it instantly. Then I have to drive there and buy it (if it is cheaper) versus just having it shipped free to my house. None of this makes sense for me to do.

I love going into my local Ace Hardware stores. I have found that these are usually staffed by older/retired guys that have been there, done that, and they are eager to assist. In fact, one guy would recognize me and ask what "crazy" thing I'm trying to do now. This is all because the first time we interacted I was attempting to build a "portable" 25' long suspension cable system for a camera rig. We probably spent 2 hours looking at all of the doodads they had available (of course he'd help other customers when needed). However, we did spend a lot of time just chatting about random projects. At the end, he asked if I'd show him the result of it when finished. It was sad day when I learned he had passed away. Kind of like losing a distant relative.

Show me where Amazon or whatever online shop can emulate that.

A service which you find useful that eventually disappears? I think you may find some Google products to fill this niche :)

haha, nice and true to a point with a few caveats - you may search for what you think you need which is a "whatsit" which can be fixed by a "whoseit", which may be in fact be best solved by a "thingamajig".

At my local hardware store this saved me $40 and a whole bunch of plumbing and a trip back to the store when the seasoned veteran simply asked what i was trying to do. The money, meh, saving the time and frustration priceless.

The best help is when someone asks you what you are trying to accomplish instead of what isle something is in. It's why you go back to that store and learn when certain employees are working. To the young workers, i totally get that your underpaid and not your career path or one at all. Perhaps for some of the older/retired gen is it more supplimental income and they enjoy being a knowledge base for people like me who sometimes know enough to be dangerous..

how do i get this Tele-Phone app you speak of?

Do we really need such shops though? It's like being concerned about horses, when more and more people drive cars. Only thing I buy in a corner store is probably bin bags and something like water if I forget to put it in my bag before leaving house. Everything else I buy online because I can compare, read about the product, watch reviews etc. when in store being on the phone looking up products is not comfortable. We should accept that certain era has ended and look how these store owners could transition into online world. If a corner store was online, I could order that bin bag and they could just pop it in through my door few hours later.

How true is that really? Maybe there will come a point where this is true, but there are still lots of things on Amazon that don't have next-day delivery. Many specialty items on Amazon have slow shipping, and I would gladly have bought them at a local store if I had the choice; I used to until they all closed.

But by the very nature of being a specialty item, there's unlikely to be a shop for that thing in any given area. Occasionally you luck out and it turns out you live near a major kitesurfing shop or whatever, but on average you're no better off than online - probably worse off if you actually make a day trip to a brick-and-mortar shop halfway across the country.

My new favorite is hunting through their online catalogues and only finding the things I want via their online sales. Just with worse shipping.

Other then niche products like brewers items, furniture and other home goods it’s difficult to find things I need.

It’s not like I live in the woods either.

It's also part of their business model. If you call for info on products they will half-ass it and try to avoid giving much information. They believe forcing people into coming will more likely make them buy at least something.

I've tried to approach some local businesses to create an online catalog and they claim their competition would use it against them...

If you already know exactly what you want, buying online from a big corporation will always be better than buying from a local brick and mortar store.

I think bookstores are one of the best examples. Amazon has literally everything, but if you're not exactly sure what to read next, if you walk through the highly curated aisles of a local used bookstore, or talk to the (highly knowledgeable) person behind the front desk, you'll probably walk out of the door with something awesome.

I just don't buy this argument. If you go to a store, you'll get the opinion of the people who work there. If you go online, you can get perspectives from any number of people (and make sure their tastes are similar to yours).

Nearby (unrelated to this extension, AFAICT) is a company that creates a unified online storefront for local shops and they handle the separate ordering, pickup, and delivery to shoppers:

“On Nearby, they shop across multiple local stores, in one basket, with one checkout, and no fuss. After a customer checks out, we place orders with you and the other stores, and do the work of putting the order together.”

https://nearbyhq.com/

If I hunt for specifics I usually call small shops: "Hello. Do you have washing lines? Oh, thank you."

Bigger chains usually has a website you can browse instead.

The value-add is that I can see the washing line before I buy it. Pictures just doesn't make it - they lie. And then I would have to live with a crappy washing line because what are the chances I would bother replacing it with another cheap random internet washing line.

Have you ever thought about calling the store to see if it is in stock before going out of your way to drive there. This would prevent you from leaving your computer desk. Also for the increased price that local shops might have, I view that as a convienience fee for not having to wait 3-4 days for the package to arrive at my house.

Not to mention supporting the local economy.

The search latency is high. It can be very frustrating.

Not scalable though is it. If everyone only goes when needing something right now, there won’t be any shops left to be able to get something right now. I love the concept of local recommendations but yes real-ish-time inventory of local shops needs solving too.

> there won’t be any shops left to be able to get something right now

Of course there will be, because demand will still exist.

There will just be less shops, with higher prices, and focused only on the types of things people tend to need immediately.

But that's exactly what people would want -- buy most of your stuff cheaply online with a delay, but have shops specializing in need-it-now categories of things for a premium price.

It's an entirely viable model.

>real-ish-time inventory of local shops needs solving too.

Shops seem reluctant to do this, possibly because they don't like being price matched or view their inventory as a trade secret.

Exactly. I'm not driving around for 2 hours comparing against local businesses on the off chance they can compete on $20 in random crap I buy. Small businesses are simply too time and information inefficient in most cases for general goods.

Just thought of an awesome way to get inventory data by crowd-sourcing it. Sort of creating a game for consumers

Maybe this is a good opportunity to create a "reverse Amazon" service for small businesses?

Well, yeah.

The point is to sacrifice convenience to support local stores.

You want to do the right thing AND you want it to be more convenient? Sounds like you're just looking for convenience.

> Hunting for a specific product (for example a washing line) might involve walking into 3 different shops and guessing which shop might sell what you need.

The horror!

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