I love how Amazon has gone from customer obsession to the lowest of the lowest common denominator. Easiest boycott of my life to stop buying tripe from them.
They’ve successfully pivoted from customer obsession to obsessed customers.
They’ve successfully pivoted from customer obsession to obsessed customers.
I made the mistake of buying bandaids from there, they looked like a brand name but slightly off, they gave my kids rashes.
I made the mistake of buying LED light bulbs from there, the brand name was reputable but who knows if what I actually got was the same brand or a copy, they started flickering and randomly going out within a year.
I made the mistake of buying an LED monitor from there. It turned out to be some third party seller with a ridiculous return policy, so even though I had been conditioned to think Amazon had good return policy, now that they let third party sellers set their own policies I had to eat 30% of cost to return it.
No more Amazon for me.
Walmart, Staples, Best Buy, Microcenter, Ace Hardware (there is usually a local one near you that is a Mom & Pop with the affiliation so they can do online orders and inventory management, etc), Walgreens, Lowes/Home Depot, Digikey, Ikea, eBay, or if you don't mind waiting you can just skip the middle man and go right to Ali Express.
Also, it is always a good idea to check the manufacturer's site if you know you want something specific -- they almost always have a 10% - 25% off new customer/newsletter signup deal.
Add a password manager and it's just a couple clicks, really no more work that amazon.
So for a huge amount of my stuff, I'll see if I can buy directly from the person/people that make it.
Before, if you wanted to have a web store, you basically had to have a kid build you a website, updating was slow, every transaction processing system was different, (or they just took it in a web form and processed your card by hand on the visa machine in the office), the website didn't process inventory so someone had to keep that up-to-date. Then, they'd take your address and box to the post office and get a label. Hopefully, you didn't fat finger it, there was no data sanitation on the form and the post office isn't checking. And, if you didn't get the right product, they were out of stock, it was damaged . . . w/e, the return process was an email, goofy web form, or phone call to get a person on the phone to manually handle whatever went wrong, and that's if they weren't just a scammer and were actually going to ship you your stuff.
Now, any business that wants to have an online store front can grab a template, upload some pictures of their inventory, and the site handles payment processing, buys and prints a label, schedules a shipping pickup, handles the return process including generating return shipping labels. Often, the processor has a quick payment resolution system.
Amazon was really good at some point because they had enough people to build those things and make the experience pretty good, like, you just knew that you wouldn't get ripped off, you could send it back, hell, order two and pick the one you like and send one back. Youu didn't even have to enter your card number into some dodgy site or stop to type your shipping address and risk sending it next door with no recourse because amazon already has that seup.
But now, a lot of that barrier to entry is gone as companies have made the various parts of the stack available for a small percentage of each transaction. You can go to a website that works, order something, pay with paypal or stripe which have some customer protections, just select the shipping address on file with the processor and get an email with a tracking number a minute later. If you don't like it, you can send it back and the site will probably even integrate with usps/ups/shipper of choice help you to create a label and arrange a next day pickup.
And when you buy directly from the company, you can assume they are validating their product and it's not a fake, you know there's been no inventory mixing. You know what you are going to get.
And, to top it off, with a password safe, you can track accounts at 500 places so it's not really that much of a hassle to have multiple accounts, and that's only if you have to make an account because the payment processor of choice (of which they probably have several), even requires you to make an account on their site.
My point being, that other than amazon being a single point of shopping, they really don't offer anything that a small business can't for a relatively small effort.
I miss wandering the isles of Costco though.
Batteries I get at Costco when they go on sale, Walmart if run out before a Costco sale.
These aren't items I'd usually buy online but all three of those stores have online sites where you can order their merchandise.
But they do quite a few other things I like: If you choose that delivery is not urgent, they will wait for all articles to be available and send them as one package. You can pay a little extra to have the carbon footprint of your order offset. They have their own paid staff that answers questions on products in addition to the community. They pay their own writers to review products and write guides for selecting the correct product in a category, and they seem very genuine, it doesn't read like marketing BS.
So generally, I feel quite good about shopping there. And it seems their style fosters a community of buyers that care about buying the correct product for their needs, and wanting to inform others about their experience.
> Everything on Amazon is shady knock-off garbage.
I have had the opposite experience. Everything I have bought over the past 20 years has been legit, except for one single thing.
The website is fun and nostalgic to me.
I don't know if this was ever made public knowledge, but I'm wondering if this is now coming to fruition a decade later with all these e-bike fires.
I figure if I ever need to commit arson I'm just going to charge a Chinese e-bike on a Chinese power strip and feign ignorance.
No other store/website even comes close to this. BB gives you 2 weeks to try the product, and you'd have to drive all the way to their location to return the thing.
I keep purchasing from Amazon mainly because of the return policy, but I agree that there are cheaper options out there.
The marketplace reseller denied my refund because he claims I swapped the product. I escalated the issue to the Amazon support. They told my that this decision is final and I can nothing do about it. I let my lawyer send them a letter. Only then Amazon gave me my money back.
This if the story how Amazon lost me as a long time customer because of poor and stubborn support over a 23€ product.
That's as appealing an idea as it is horrifying, honestly.
Who’s getting shafted on processing these returns?
Amazon is 12 month 0% APR installments on anything >$50, 5% cash back on everything else, no questions asked drop-off at Whole Foods/UPS returns/pickups. Your money is back in your pocket that day.
I tried Best Buy, NewEgg, and eBay. NewEgg, you'd think, would be better. But their return policy is non-existent compared to the convenience Amazon provides.
I think how I feel Amazon.com has degraded is that they've made it so smooth to shop that I end up buying things I don't need. It feels like the site has spliced itself into my "oh yeah I can solve that" internal loop and makes me spend $30 on some crappy (cheap) solution and before I know it it's on my doorstep.
If you live in the USA and have a Microcenter anywhere nearby, I suggest paying a visit.
I had the choice of buying my 65" LG from Amazon, sure, I have an account already. But someone (Reddit?) suggested to buy directly from LG to make sure you get a factory-fresh box. Seeing all the Amazon shenanigans, it was an easy decision. 10 minutes and I checked out the new TV from LG directly.
I buy small household items from Amazon, floor wipe refills, batteries - and these are not at risk of being scammy products in the first place, unless someone is a total dolt.
As for return policies - that's just a matter of doing your homework. I don't think I ever returned anything to Amazon.
These days I avoid 'market' places like Amazon and Bol like the plague as I've been bitten too many times.
The last few times I tried to buy anything expensive from Amazon, the item I received was faulty and I ended up just sending it back and buying a replacement direct from the retailer. I also don’t care at all about next day delivery since if I need something so urgently I can just go out and find it myself.
That seems so strange to me. Here in Germany we have countless electronics shops that have better (as in cleaner, well categorized) inventory as well as better prices than Amazon. Amazon can work quite well for these devices but it's just one of many options. Not using something like Geizhals to compare prices very likely results in overpaying.
And of course, a minimum return policy of 14 days is set via european legislation for all shops.
Maybe I'm misremembering but I don't remember this halcyon time where amazon was able to distinguish themselves from competitors to the consumer via anything but listed inventory. Their website has always been a cluttered mess filled with spam....
It was inventory plus ease of use. Which is customer obsession.
One click purchase. Next day delivery. Flat fee shipping (prime). No questions asked drop-off returns. True, useful reviews. Good algorithmic sorting. Best in class logistics.
It was really much better than anything else online.
Now reviews are shit, searching products is a nightmare of sorting through clones and knockoffs, marketplace returns are hit or miss... and that's why it's worse.
At some point they got rid of that despite it being useful. I assume that Amazon prefers being able to control what you see when you search for an item. Now you’ll still see carousels and comparison tables when you click on an item, but it’s all stuff that vendors paid to have placed there (or that Amazon decided it wants you to see).
Additionally, because of inventory mixing, they don't really know who put the fraud in and who didn't (maybe they do, but they don't seem to do anything about it)
Additionally, some of the stuff on the site is not stored or shipped by them at all, you buy from the store site and it gets shipped from the vendor.
So no, they really haven't made a system that they can use to validate their items sold at scale.