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3a it shows up in an Amazon box delivered by an Amazon truck.
Or you go to their site and they just direct you to Amazon – and not because they’re lazy, to sell on Amazon you need to agree that you won’t offer the product cheaper than Amazon anywhere else, including on your own site.
And, that’s even assuming you can go to the manufacturer’s site. Often instead you’ll just get a facebook page, or maybe not even that.
I hate when I go to a manufacturers site and navigate to “products,” filter the list and find what I want, and on the product page it gives a description, no “add to cart” button but a “buy on amazon” button.
Like. FFUUUUCCCKKKKKKK.
[image of a computer leaving a broken window of a high-rise building]
Yeah. Especially if it’s a very specific version of a product you want, and they just link to their “amazon store”, which has terrible search filters, or doesn’t have that model available.
It’s not just that they give a big cut of their sales to Amazon, it’s that often the manufacturer puts a lot of effort into having different versions of their product with different features. But, then it’s dumped on Amazon. Amazon’s search is “helpful” and gives you similar products and then uses their “recommended” ranking to put products they make more money from at the top.
- Amazon still delivered the product because they use Amazon for their own fulfillment.
Literally just had this happen.
Honestly I’ve mostly been finding items cheaper on Amazon either because you’d have to pay for shipping on it, or because they just entirely neglect their website since nobody uses it.
Also that only really applies to “real” brands, not the gibberish named brands. Those companies only exist to use Amazons brand registry for better SEO and probably don’t even have a website. AINOPE is not a “real” company, they just slap their name on whitelabel products. Of course the first random one I picked does have one, but it is more expensive than amazon.
At least with AINOPE or GJHUIRAJ or MBHJOILJRE you can go to Ali Express and get it more directly from China, often for half the price.
Yeah but you’re almost definitely not getting that within the 2-8 days the OP quotes, compare that to being able to get shit within hours in some cases through Amazon and it’s curtains
Unless you don’t need your curtains right away and wouldn’t mind waiting a few extra days/weeks to get them much cheaper.
Some places don’t. 3M, for example, in spite of how big it is. I needed P100 filters. I go to 3M which links me to Amazon. I could go to Home Depot, or buy from the Amazon 3M store and pay 2/3 to half.
WEN. A tool company that actually sells their own from their site. For whatever reason, their stuff is 10% more expensive on their own site, plus shipping.
And let’s not forget returns, which are free, easy and require no packaging most of the time with Amazon. I hate to say it, but they’ve got keeping people hooked figured out.
Walmart does well. The shipping is faster with no membership. And the returns are easier than Amazon. Provided you make sure the “fulfilled by Walmart” box is checked. But it’s Walmart, run by shitheads and associated with Heritage.
Michaels does alright on the crafting materials side. As does Blick, on art supplies. Fabric Warehouse is fairly solid for fabric though their selection is a bit random.
People I’ve talked to actually like shopping in just one place. So you’re combatting the “one stop shopping” thing as well.
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I’m happy with slightly slower and non-free shipping if it buys me the knowledge that I get a genuine product. That’s not a given with Amazon.
I think they finally stopped commingling items between different sellers but there still enough dodgy shit floating around that I’d rather go to the manufacturer or a dedicated retailer for anything expensive or commonly faked.
Especially for expensive stuff. Lenient return policy or not, I’d rather not wait for my new phone twice because the first time some fulfillment center worker “accidentally” put something else in the box. And yes, that has happened to me.
Step 6: Product comes shipped in an Amazon box using Amazon couriers :facepalm:
2-8 days? Is it being delivered by sloth?
Good advice. I will treat the amazon site as nothing more than a catalogue I can peruse. Any purchase decisions will make me find the source of the product. Thanks!
I also look up an Amazon listing on eBay too and usually the shipping is free even without prime.
Try to not use google in the process too.
Hang on now. I’m shopping on the Internet because I don’t know how to buy stuff in real life.
How am I supposed to not use Google?
Go into your browser settings and pick a search engine thats not google
Im currently using DuckDuckGo No ai
I used Ecosia for years up until recently. everyone has a preference, but there are plenty of other options.
Doesn’t DDG literally just feed it through Bing instead?
And Google is able to harvest your information in a million other ways, literally from you simply going to a website.
Well IDK, I tried Bing directly a few times and it would just grab one of the keywords in the query and then completely ignore the others. Unless it’s a conspiracy of the big DuckDuckGo with Macroslop…
So far my experience with DDG is it’s not exactly great at searching either.
I need a browser extension that does this for me.
I will put that on my ideas notes folder and forget about it for 15 years, then implement it
I’m getting started on it. This is what LLMs will be useful for. To fight the power as fast as they shittify things.
Yeah, but having to do that for a dozen stores and than having to cancel a dozen mailing lists is a pain in the ass. Entering in card information each time so it’s not stored…
Convenience is worth the cost sometimes.
