Amazon.com

Discussion in 'Cactus Cafe' started by Dionysus, Jan 30, 2013.

  1. Dionysus

    Dionysus Idoit Admin

    Amazon kicks so much ***.

    It's the first place I look for a lot of things. We got the Prime membership recently, I think it's about $80/year and you get free shipping on a lot of things, and many of their streaming video titles are included in the deal.

    We got the kids a Wii U for Christmas and I didn't know it at the time but we can also stream our Amazon Video (Netflix too) through this platform. So I'm managing another film queue through a gaming system and it just rocks.

    I order books all the time at Amazon — awesome selection and great prices, plus the reviews on many things can be really helpful in a purchase decision. They have really built something amazing.
     
  2. georgecostanza

    georgecostanza NBHorn7’s Protégé

    Pretty much everything I buy nowadays short of food and gas I price check on Amazon first. There is so much stuff on there that is priced better on Amazon than it is in an actual store. Sure, you have to pay for shipping, but a lot of the time it still doesn't cost as much. You just have to wait a week or so.

    And I agree. They are great for searching through customer reviews. A lot of the technological stuff I buy I research on Amazon first.
     
  3. Dionysus

    Dionysus Idoit Admin

    I buy tech stuff on there fairly often too, hard drives and RAM mostly. It's like this huge retail outlet that hardly anyone can compete with price-wise.

    I read something recently about Amazon’s plans to set up huge distribution centers in the major metropolitan areas so they can do same-day shipping on a lot of items. I wouldn’t bet against them pulling it off.
     
  4. VYFan

    VYFan 2,500+ Posts

    I love Amazon, too. The wish list aspect is very convenient for buying gifts for people that they might actually want.

    There's also a very cool add-on I have from Firefox called Cuivo. Whenever you look at any product for sale on any website, including Amazon, a little toolbar automatically drops down and tells you whether the product is for sale on any other site for cheaper. It usually gives you about 5 other places and prices, and you can click on it to go to those sites if you want to. So, I just go to Amazon and between it and Cuivo, I have the best price 98% of the time by just opening one tab.
     
  5. l00p

    l00p 10,000+ Posts

    Great info, VY. I am thinking about running Firefox again on my new cpu.

    I agree about Amazon. I am able to buy a lot of import niche music I cannot get in Austin now with many stores closing down. I still buy the bulk of music locally and whenever I can but it's dwindled down to a trickle.

    I def. use their customer reviews for many products. In fact, used them a few days ago before buying a convection oven.
     
  6. Statalyzer

    Statalyzer 10,000+ Posts

    Anyone tried selling stuff on amazon as opposed to using craiglist or ebay?
     
  7. Dionysus

    Dionysus Idoit Admin

    My wife sold some books on there and she said the system was really easy to use, but it’s probably not going to be very profitable unless you have a lot of volume or something unique and valuable. Commodity items just compete on price, as you would expect.
     
  8. georgecostanza

    georgecostanza NBHorn7’s Protégé

    I sell old textbooks that I don't want to keep. It is easy to use and better than waiting in line at the bookstore to get less money.
     
  9. BrntOrngBld

    BrntOrngBld 25+ Posts

    Amazon is amazing!

    We needed to replace a laptop cable priced at $79 on line. Amazon had them for $0.01, that’s right $0.01. I ordered two, and although they shipped separately for $12 each, it was easily the best bargain I had ever seen.

    I buy cd’s from Amazon all the time, as I am old school and prefer actual hard copy cd’s. Plus they have a ridiculous variety of old, new and rarely-available-anywhere-else cd’s. I have purchased season dvd’s of Frazier and Seinfeld too; Amazon had the lowest price anywhere.

    The third party sellers have been extremely professional and downright accommodating when items received were not as advertized.

    Amazon’s reliable reviews have steered me towards many purchases I need to make anyway, and felt better about once received. Consequently, when asked, I always review a purchase as truthful as possible to educate others on their potential purchases.

    Cool tool, indeed!
     
  10. Dionysus

    Dionysus Idoit Admin

    BrntOrngBld, speaking of cables another great site for that is Monoprice.com. I have bought things like HDMI and network cables there, and the prices are terrific. They have a lot of tech stuff, definitely worth a look before you buy.
     
  11. BrntOrngBld

    BrntOrngBld 25+ Posts

    Bookmarked.

    Thanks Dionysus! Those are some very competitive prices for sure. Amazon, (err at least a discussion about Amazon), strikes again.
     
  12. Bevo Incognito

    Bevo Incognito 5,000+ Posts

    If they could just make a profit!

    Seriously, sales of 22 billion dollars in one quarter and still lost money in 2012. On the other hand, the stock price has been surging so I guess I should shut up and be happy.
     
  13. Dionysus

    Dionysus Idoit Admin


     
  14. NBHorn7

    NBHorn7 Pimp Daddy

    I also use amazon, but I really enjoy this site for good deals
    on many different things.


    The Link


    They have really good prices on lots of things. They send
    me special sales through emails and I became a Buyers Club
    member for $29.95 a year which they gave an additional
    discount for joining which amounted to more than the
    membership price for a year. You get an additional discount
    as a member to a usually already great price.

    You can usually get free shipping and they send coupons with
    every order. I recently bought an eighteen inch Poulan Pro chainsaw
    for $87. The clothing and footwear sales are great too.

    Also for coupons for web sites you can try this.

    The Link
     
  15. seb44

    seb44 250+ Posts

    Amazon is building a distribution center in Schertz just outside San Antonio.
     
  16. l00p

    l00p 10,000+ Posts

    I made an order that never arrived. Tracking said it did but it didn't. I contacted Amazon about it and without batting en eyelash they immediately reshipped the item with two day shipping. They kept on saying they were sorry and I kept on letting them know I blame the postal service or delivery people, not them.

    Amazing customer service.
     
  17. Dionysus

    Dionysus Idoit Admin

    This weekend I was looking for some headphones for my father-in-law to use with his TV. He lives with us and watches TV all f-ing day long at father-in-law volumes so I decided we need to bottle that noise up and confine it to his head.

    Found a few headphone models on Amazon that looked promising, but decided to pop into Best Buy while we were out and check what they had — with absolutely no intention of buying anything there.

    Turns out they had one remaining Sony model that was an opened box but not used, so it was discounted. I pulled up the same item on Amazon on my phone, showed it to the manager and he not only matched that price, he gave me a 10% discount which brought it a little lower than Amazon's price.

    Retailers must hate and fear Amazon.
     
  18. CottonEyedHorn

    CottonEyedHorn 1,000+ Posts

    Love us some Amazon. Got the Prime membership a couple years ago and it's totally worth it. Free two day shipping in most cases. When you don't live in a large metro area, it's often the only place that has what we need, price break or not.
     
  19. brntorng

    brntorng 2,500+ Posts

    Amazon now charges sales tax in Texas. Fry's, Target, and probably others will price match anything on Amazon and other reputable online retailers. As a result, I've been buying more tech items at Fry's to avoid shipping cost, potential damage to fragile items, or delivery time. Plus, I appreciate having brick and mortar businesses available to see items first hand, and it helps them out.

    BTW, monoprice.com is terrific for the items they carry. Have bought tons of cables and several other items from them with no issues at all.
     
  20. l00p

    l00p 10,000+ Posts

    Does Fry's now match anything on Amazon? I know about a year ago they were not willing to match a tv set. But policies can change. Have they?
     
  21. Bevo Incognito

    Bevo Incognito 5,000+ Posts


     
  22. brntorng

    brntorng 2,500+ Posts

    A year ago Fry's matched the best online price I could find for a $3000 TV. The price was even significantly lower than Amazon. The seller they matched was one of those sketchy low overhead outfits that I was reluctant to order from, but the store manager approved the match without any issue. Even brought the TV from Houston to Austin since they were out of stock locally.

    Bought another item recently, and they matched Amazon without an issue. They did mention that they matched Amazon, Buy.com, B&H, and a few other major online retailers, so I got the impression they no longer matched just any online price. Regardless, matching the major competitors is usually just fine.

    I'm not usually a big fan of Fry's, but they've been earning more of my business with their policies. You don't even need any price proof with you. Just ask, and they'll pull up the competitor's website and match.
     
  23. l00p

    l00p 10,000+ Posts

    Outstanding information. I went and double checked when I bought the tv I mentioned above and time flies! It was in early August of 11 in time for foozball season. So maybe this policy was enacted then?

    I wonder if they match Newegg and others too. But this is good stuff you brought. I don't like waiting either so this price match is what the doctor ordered.
     
  24. Statalyzer

    Statalyzer 10,000+ Posts

    Fry's also has the most efficient checkout line.
     
  25. utmck

    utmck 500+ Posts

    Best Buy announced today that starting on 3/3 they will "price match" local stores and 19 on-line stored including Amazon.
     
  26. Bayerithe

    Bayerithe 1,000+ Posts

    Amazon reinvests much of their "profits" into buying items in large quantities. this gives them the ability to negotiate costs with the vendors, and pass that savings along to you and I. This is different from a mom&pop shop that doesn't place a huge order.

    Example. I went down the street to a small music shop to buy Martin SP acoustic guitar strings. Asking price was $16 for a single box of strings. I go to Amazon and they are $5.50 or so. The difference is, Amazon can buy a pallet full of these strings and store them in their warehouse. They have the ability to research their supply chains and do comparisons of slow and fast moving items and decide how much to buy and keep in stock. Having something "in stock" is huge to consumers.

    Small shops have to keep their margins large to stay in business. Amazon can get away with small margins these days because they are so reputable and established.

    I love going to Amazon for user reviews as well. I hate buying anything without reading user reviews and looking for the highly rated items. Great for research!

    I will second the mention of Monoprice for audio cables. They are popular in the A/V community for cables. I buy all my speaker cable, hdmi cables and banana plugs from there.
     
  27. Dionysus

    Dionysus Idoit Admin

    Amazon just bought 20k delivery vans. That’s 20% the size of UPS
     
  28. Vol Horn 4 Life

    Vol Horn 4 Life Good Bye To All The Rest!

    I too use amazon for finding highly rated value items that may not be name brand. Many times you simply pay for brand reputation. For whatever reason I am finding that the star ratings alone these days may not be very accurate when I look at the review breakdown. Ive found many 4 or 5 star items with a lot of bad reviews. When I see that I dig into those reviews to see whats actually said. For example I just bought a hitting net for my daughter. One brand had a 4+ star rating, but probably dozens of reviews that the net came apart after just a few weeks or couple months of use. Another highly rated brand had the fiberglass poles breaking and splintering in lots of reviews.

    Sometimes its petty stuff, but sometimes its repetitive serious failure like described above so I choose something else. I've also learned that to be reliable I need to see at least 200-300 or more reviews, depending on the item, to be trustworthy.

    What I'm getting tired of is getting solicitation from every company asking me to write a positive review two or three days after receiving their product because "their reputation depends on good reviews". Who in their right mind would write a review after just a few days? I frequently write reviews, but almost never before I've had that item long enough for it to fail if its going to do that.

    While Amazon gets blistered for putting mom and pop store fronts out of business, I suggest it also give the small producers off goods a place to be competitive against the over priced big dogs. I think it balances out.
     
    • Like Like x 1
    Last edited: Sep 9, 2018
  29. Seattle Husker

    Seattle Husker 10,000+ Posts

    The day will come when Amazon has a better distribution system than UPS, FedEx or USPS.
     

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