Ask HN: Are you crosssing the Amazon picket line? If no, where are you shopping?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42497004

by jMyles • 2 years ago

8 13 2 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

Feels like such a bougie question, but I just wonder: have any of y'all discovered an online shopping experience with quick shipping and broad product selection that competes well with Amazon?

I'm a long-time newegg user, so I use that for computer components. But what about for general household goods, tools, dry goods, cleaning supplies, etc?

Is there a good place to buy where workers aren't striking?

grumpyinfosec• 2 years ago

go to the IRL hardware / grocery store? I still get out of my chair to go the Costco, Ace hardware, Microcenter and REI's of the world. But short of that target, walmart, home depot have really stepped up their (fast/free) shipping game in the past few years.

jMyles2• 2 years ago

Yeah, I do nearly all of my grocery shopping IRL, and about 75% of hardware shopping (at Rollin' Oats and Ace Hardware, respectively, here in St. Pete).

Last few things I bought on Amazon, that I'm not sure where I'll get, at least with reasonably fast shipping:

* Case for a 32" monitor

* Pegboard-mounted magentic knife rack

* Outdoor folding table

* USB and HDMI cables (I guess Newegg?)

* Spice grinder (a particular one)

* Bulk organic coriander seeds (actually they might have these at Rollin' Oats - but what about other bulk dry goods that aren't at small grocers?)

* Shower head

etc etc

And yeah, I guess at this very moment, walmart is perhaps a more ethical option.

jarsin2• 2 years ago

I do most of electronic shopping at bestbuy now. Typically can pickup same day or next day shipping.

jarsin2• 2 years ago

Don't forget cloud alternatives like Digital Ocean.

bloomingkales3• 2 years ago

I'm kind of pro Amazon regardless of their ruthless capitalism simply because I don't think regular people could have come up with the conveniences Bezos came up with. He improved QOL for people, period. Unions would never have allowed something like Amazon to evolve to what it is today.

This is not true for all companies, but I think it's particularly true for Amazon.

jMyles2• 2 years ago

I had more-or-less the same position, until the childish and violent responses to the protests began.

The spraying of water - on a day below freezing - at the food and water station is perhaps a back-breaking straw. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=so0A0wNfkIc

If respond with real discussions about whether the point you make is dispositive, rather than being assholes, I think things are different.

bloomingkales3• 2 years ago

Woah. TIL.

muzani• 2 years ago

We don't have Amazon here in Malaysia (not counting AWS, Kindle, Prime Video). But I think life hasn't become any better or worse with the alternatives. There's the big 3 e-commerce companies (Lazada, Shopee, TikTok). But even if we didn't have AWS, there's still Azure, Alicloud and so on, same with other products.

I'm curious what kind of conveniences Bezos did that wouldn't be around without him.

bloomingkales3• 2 years ago

I don't think there would have been a societal push for same-day delivery, and I don't think there would have been an ambitious push to own the entire delivery logistics operation. Not only did they aim for a crazy feature, but they knocked it out of the park by going overboard and owning the trucks.

Our society would not have this if someone didn't push for it IMHO, or we would have had it much later.

Think of it like Covid and remote work. It wasn't going to be happen for real without something extraordinary.

muttonhead• 2 years ago

Odd way to say that it wouldn’t have been possible without taking advantage of workers

cafard• 2 years ago

We buy very little on-line. Our grocery shopping is done at the store, also hardware, etc.

Our last two delivered book purchase were from McGill University Press and Barnes and Noble.

nahtnam• 2 years ago

Walmart+? But I'm not sure how much better they treat their employees

more_corn• 2 years ago

Walmart has good selection and free shipping.

Ask HN: Are you crosssing the Amazon picket line? If no, where are you shopping?

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