Will Amazon Become the Wal-Mart of the Web?

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/20/business/20amazon.html?_r=1

by peter123 • 17 years ago

47 48 17 years ago

nytimes.com

pragmatic• 17 years ago

Wal-Mart++?

I've ordered lawn mower parts, (kid's) toys, a laptop, a Kindle, hard drives, etc, etc from Amazon this year.

My local hardware store didn't have the lawnmower parts I needed but Amazon did.

rhartsock• 17 years ago

I ordered a Wii from Amazon, got a better deal and extra crap with it...Amazon is the only place I shop online.

jeffbarr• 17 years ago

Yes, but did you launch 100 Linux servers, store a couple of hundred GB of data, or run a MapReduce job?

You will...

haupt• 17 years ago

I can't arrange for an in-store pickup when I order something from Amazon, and I can't order a copy of any Marilyn Manson CD from Wal-Mart. I was shopping for a Magnavox DVD Recorder (model: H2160MW9) and found it for $290.99 at Amazon vs. $229.00 from Wal-Mart's site.

IMHO, both sites will continue to serve their respective niches. I don't think either juggernaut is going anywhere anytime soon. :)

sfphotoarts• 17 years ago

I don't care what anyone wants to think of Amazon as. They are just Amazon, the best retailer for practically anything

stevenj• 17 years ago

I think it already has

rabidgnat• 17 years ago

I think that the rise of Amazon as the primary retailer leaves the delivery market ripe for upheaval. The current delivery model is kind of awkward: they do a first delivery when you're at work, and then trying to coordinate with them becomes a huge hassle. I usually end up having packages delivered to my parents' house, since they won't leave packages at my door at my current apartment (and rightfully so!)

To me, it seems like it's in Amazon's best interest to use a delivery service that is more convenient for the end user than the current model, like picking from available delivery dates and times.

HeyLaughingBoy• 17 years ago

FYI: I don't know what alternative delivery services exist (the nice thing about living way out in the country is that they'll leave anything at the door if you're not home!), but when I lived in an apt in town, I had an account with the local Mailboxes Etc. (now UPS store) and I just had my packages shipped there and could pick them up at my convenience.

scythe• 17 years ago

It seems like drop-boxes, like the ones used to return library books, could be built into the rooms in new apartment buildings. That would probably solve the delivery problem except when shipping really big packages (e.g. televisions).

philwelch• 17 years ago

Apartment buildings already have simpler options: an in-complex office that receives all deliveries on your behalf and checks them out to you. The problem is, you've changed the problem to "redoing how the country builds apartments, and rebuilding all the apartment buildings" when the original problem, "find a way to deliver packages at more convenient times", was an easier problem to begin with.

rsheridan6• 17 years ago

Lots of mailboxes, and not just at apartment buildings, already have dropboxes: http://www.mailboxworks.com/AF_Outdoor_Parcel_Locker.html

You don't really need one for every room because not everybody is going to get a delivery every day. One for every 10 rooms would be enough most of the time.

wheels• 17 years ago

In Germany (where Amazon uses DHL), DHL has "PackStations" scattered around the country where you can go to pick up your package if they miss you at home delivery. I think in most cases they're within half a mile of the home they tried to deliver to.

So when Amazon misses me, I just walk over with the DSL slip that says a package is there and scan the barcode on it and grab my package.

Erwin• 17 years ago

The Danish Post has installed such a system for general packages here. If they cannot deliver, they stick it in such a machine (open 24/7) and you can pick it up. But you can also put a special delivery address on your package so it will end up there right away (and you'll get a text message when it's there).

You can also supposedly send packages from them.

x3m• 17 years ago

Wal-Mart is the Wal-Mart of the web. Their online holidays' sale numbers are higher than Amazon. edit: http://siteanalytics.compete.com/walmart.com+amazon.com well this shows Amazon gets 20M more traffic than Wal-Mart during peak of holiday season, but I am pretty sure Wal-Mart's sales were higher on 06

skinnymuch• 17 years ago

Can you give any proof about the 06 numbers? It seems doubtful.

Grinnmarr• 17 years ago

Dude...Amazon has been the leading e-tailer for around a decade or so. Wal-Mart is not even in the top 10. Where did you get the idea Wal-Mart did anywhere near Amazon volume online? http://www.internetretailer.com/Top500/list.asp

scottjackson• 17 years ago

My one annoyance with Amazon: I live in Australia, yet Amazon item pages still say, even when I'm logged in, that I've qualified for "FREE Super Saving Shiping!" A quick check of Amazon's help pages will tell you that international customers aren't eligible for free shipping of any kind. All of my shipping addresses are in Australia, but Amazon doesn't do any checking of that before saying that I've qualified.

Also, there's no Amazon Prime for international customers, which is a total shame. I understand that it's not cost-effective to give free international shipping for $75 a year, but I'd happily pay double, maybe even triple for it. The shipping costs are what kill me on Amazon -- it's the only thing that stops me from buying everything (literally, everything) from Amazon.

electromagnetic2• 17 years ago

Amazon's severely restricted here in Canada compared to the US, and is pitiful compared to what I'm used to in the UK, so I receive the same problem as I'm frequently on the US site.

I don't fare well as I used amazon for nearly everything while in the UK, but now in Canada I'm stuck with CrapBuy and Shit-Mart who sell everything at hiked prices.

MikeCapone• 17 years ago

Agreed. I really wish the Amazon.ca site would come to mirror the US version.

Anyone knows if they've announced plans to do that?

euccastro• 17 years ago

Literally everything? Is Amazon selling any type of food? In any event, I don't think they're working with fresh (or even frozen) food anytime soon.

An idea that I've been thinking about for a while is an Amazon for perishable commodities. At least here in Western Europe, fresh produce has ridiculous markups. It seems obvious that producers and consumers get abused by distributors. I have the feeling that there's an opportunity in delivering to the customer's home, offering competitive prices in exchange for predictability (repeat orders, preorders, orders with flexible delivery dates, machine learned purchase patterns) that would let one move high volumes without keeping much stock.

To begin with one could focus on organic produce, which (again, in my area) has trouble finding shelf space.

I haven't discarded this idea yet, but I wouldn't mind if someone out there gave it a go first :).

mbrubeck• 17 years ago

http://www.amazon.com/grocery-breakfast-foods-snacks-organic... http://www.amazon.com/Natural-Organic-Grocery/b/ref=sd_allca... http://www.amazon.com/gourmet-food-gifts-chocolate-seafood/b...

The above links go to the Grocery, Natural + Organic, and Gourmet Foods departments at Amazon. These mostly sell non-perishable items, but do include some frozen foods.

http://fresh.amazon.com/

Amazon Fresh is a pilot program, currently in the Seattle area only. It features just about everything you can get at a grocery store, plus a partial selection of items from regular Amazon departments (books, music, electronics, etc.). A lot of companies went bankrupt trying to do this; Amazon seems to be taking baby steps to make sure it can be profitable.

dagw• 17 years ago

I don't know about the rest of Europe, but here in Sweden there are at least two or three companies in the delivering boxes of organic vegetables to your door once a week business. They basically rely on orders in advance, fixed delivery schedule and certain amount of flexibility in exactly what is delivered which means they don't have to keep much stock.

jrockway• 17 years ago

Well, some international customers have Amazon Prime. A friend of mine in Japan claims she orders everything from Amazon with low-cost same-day delivery ($8 extra in the US). She called it "Amazon Prime", but I have not looked myself.

Anyway, I am with you on ordering everything from Amazon. I live in the US and have Prime, and it's just amazing. Going to the store is just not necessary when you can have something show up at your house the next day for $4 extra. (I still buy most food in real stores. But that's about it.)

ajaypopat2• 17 years ago

Yes, Amazon Prime is available in Japan. http://www.amazon.co.jp/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId...

joez• 17 years ago

At some point the state agencies has to clamp down on people not paying taxes (known as a use tax) on their Amazon purchases. I know a lot of my friends purchase from Amazon because they save 8.5% in tax. It's significant when you make a purchase like a Macbook. That's a huge competitive advantage that Amazon currently has over other online retailers (at least for California).

Edit: Correction IRS => State agencies (thanks shrughes)

shrughes• 17 years ago

The IRS is a federal agency, so it would be state tax agencies that try to clamp down on use taxes.

sahaj• 17 years ago

it already is. it's the biggest and cheapest place on the web.

shipping is getting faster and better as well. i was going to order an OEM hard-drive and in the reviews someone complained about the poor packaging. someone else replied and said to take a picture and submit to amazon. one day later another reviewer said that their packaging was fine. trusting amazon, i placed my order (free shipping). i just got my hard-drive today (2 days later), and packaging was on par with the retail version.

[edit] link: http://www.amazon.com/review/R2Q6A3WHMIDISG/ref=cm_cr_pr_cmt...

potatolicious2• 17 years ago

I work on the team that handles packaging feedback at Amazon, we do care about these issues and need your feedback on how both Amazon and the product manufacturers do on packaging.

http://www.amazon.com/packaging

You can always submit feedback on past orders here, it's easy and quick, and helps us fine-tune things a lot. Like parent said, you can take pictures of how we packed your stuff and submit it, we do go through the feedback religiously :)

pyre• 17 years ago

They will be the Wal-Mart of the web when they start throwing their weight around and 'holding wholesalers hostage' to drive down prices, forcing manufacturers to make 'cheaper' versions of the same product just for Amazon (and in some cases listing that 'Amazon-version' with the cheaper parts/build quality as the exact same model as the ones that were sent to other retailers).

sfall• 17 years ago

i don't see a problem with using your purchasing power. but abuse can lead to larger problems, walmart is now seeing some brands not wanting to enter their stores because of potential problems it can cause.

eru4• 17 years ago

Did you know that Wal-Mart left the German market, because it was too competitive for them?

oconnor02• 17 years ago

Do you have sources or an article on that?

potatolicious2• 17 years ago

http://www.amazon.de/

is still there. In fact my team just launched a new feature on it a week ago. Amazon is far from dead in Germany.

natmaster2• 17 years ago

Given that Walmart.com runs on the Amazon software, Amazon literally is the Wal-Mart of the web.

tome• 17 years ago

Isn't that more like "the web of Wal-Mart"?

ajaypopat2• 17 years ago

Can you cite a source that says walmart.com is using Amazon software? I'm not aware that walmart.com is running on any Amazon software.

PS: I work for Amazon and have a friend that works for walmart.com

known• 17 years ago

http://toolbar.netcraft.com/site_report?url=http://www.Walma...

natmaster2• 17 years ago

Ok, you caught me. I was thinking of Target. Silly me.

chris123• 17 years ago

Isn't Amazon already the Wal-Mart of the web? If it isn't, who is? Exactly.

sjs• 17 years ago

Not in Canada, not soon anyway. You can't buy anything off of Amazon when shipping to Canada. I still only think of them as a book store.

jhancock2• 17 years ago

The article shows an Amazon which is exactly the opposite of what I experienced 3 weeks ago. I needed several items for my wife's birthday. We are on extended stay in the U.S., away from our home in Shanghai. I wanted some Chinese comforts for my wife: tea, chopsticks, chinese cooking spices, rice noodles. After some searching on the web, it looked like I could buy all these through Amazon. I picked 4 different items from 4 different suppliers. All items showed "in stock, ships immediately". So I added them to my shopping cart and went to checkout. I see a whopping and opaque 50% charge over the costs of goods for shipping, no shipping breakdown. I decided to go ahead and do it, its my wife's birthday after all. In the days following the purchase, I receive 4 different emails from each supplier, not Amazon, telling me various things about the item's true availability and when it should ship. It took 3 weeks to get all the times in individually. It is clear Amazon was just operating as a sales affiliate for these other providers which is far cry from what they portray on their site.

Amazon lost a lot of credibility in my eyes. Next time, I'll go to each supplier and make separate purchases and skip the middleman that is adding so little value.

billswift• 17 years ago

They tell you on the item's page, right under the item itself, when the item is being shipped from another seller and is just listed on Amazon. If you don't carefully examine the information they provide, that's your choice.

jhancock2• 17 years ago

All I can tell you is I was being pretty careful, as I always am in my online transactions, and I feel I was both misled and that Amazon did not provide value to the transaction.

I am absolutely certain each item I put in my shopping cart said it was "in stock", yet days after the purchase, I received emails from the various providers telling me the real story. I am also certain that even though I tried hard to find out prior to the purchase, it was not possible to see the breakdown in shipping costs. Only seeing one shipping cost line item is one reason some might believe its all being bundled together from a big amazon warehouse somewhere. Especially with widespread business articles like the OP educating the world that's what Amazon has become. Otherwise, why not show me 4 different shipping charges, maybe I want to send one priority and the others not.

I also filled out feedback on these purchases after I received the shipments to state what my complaints were about the shopping experience, but never heard back from anyone. This part of course, doesn't surprise me. Simply pointing out that if I were to do something like this again, I may as well buy direct from the real supplier so that if I did have a problem, I wouldn't be complaining through a middleman.

Will Amazon Become the Wal-Mart of the Web?

Related Stories