About Those Air Cushions in Amazon Packages • Hacker News Board

Re: About Those Air Cushions in Amazon Packages

#111

Post by uxp » Wed, Dec 28, 2016, 4:58 AM UTC

ekzy wrote: post #73

pedalpete wrote: post #68

I think there are two opportunities for the environmental effects of the air cushions. 1) Re-use rather than recycle: What if you could let the air out at home, open up the bag, stuff it with other bags, and the outside of the bag had a postage paid stamp. It goes back to the company that made the bag so it can be re-used. 2) Make them out of compostable plastic. Much simpler than above, probably the better way. The…

They should just ship with reusable boxes. Better boxes with inner protections, where you would get some kind of credit if you post/bring it back empty, or reuse for personal mail. Maybe we should only be allowed to send packages with these boxes

Reminds me of a European grocery store. As an American, I was confounded to see a lack of bags at nearly any store I visited that wasnt a tourist gift shop my first time I ventured across the Atlantic. Then it started to make more sense than the garbage-cycle we have over here.

Re: About Those Air Cushions in Amazon Packages

#112

Post by somethingsimple » Wed, Dec 28, 2016, 5:01 AM UTC

krapp wrote: post #17

I had to package and tape boxes at an Amazon fulfillment center over peak season one day. One of the "problems" I found with the process is the system tells you the size of box to use. You're not allowed to use a smaller size, even if it would work, only that size or larger. It also tends to overestimate the size of the item, so many boxes wind up with a lot more empty space than would be necessary, and more packing.…

Sorry for going off-topic here, but I'm curious. You say you "had to" work a fulfillment center over peak season. Were you an engineer at Amazon at the time?

I'm asking because I've been told that Amazon makes engineers work at their fulfillment centers when it's peak season. If that's true, are people paid extra to do so?

Re: About Those Air Cushions in Amazon Packages

#113

Post by ChoGGi » Wed, Dec 28, 2016, 5:06 AM UTC

djrogers wrote: post #87

noarchy wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where I live (in Canada) they tend to use balls of dough in the middle of the pizza to get the same effect, instead of the piece of plastic I've seen elsewhere.

Where in Canada? Turns out it's a pretty big country ;-) I grew up in the Vancouver area and never saw dough balls. [1] comments like this are a bit of a peeve of mine as they contribute to the global mental picture of Canada as one homogeneous biosphere instead of a huge land mass with many different cultures and environments. Ever heard this one - "Oh, you're from Canada? My brother in law is from Canada; Jake Unra…

I'ved lived in Toronto and Calgary, never seen any balls of dough (visited out East, no balls that I remember). Always those little plastic things or naught.

Re: About Those Air Cushions in Amazon Packages

#114

Post by Godel_unicode » Wed, Dec 28, 2016, 5:07 AM UTC

massysett wrote: post #46

anexprogrammer wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's sensible. What isn't is the often vast oversize of Amazon packaging. Like sending one hard drive in a 2cu ft box with lots of packaging. There's now lots of scope for the item to move around so the single item inevitably ends up in a corner against the outer box. Amazon never seem to actually bubble wrap anything any more - which has led to damage more than once. Neither the string of air pockets, as in the ar…

Amazon ships a huge box, then loads it halfway with paper or air bubbles. Everything shifts around, so it protects nothing in transit. They often ship non-delicate items like clothes in cardboard boxes, where plastic bags would be less wasteful and more protective. Overall, the result of their shipping is that I spend a lot of time deflating plastic, breaking down boxes, and moving lots of garbage to my garage and, s…

> And Amazon does not seem to care.

This might be of interest to you; send your gently used stuff to Goodwill, in Amazon boxes, for free.

https://www.givebackbox.com

Re: About Those Air Cushions in Amazon Packages

#115

Post by colejohnson66 » Wed, Dec 28, 2016, 5:08 AM UTC

mirimir wrote: post #97

anexprogrammer wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's sensible. What isn't is the often vast oversize of Amazon packaging. Like sending one hard drive in a 2cu ft box with lots of packaging. There's now lots of scope for the item to move around so the single item inevitably ends up in a corner against the outer box. Amazon never seem to actually bubble wrap anything any more - which has led to damage more than once. Neither the string of air pockets, as in the ar…

Yes, Amazon seems to have no clue about shipping HDDs. Especially OEM HDDs. They have come loose, in a huge box, in just thin plastic "cases", embedded in air pockets. Which had been pounded flat in transit. New Egg, in contrast, shipped HDDs with molded cardboard padding (as I recall).

I've rarely buy from NewEgg, so I don't know how their return policy works, but for Amazon, if I ordered a hard drive and it was DOA, I tell them and they send me a new one before I even ship the first one back. No RMA numbers, no warranty problems, no "it was fine when it shipped, so that's UPS' fault". A simple "defective or doesn't work" and a new one is shipped that day.

Re: About Those Air Cushions in Amazon Packages

#116

Post by hueving » Wed, Dec 28, 2016, 5:08 AM UTC

gumby wrote: post #71

anexprogrammer wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's sensible. What isn't is the often vast oversize of Amazon packaging. Like sending one hard drive in a 2cu ft box with lots of packaging. There's now lots of scope for the item to move around so the single item inevitably ends up in a corner against the outer box. Amazon never seem to actually bubble wrap anything any more - which has led to damage more than once. Neither the string of air pockets, as in the ar…

> Here in the UK Amazon seems to have switched solely to paper inner packaging. Environmentally I prefer this. It's not clear to me you should (perhaps you should, the balance simply isn't clear to me). A plastic air cushion weighs almost nothing, so shipping it to the merchant and then to you uses almost no fuel. It is rarely recycled but instead become sequestered carbon in a landfill. For me, they are convenient t…

>and involves cutting down trees

Which they plant more of. Using this as an argument against paper is silly because it only applies to unsustainable approaches to paper. If we judged every process by the worst way to do it, then no process would be acceptable.

Re: About Those Air Cushions in Amazon Packages

#117

Post by nocoder » Wed, Dec 28, 2016, 5:15 AM UTC

The issue I think is amazon has boxes in a few standard sizes. As a result for many products, they end up shipping in much larger boxes. I think it is economical to procure large amount of boxes in few standard sizes vs. have small quantities of many different boxes. This does lead to increase wastage though.

Re: About Those Air Cushions in Amazon Packages

#118

Post by hanniabu » Wed, Dec 28, 2016, 5:16 AM UTC

waterphone wrote: post #28

justinator wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the last package peanuts I seem to remember finding in a package were disposable by putting them in compost, which seems like an advantage over plastic bags.

I haven't seen anyone else using it yet, but iFixit uses a paper/cardboard lattice/expanded mesh as packing material.

These are awesomexpected and work great, but unfortunately I bet they're pricier which is a huge influencer in packaging decisions.

Re: About Those Air Cushions in Amazon Packages

#119

Post by developer2 » Wed, Dec 28, 2016, 5:18 AM UTC

> frustrated customers on forums discussing how many air-filled cushions they were getting

> while deflated air cushions can be recycled, many cities won’t collect them curbside

Pop them, put them in recycling. It's plastic, it's not my job to deal with the fallout. Either it's recyclable and I've done all I can, or it's the retailers' or cities' problem. The idea that there are "frustrated customers" is beyond me. Is this really what ordinary citizens sit around obsessing over? I just don't get it; this would be concern #10,056 on my list of priorities.

Re: About Those Air Cushions in Amazon Packages

#120

Post by shiven » Wed, Dec 28, 2016, 5:19 AM UTC

colejohnson66 wrote: post #115

mirimir wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, Amazon seems to have no clue about shipping HDDs. Especially OEM HDDs. They have come loose, in a huge box, in just thin plastic "cases", embedded in air pockets. Which had been pounded flat in transit. New Egg, in contrast, shipped HDDs with molded cardboard padding (as I recall).

I've rarely buy from NewEgg, so I don't know how their return policy works, but for Amazon, if I ordered a hard drive and it was DOA, I tell them and they send me a new one before I even ship the first one back. No RMA numbers, no warranty problems, no "it was fine when it shipped, so that's UPS' fault". A simple "defective or doesn't work" and a new one is shipped that day.

This, this and so much this. This is why the majority of my electronics and parts come from Amazon. All other vendors are a morass of justificational cowdung compared to Amazon.

Dear vendor: You can take your RMAs, your restocking fees and your lame-ass excuses for shirking responsibility and shove it where the sun don't shine. Because, Amazon.