Shopping Sucks Now • Hacker News Board

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#41

Post by jkhwleroiu » Fri, Dec 13, 2019, 9:34 PM UTC

papreclip wrote: post #37

jkhwleroiu wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that even in big cities, real world shops are disappearing. This year I wanted to buy a TV, and wanted to see them in real life to judge colors/brightness levels, and shockingly, in London, I found just one place which had like 10 TVs from the leading brands. I'm sure there are a few more, but I wasn't able to locate them using google, or walking the main shopping streets. I remember shops 10 years ago…

Brick and mortar shops can't stop you from coming in and finding the perfect item, then buying it online to save money. I bought an office chair recently and didn't feel confident picking one without trying chairs out in person. The chair I settled on was $100 cheaper online

I wouldn't mind paying a few pounds for them to let me browse the products. Maybe this is a viable business model.

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#42

Post by jancsika » Fri, Dec 13, 2019, 9:34 PM UTC

> I’d love to only spend $17 except there is no way 17-dollar leather gloves won’t be fake and off color and smell of gasoline when they arrive, and after only a few wears the lining will pill or develop holes. I’d love to just buy the $60 gloves except that seems like a pretty large amount of money to spend on non-weatherproof gloves, and how can I, when there are identical $17 gloves right there.

17, which is too risky, and 60, which isn't 17, which is too risky...

There are probably hundreds of salespeople inside small business abodes in a 20 mile radius who are trained in the diplomacy of breaking out of that loop without making the author feel like a complete idiot.

Not saying a brick-and-mortar is a utopia, but at least the problem of ending up with a 5-star pair of "glarves" goes away.

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#43

Post by vector_spaces » Fri, Dec 13, 2019, 9:36 PM UTC

egypturnash wrote: post #12

When I was living in the PNW and realized I direly needed gloves, I just hit up a few of the department stores downtown until I found some that met my criteria. Which are probably similar to those of this author, I wanted some that looked cute, had a conductive patch on the finger so I could use my phone without taking them off, would fit on my long hands with long fingernails, and weren’t super expensive gloves desi…

I feel this so much. Sometimes I'll look up objects I've bought in brick & mortar stores that I've been completely happy with, and find that they have dismal reviews. This is why for certain items I make a conscious effort to not bother looking at the reviews. Even if it were possible for me to find the best doormat, it simply wouldn't be worth the time, labor, and emotional energy of sifting through reviews and forums and blog posts, and discerning fake reviews and influencer marketing and people who have different requirements and expectations than me, and product SKUs that have changed since reviews/posts/whatever were written.

As an aside: I'd love to find the best cat wand toy. I've tried hundreds from pretty much all the major eCommerce sites and they all suck. If someone knows of one that won't break immediately I'd be willing to pay top dollar for it.

But yeah, unfortunately as other commenters have pointed out, in small towns and even where I am in Albuquerque, brick & mortar stores are either disappearing or aggressively shifting their business to the internet, so it's becoming more and more unavoidable to come into contact with reviews and whatnot even for relatively basic items.

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#44

Post by JohnFen » Fri, Dec 13, 2019, 9:36 PM UTC

smacktoward wrote: post #32

egypturnash wrote: post #12

When I was living in the PNW and realized I direly needed gloves, I just hit up a few of the department stores downtown until I found some that met my criteria. Which are probably similar to those of this author, I wanted some that looked cute, had a conductive patch on the finger so I could use my phone without taking them off, would fit on my long hands with long fingernails, and weren’t super expensive gloves desi…

I think the key to the article can be found in this passage: > [T]he problem is that now, somewhat suddenly, perfect knowledge of the perfect glove, for you specifically, exists, if you simply do enough research. When you're shopping in a physical store, you have no expectation that you're going to find the absolute, one-and-only perfect glove (or whatever) in the world for you. Even in the largest stores, you unders…

I think your comment makes really excellent points. This line:

> The infinite variety of online shopping tells us to set our expectations higher than that.

made me think a bit -- that used to be true for me, but the effect is trending in the opposite direction now. I have learned that it's very nearly impossible to tell if a product being shown is actually any good or not unless I'm already familiar with that company's products, regardless of what the product listing or product reviews say.

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#45

Post by rednerrus » Fri, Dec 13, 2019, 9:38 PM UTC

I've started only buying things directly from brands that I trust and have legitimate warranties. I bought 5 pairs of swimming shorts on Amazon last year and all of them have completely fallen apart. I have a pair that I bought from Patagonia that look as good today as they did 6 years ago. I have a 10 year old puffer from them that has been so good to me. It's worth the extra money, if you can afford it, to just buy one nice thing and be done with it.

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#46

Post by arkitaip » Fri, Dec 13, 2019, 9:39 PM UTC

kaibee wrote: post #33

umvi wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Currently I only trust reddit for "genuine" reviews. Seems like Amazon reviews these days are gamed to the max. Once companies figure this out and reddit has a high degree of astroturf it will be impossible to find out what normal, unbiased (as in don't have an agenda) humans think about a product.

I suspect that once that fails, the next step is going to be having to join the Discord server or whatever chat-group exists for that niche. Then asking for a recommendation from some weirdo whose super obsessed with gloves or whatever. The future is weird.

Super niche forums have existed for this need for many years and cover everything from multi-tools and flashlights to makeup and perfume. It's just that they require more effort to use and many are disappearing due to social media.

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#47

Post by Retric » Fri, Dec 13, 2019, 9:39 PM UTC

basseq wrote: post #4

That "tyranny of perfect information" begets FOMO. If you'd looked at one more site or one more review you might have discovered a "better" (cheaper, high quality, higher utility) item. I'd add that's it's worse because the world is flatter. Why should I buy Brand Item when I can get a version from Alibaba for 10-20%? If it truly is comparable, then why pay the markup when the internet lets me cut out the middleman?…

Consistent quality is the entire point of brands. Find a soap you like and you can mindlessly get the same thing for the next 20+ years. Which also generally means you can pick a random brand and not end up with junk as long as trust the supply chain.

The issue is when you want something different than the millions of other people out there. Sure, things change and the quality may slip, but there is only so much time in the world is comparison shopping really worth it to you?

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#48

Post by cgriswald » Fri, Dec 13, 2019, 9:41 PM UTC

paulcole wrote: post #16

egypturnash wrote: post #12

When I was living in the PNW and realized I direly needed gloves, I just hit up a few of the department stores downtown until I found some that met my criteria. Which are probably similar to those of this author, I wanted some that looked cute, had a conductive patch on the finger so I could use my phone without taking them off, would fit on my long hands with long fingernails, and weren’t super expensive gloves desi…

You're talking about a pretty specific type of physical goods that have to fit properly and meet your requirements for aesthetics, quality, and function. Buying physical commodities or items where those factors don't matter on the Internet is incredible. I don't have to go anywhere, I don't have to talk to anyone, I don't have to lug anything anywhere, etc.

What are you buying that quality and function don't matter? I expect quality and function even in something as basic as toilet paper. It used to be I could find a brand and type that I liked, and then order it over the internet, often in bulk since it stores without really going bad. But now, I can't be sure I'll even get the genuine product from ahemazon certain vendors.

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#49

Post by distdev89 » Fri, Dec 13, 2019, 9:42 PM UTC

Lets see:

1. You have the choice of getting any of the options you want, that are not available in store near you in 2 days sitting at home. 2. You can compare prices on each of those items and choose the price point that best suits you. 3. You have an option to get information from people who have previously owned that item and read their thoughts and reviews. 4. You can order as any many you want, and spend 5 mins preparing a return and 10 - 15 mins returning the item (or, just pay a small fee to get it collected back from your house)

Yet, you choose to drive down to a store, a store which probably doesn't have an online inventory index. Try to find an option you want, don't find it, and now you're mad?

Do you see the hypocrisy?

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#50

Post by jkhwleroiu » Fri, Dec 13, 2019, 9:42 PM UTC

umvi wrote: post #23

ropiwqefjnpoa wrote: post #2

Something that has been lost is genuine reviews. First you have all the sponsored reviews and then all the equally worthless "I don't know how to use it so it's junk" or "it never arrived" 1 star reviews. And so many "review" sites look like they've been procedurally generated then SEO optimized and filled with ads.

Currently I only trust reddit for "genuine" reviews. Seems like Amazon reviews these days are gamed to the max. Once companies figure this out and reddit has a high degree of astroturf it will be impossible to find out what normal, unbiased (as in don't have an agenda) humans think about a product.

But reddit is flawed in a different way - it's extremely biased towards the trendy and the fashionable.

For example if you search reddit for what computer mouse to buy, you'll be told that unless it weighs less than 70g and has holes, it's utter shit and not worth your money.