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Shopping Sucks Now

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71–80 of 230 posts

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#71
post #3

Anyone working on a Trader Joes meets Amazon? That curates maybe 1-3 versions of things, largely eliminating paradox of choice. I guess Costco is kind of a bulk version of that... Also I've been increasingly interested in just buying things once and having them last a decade+, ideally a lifetime (less waste). But this takes a lot of research. Trader Joes does a good job of curating groceries and I've come to trust th…

You mentioned it, but: costco.com. The restricted set of choices is very freeing!

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#72
post #40

Obligatory xkcd: https://xkcd.com/1036/ It is from 2012 by the way.

Oh my. I once tried buying a kettle on Amazon but the reviews convinced me that any purchase would be bad. In the end I deliberately went to my local supermarket and bought one from there simply because I couldn't see the reviews.

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#73
I wonder if there is a market for a company that will shop for you, but at scale.

You go and say "I want a pair of black leather gloves, in this size." Check a box or two about your usecase, and give them your price range... and viola. A few minutes later you've got 2-3 to pick from. Even include a "I'm feeling lucky" option.

Though, I imagine even saving people time for things like "I need a hammer" would save people enough time comparison shopping that you could still take a cut and everyone would be happy.

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#75

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…

What's interesting is your second time around was probably faster because your research from the first round could have altered the second round of choosing gloves.

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#76

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…

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…

A shift I've noticed in the USA, is I'll go to an electronics retailer, and the item I want isn't on the shelf. In it's place is a placard instructing me to order it online. My hope was to actually handle the item and see if I liked it, then not buy it if I didn't like it.

Instead I have to order it online and then if I don't like it, either return it to the store or send it back via post.

While its super convenient for the consumer, in some respects, ordering everything online seems wasteful and bad for even the consumer and retailer in many respects.

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#77
post #3

Anyone working on a Trader Joes meets Amazon? That curates maybe 1-3 versions of things, largely eliminating paradox of choice. I guess Costco is kind of a bulk version of that... Also I've been increasingly interested in just buying things once and having them last a decade+, ideally a lifetime (less waste). But this takes a lot of research. Trader Joes does a good job of curating groceries and I've come to trust th…

Brandless is pursuing something down this line: https://brandless.com/

CBD is listed as the first item...

My trust in such a brand quickly goes to zero.

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#78
I don't think searching for higher quality longer-lasting products in a sea of disposable short-term-focused products is something we should be so eager to complain about. In other words, this is bad take.

The author comes so close to this realization near the end of the piece when he says: > But isn’t that terrible for the environment?

And never follows up on that statement.

We spend decades of consumerism buying whatever was available with little forethought because either we didn't have a choice, or we didn't really care because it was cheap and got the immediate job done. This resulted in single-use products littering the shelves of most retail outlets because of our focus on instant-gratification.

Wirecutter may make people overthink their purchase experience but at the very least educates people on the pros and cons of different products which is something the market has woefully failed at doing.

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#79
Buying things sucks now. This drives me nuts all the time and is one of many reasons I want a democratically planned economy. In addition to too many choices to meaningfully use, the vast majority of them are trying to essentially trick you into buying them. The drive for each glove (or whatever) manufacturer to increase profits causes them all to buy fake reviews, use cheap materials, imitate the style of the authentic, high quality ones... There is a persistent problem in clothing where whenever a brand gets a reputation for being good and not over-expensive, it is quietly bought out or switches to lower quality material in a year or two to cash in on its reputation. The same thing, of course, happens to the review sites (like the wirecutter) over time... It's hard to imagine the waste of resources that goes into this insane battle over the same purchases.

By contrast, if all the designers, manufacturers, and sellers were working not individually for their own profit, but for a salary (and intrinsic motivation) along consciously, democratically planned lines, we could have a rational and sane number of good quality gloves (etc) to choose from.

As Marx said, "In bourgeois societies the economic fiction prevails, that every one, as a buyer, possesses an encyclopedic knowledge of commodities." What is funny is he said that in about 1850.

Re: Shopping Sucks Now

#80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

Maybe they can offer a super wide selection available to see, since they don't need to carry stock. And perhaps you can order from them if you like it, and they run an online store where they ship it from, and you get your $10 back as a discount.

This is basically describing the Amazon stores.
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