I don’t always see it but sometimes on their home page there is an element that shows a few random products with their nice line drawings they do for the product. This just feels like it would be a really cool thing to put up on an e-reader as a kind of digital photo frame. Just random nice line art of McMaster products, hopefully just reusing the existing web element they display on their home page. If anyone works this up please let me know!
Mcmaster.com is the best e-commerce site I've ever used
131–140 of 501 posts
Re: Mcmaster.com is the best e-commerce site I've ever used
#132Mechanical Engineer and product designer here. I've been using mcmaster daily for 20 years to do my job. It is definitely the standard by which all others are judged. I'll gladly pay 2, 3, 5, even 10x the price to get it from McMaster. The service, the CAD models, I have what I need the next day. As an example of the level of their service, you can send them a box of loose parts, no part numbers, no markings, and the…
> you can send them a box of loose parts, no part numbers, no markings, and they'll go through it, figure out what's what, and refund you for it
That is insane. Mad props to them
Re: Mcmaster.com is the best e-commerce site I've ever used
#133Mcmaster is what the web is supposed to be like.
I agree so much. It's what every single mail order company should have done. Freaking parametric search eaverywhere and uniform engraving style pictures so that your eye quickly catches the difference between the screw types.
McMaster is like the backend of an auto parts store. You tell the clerk what you need and they might ask if you want the cheap or premium version, then you pay and leave. You don't want to walk the aisles looking at stuff because you've got a dead alternator that needs to be replaced by Monday morning. Shopping at Amazon is like going to a massive department store. They've got everything but they lay out the store in a way that almost forces you to browse. You aren't in a rush because you are just looking at kitchen gadgets and might also be interested in buying a new pillow.
Re: Mcmaster.com is the best e-commerce site I've ever used
#134McMaster-Carr is an incredible example of how an existing physical-product distributor with a vaunted historical operations department, when faced with moving into the e-commerce world, could choose one of two paths:
- Build an online presence cheaply because you can rely on your historical offline operations to paper over any shortcomings in the online system.
- Build an online presence with the same ethos, standards, creativity, and long-term continued investment with which you built your offline operations to be your competitive advantage in the first place.
There aren't many legacy organizations that successfully digitized with that second path in mind, at least not at first - McMaster, B&H Photo, and Sweetwater come to mind as notable exceptions. It's a useful thought experiment, I think, even for those working on startups and green-field projects.
Re: Mcmaster.com is the best e-commerce site I've ever used
#135Earlier quoted context omitted.
Plenty of dedicated shipping companies do exactly the same thing (if you don't pay for next day then they'll deliberately delay it so it takes 5 days or whatever you paid for), it's got nothing to do with being owned by a retailer or not.
this definitely used to be a thing until like... early 2010s. Back then I completely recall watching tracking for some items and they'd accept it and run it a couple hops and then... it'd just sit for 3 days or whatever. Fedex said it was gonna be 5 business days? Then don't expect to see it in less than 5 business days. I've seen both Fedex and UPS do it, but in some places it seemed like one or the other. I don't s…
FedEx still does this all the time, especially for their cheaper Ground and Home Delivery products.
I’ve had countless packages “stuck” in Troutdale for days before suddenly continuing on to Seattle.
Re: Mcmaster.com is the best e-commerce site I've ever used
#136Re: Mcmaster.com is the best e-commerce site I've ever used
#137McMaster doesn't show you shipping and tax before you place your order! How is that legal? Everything else is fantastic though. I adore their catalogs and having the print version is a point of pride.
Because most of their business comes from other businesses that receive quotes and pay net 30. The buyer already has a FedEx account so they just send that and it's billed monthly.
Re: Mcmaster.com is the best e-commerce site I've ever used
#138At some point several years ago, Amazon actually tried to compete with Mcmaster and others selling in this niche. They had a sub-site or something like that, I think it was called "Amazon Pro" and it focused on nothing but the sorts of parts and fittings that Mcmaster sells. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't as good as Mcmaster, and it sank (AFAICT) without a trace.
Re: Mcmaster.com is the best e-commerce site I've ever used
#139Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's really a thing they sell. https://www.mcmaster.com/tricycles/ The why, though, no idea. Warehouse schlepping, probably? On the other hand, I take one look at this mostly-prefabricated building and I'm like "... I could use one of those." https://www.mcmaster.com/6704T998/
Every other worker in a shipyard has a tricycle like this.
TIL. Thanks!
Re: Mcmaster.com is the best e-commerce site I've ever used
#140This doesn't go into the actual mechanics of finalizing your order, which is incredibly well done. I've only actually ordered from McMaster 3 times and don't have a need for anything right now so I might be getting details wrong, but basically, the "items in your cart" page has a shipping address and payment method pre-filled, and you just hit "order" and that's it. What's in stock, what ships when, etc. is all clear…
> I also like their parametric search. If you type '1/4"-20 screw', the page goes to the overview of that screw type AND populates the "machine-readable" parameters on the left side with what you typed.
This is something I wish more e-commerce sites would grok. I go to Lowes and type in
1/2" 10-32 stainless bolt
Same for you, Amazon! "64GB sd card" and then Amazon's filter lets me further drill down... by capacity. DUHH, I specified the capacity! How can Amazon operate for almost 30 years and still not have this one figured out?