This is already happening in China. Because of the nature of shipping companies here it's not unusual to buy a product (typically off of http://taobao.com) and get it later that day or the next day. Many of these businesses are based in Shanghai and if you live there delivery happens nearly instantly. One online shop, http://cheers-in.com/ delivers cold beer in Shanghai in 1 - 2 hours from an order. Stuff like this is absolutely fantastic and it would be amazing to see it come to the US.
How Amazon’s ambitious new push for same-day delivery will destroy local retail
171–180 of 321 posts
Re: How Amazon’s ambitious new push for same-day delivery will destroy local retail
#172Earlier quoted context omitted.
Also, amazon is kind of skeevy; I'm very leery of buying food, cosmetics, or toiletries from them because they make it really hard to tell from whom you're buying stuff. I'm happy to buy eg usb cables from the cheapest vendor, but I don't trust any of the chinese knockoff shit if it's going to regularly touch my skin or be eaten. Particularly since china appears to have no real food safety laws and poisoned 300k of t…
They show the seller, and I agree a lot of the Marketplace sellers are horrible. I pretty much stick to Amazon.com LLC (i.e. real Amazon) and trusted sellers (Adorama, J&R, ...) for most products. I wish there were a way to set a flag in your account to ONLY show Amazon.com LLC products.
They show the seller, kind of, but say the seller is rightguard. Is it the deodorant brand or is someone camping the name?
Re: How Amazon’s ambitious new push for same-day delivery will destroy local retail
#173Amazon has been doing this in parts of Germany since 2009. The results haven't been nearly as dramatic as the article predicts. As others have indicated, the limiting factor isn't so much speed of delivery as the inclination to physically inspect items before buying them. That said, Zappos, now a part of Amazon, has succeeded in doing that in one of the markets that tends the most towards such. Even so, there are sti…
When Zappos first came out I thought they'd tank. I purchase new basketball/running shoes every 6months, and never ever make a new purchase without trying it on. Playing basketball or running with an even slightly uncomfortable shoe can lead to blistering, back problems, ankle sprains, etc. But my gf at the time thought it was brilliant. What I learned was that a lot of women's shoes are purchased based on anything e…
Then I'm definetly a exception for a man. I buy most of my clothes because they look good. And if they aren't really comfortable or break down after a year than be it. Exceptions are sports and outdoor equipment, but again if the don't look good for me, no way I will ever wear them.
I still have to try them on so in order to judge all that.
As far as Amazon's same-day delivery is concerned, i guess it is as much warehouse / picking speed and efficiency as it is to have the right transportation partner. In germany they are aoing with DHL, now a post susidiery. And the german postal service always had over-night next day delivery for letters within germany.
But if they can really pull it off, it would be amazing!
Re: How Amazon’s ambitious new push for same-day delivery will destroy local retail
#174Earlier quoted context omitted.
China hasn't been a 3rd world country for some time. It isn't even close. Sure there are massive pockets of poverty (with 1 billion people, there are massive pockets of everything)...but visit India or parts of Africa if you want to see what 3rd world is.
If we were going by the original definitions of first world, second world third world. China would be a second world country since it was aligned with Russia and not the US.
Not really, the Russians and Chinese were both communist but were rivals rather than allies through most of the cold war.
Re: How Amazon’s ambitious new push for same-day delivery will destroy local retail
#175Earlier quoted context omitted.
And the store makes money off of amazon affiliate links?
Makes more sense for Amazon to set them up themselves. To an extent this is what Apple stores are, although they have a limited range and stock for standard configs.
And that would be some kind of revolution, or evolution. Given amazon's logistics can keep the pace.
Re: How Amazon’s ambitious new push for same-day delivery will destroy local retail
#176This is already happening in China. Because of the nature of shipping companies here it's not unusual to buy a product (typically off of http://taobao.com ) and get it later that day or the next day. Many of these businesses are based in Shanghai and if you live there delivery happens nearly instantly. One online shop, http://cheers-in.com/ delivers cold beer in Shanghai in 1 - 2 hours from an order. Stuff like this…
Great for consumers like us, but terrible for all of the people who work ridiculous hours under constant stress on warehouse floors or do deliveries day in and day out. I try to buy from brick & mortar shops purely because running a shop is a job that has a shred of dignity left in it.
Re: How Amazon’s ambitious new push for same-day delivery will destroy local retail
#177Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Amazon has an absolutely amazing return policy." Watch out of Amazon Marketplace though. I bought a copy of The Wire through there that ended up being pirated (and terrible quality), and Amazon would neither refund the purchase nor shut down the vendor, even after we got a letter from HBO confirming that it was a pirated copy.
Did you contest the charge with your credit card provider? I can't imagine that Amazon would contest such a claim.
Without looking I'd be nearly certain that Amazon isn't going to take the hit for chargebacks on the marketplace. Appart from costing a heap it would just be inviting fraud.
Re: How Amazon’s ambitious new push for same-day delivery will destroy local retail
#178Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why wOuld I feel the need to inspect a book before buying it? I am working under the assumption that no pages will be missing. It's worked out fine thus far. You do realize that purchasing items over the Internet has been working well for some time now, right?
I like to flip a book open that I'm considering at a store to random sections. Not one of 20 pre-selected pages offered in some online shop, but just random places, so I can see if it's my speed. This has saved me from purchasing many (seemingly) awful works.
Google Books supports that kind of browsing pretty well showing selected chunks of a lot of books.
Re: How Amazon’s ambitious new push for same-day delivery will destroy local retail
#179I bought 2 things on Amazon this week, both with free 2 day shipping with Prime Item 1 spent 13 hours on a UPS truck driving around my city and was delivered about 7pm in the evening 2 days after ordering. Item 2 was delivered 14 hours after purchasing by Amazon Fresh at 9am. For the same price of shipping, which service would you rather have? EDIT To Add: The delivery guy for the 14 hour item works for Amazon - the…
If amazon decides to built its own transportation organisation, yes. But such a thing would make most sense in metropolitan areas, in rural ones I'm not sure. Maybe here it's better to use the existing specialist. But then amazon built it's own top-notch distribution and warehousing infrastrucrure, so maybe I'm wrong.
Re: How Amazon’s ambitious new push for same-day delivery will destroy local retail
#180Earlier quoted context omitted.
True, there will always be a need for immediacy in shopping. However, on three of the four you listed (Not sure if I want to know why you need ammunition at 1 am...) Amazon carries them, and at a reasonable to very low price. Most of the time I know I'll need something a couple days before. Instead of "I'm out of coffee, better go to the store" it's "I'm running low on coffee, better order some and it will be here in…
> Not sure if I want to know why you need ammunition at 1 am... Zombies. That's the real mistake we're making with shifting all our purchases to Amazon and their just-in-time delivery. There will be nothing to loot when the zombie outbreak happens.
Unless you know where the warehouses are... But surviving the zombie apocalypse in a wal-mart store or a huge mall has much more style then doing in a damp worehouse in the middle of nowhere. That is unless amazon is changing that bit about zombie outbreaks, too!