281–290 of 610 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Since toilet paper is mostly non-perishable it shouldn't really matter, right? But for anything that goes bad there is also a tipping point where you bought too much and have things go to waste.
Do you really think families waste half of what they buy at Costco? Come on now.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The incremental cost of an extra stop is near zero. This assumes folks get deliveries on the same day and largely only from Amazon. And that we cannot build more walkable / bike able infrastructure.
Amazon already gives a discount if you're willing to wait for them to batch deliveries. Personally I would still have an order arriving every other day regardless of walkable/bikeable infrastructure. Same as most Americans.
If feels like there are Amazon households that get a delivery every or every other day and non-Amazon households that order 1-5 times a year (if that) and batch their purchases from other retailers (physical or online). That's the genius of Amazon. Those that use them, use them a lot.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Amazon did that with an earlier version of their grocery delivery service. I assume the cost and logistics of managing and cleaning the bins just wasn’t worth it because their grocery service delivers in paper bags now. One problem with the bins for normal items is that rarely will they be packed to the brim. I imagine the overall item density would drop significantly if they started using standardized bins instead o…
Well, if there's one company on Earth that's both incentivized to find an algorithm to efficient pack stuff into their shipping bins and also well-financed enough to actually figure out a good linear or quadratic-time algorithm to do so, it's definitely Amazon. And once they do so they'll have solved two big problems! :)
The part about Costco choosing to avoid the last mile shipping problem reminded me of a proverb, roughly translated as: A clever person solves a problem; a wise person avoids it. I think it holds a lot of truth in engineering.
I hear this, I have been in plenty of meetings where I propose a solution that eclipses most of the project requirements, often for a product person to turn around and say something like “yeah but I like working with X techhnology”, for example Tailwind. Okay you like Tailwind because you seem to think “p-2” is better than specifying “padding: 2rem;” because when it comes time to tinker with things you don’t want to…
What is the challenge in downloading class names into a style directory?
I understand the appeal, but let’s be honest. Costco is designed for rich people who think they are frugal. You drive your big SUV there to load up on months worth of food and goods, which you can only do because you have a big house with enough storage for all of it. And who cares if some of it goes bad because you can always go back for more and hey it was so cheap anyway. You even pay a membership for the privileg…
> Even if you think it is preferable at an individual level, there are good reasons to question the social value of the logistical complexity that it necessitates. Home delivery of single-packaged items entails an entirely different cost structure than freight trucks driving to consumer-facing warehouses delivering entire pallets of goods to be driven home by customers themselves. Ok, so 100 people can all drive to t…
Yeah, this argument falls flat on it's face. Of course it's more complex than that. When I worked from the office, centralized retail was very convenient and hardly added any driving. If you work from home, the opposite is true. The next revolution would be to standardize reusable packaging, that same daily delivery truck could bring that back. But only government could make that happen.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, if there's one company on Earth that's both incentivized to find an algorithm to efficient pack stuff into their shipping bins and also well-financed enough to actually figure out a good linear or quadratic-time algorithm to do so, it's definitely Amazon. And once they do so they'll have solved two big problems! :)
They might have the ability to do so. The motivation? Well let me put it this way: I tried Amazon’s grocery delivery service, and stopped using it because everything— everything —kept arriving in its own individual bag regardless of whether it made any sense, so it was just a bunch of bags I had to carry upstairs. That bags also had no handles. So they were optimizing for something, but it definitely wasn’t packaging…
Another amusing one was when they packed a somewhat delicate pantry food item in a paper envelope. It arrived thoroughly crushed, exactly as one would expect.
I understand the appeal, but let’s be honest. Costco is designed for rich people who think they are frugal. You drive your big SUV there to load up on months worth of food and goods, which you can only do because you have a big house with enough storage for all of it. And who cares if some of it goes bad because you can always go back for more and hey it was so cheap anyway. You even pay a membership for the privileg…
I’m not sure you have to be that rich to pay the $300 per year membership to buy food at loss leading prices. The bulk sizing of everything at Costco is overblown anyways. I wish it was bigger
For that is a large appeal of Costco. If I need a blanket, I can visit a Costco and buy their softest blanket with no hesitation. It will be around $20. If it’s bad, they have the most generous return policy.