On Friday, January 13, 2017 at 12:01:23 PM UTC-5, Leon wrote:
On 1/13/2017 9:41 AM, DerbyDad03 wrote:
On Friday, January 13, 2017 at 10:33:14 AM UTC-5, Jack wrote:
On 1/12/2017 5:59 PM, Leon wrote:
On 1/12/2017 10:53 AM, -MIKE- wrote:
On 1/12/17 9:48 AM, Leon wrote:
On 1/12/2017 9:37 AM, Jack wrote:
On 1/11/2017 9:47 PM, wrote:
On Wednesday, January 11, 2017 at 10:17:14 AM UTC-6, Jack wrote:
Sears should be where Amazon is today, based on their long
history of
catalog and mail order sales.
--
Jack
Yes, hindsight is always 20/20. And it would be just as accurate to
say Radio Shack should be exactly where Best Buy and Dell combined are
today. In the 1970s and 1980s Radio Shack was the computer store.
Everything electronic was at Radio Shack. Radio Shack was in every
mall back then so they had presence everywhere in the country. All
the new computer buyers of the 1970s, 1980s, and into the 1990s should
have bought from Radio Shack. But the Shack is now about gone. Why
didn't the people at Radio Shack predict the prevalence of computers
and online everything that came 30 years later? Probably the same
reason Sears did not see everyone ordering everything in the mail
(FedEx and UPS are a big part) fifty years later.
It's not hindsight, it is now. Sears could have easily shifted to
online sales at any time, but my guess is management had their
collective heads where the sun don't shine.
Sears has had on line sales for most of this millennium.
But like Walmart, for most stuff they are simply redirecting to "partner
vendors."
I see that as an increasing trend. Best Buy too.
Amazon as well, and if buying enough stuff for free shipping, you have
to be very careful the "partner" isn't gouging you on shipping which
isn't included in the free shipping part. Amazon can make it a bit
confusing to say the least, and thus, more diligence required, the less
trust they get.
I recently had a situation where I bought a $42 item and got a message
saying that if I added a $7 item I could get free shipping. I found a
blade for my oscillating tool that was labeled as an "add-on" item,
one that Amazon describes as:
"The Add-on program allows Amazon to offer thousands of low-priced items
that would be cost-prohibitive to ship on their own."
I put it in my cart and my shipping cost was reduced to $0.
I then received 2 different emails, one for each item, with different
tracking numbers and different delivery dates. The $42 item arrived last
Friday, the $7 item arrived yesterday. So much for their "cost-prohibitive
to ship on their own" criteria.
I have noticed that too but to be fair, I see it happen on all prime
orders regardless of cost too.
You have to think that Amazon is loosing money on items that sell for $5
and have free second day delivery.
They cannot look at each individual sale and determine the logistics for
each. They had to come up with a happy medium. Some times it works out
better for them, sometimes it does not. If they analyze each order and
make each order work in their favor customers will get tired of the math.
Just FYI...
If you need to pad an order to get free shipping, you can search for
low priced items by using generic search terms such as:
filler items under 20
or
add on under 15
You can even be more specific by using terms like "tools under 7"
It's not perfect in that you may get some higher priced items, but it
narrows the selection to make padding the order much easier.