Replacement blade for my lawn mower
Parts for my grill
Replacement tweezers for my Swiss Army Knife Cassette to MP3 converter
Book to read on my Kindle (instantly delivered)
Most of this stuff will be at my door on Tuesday.
In the past, I would go to Sears, Barnes & Noble and an electronics store for these things. I probably would have bought an entire new Swiss Army Knife rather than search around for replacement tweezers in stores.
I still see that the parking lots around malls look crowded but I hardly go into them anymore. Maybe I'll go to the Apple Store or the food court but that's about it. I have no idea how all those clothing stores stay in business. I would never buy clothes at a mall.
Almost everything can be bought on Amazon.com. When I placed my order last night, I tried to imagine the people at the warehouses scrambling to fill my order. I hear they run those guys pretty ragged. All those items are probably already packed and ready to ship this morning.
Almost everything can be bought on Amazon.com.
Amazon or Ebay with highly rated sellers. The two places to comparison shop...
Of course, St Vincent de Paul is profiting from all the halfway decent clothes I bought over the years for work, that put together is just a confused mish mash of stuff.
I’m with you. At this point, I shop almost exclusively online (and have for several years), excepting groceries, building materials, local hardware, and clothing (which I mostly buy at Costco).
I shop online because:
1. It’s convenient. I don’t have to drive around in traffic, find parking, go hunt down what I want, stand in line to pay, etc., etc., etc. Online purchases from amazon will typically arrive in two days WITH FREE SHIPPING (because I buy so much, it’s WAY worth it for me to pay for Amazon Prime).
2. Selection and quality are FAR, FAR better than brick and mortar stores. Most of what I buy online I would be unable to purchase locally anyway, or would have to spend hours driving and/or calling to find what I need. Example: yesterday I purchased a 4L600 FHP V-belt for my evaporative cooler when I noticed the current one seriously frayed when I was doing maintenance on the unit. (Another recent purchase was a Hardline digital inductive RPM meter with which I used to tune my Stihl chainsaw after I replaced the carburetor, which BTW, I bought on line for 40% of the cost of ordering one at the local Stihl dealership. Good luck in finding either the carb or the meter locally.)
And because the online selection is so broad, one can usually find better quality than local shopping.
3. Price. Online shopping prices for most items are SUBSTANTIALLY less than local retail (assuming you can even find what you want, which I almost never can). Plus, for my state, almost no online retailers collect sales tax, so there’s additional savings right there, AND helps to starve the beast.