Dumping Amazon Prime

[Ashful]

Jeff Bezos has commented that he expects Amazon will go out of business in the future. The world changes and eventually corporations lose their way. Look at GE and Westinghouse, they both were corporate giants that invented the power industry, they got big and bloated and lost the ability to adjust the business model. Westinghouse got broken up and sold in many pieces, Jack Welch bought a lot of long term health insurance debt for too much money and raided the reserves to make GE look good during his reign but saddled the future GE with unsustainable debt. GE has sold off most of what made the company great.

I hear what you're saying, but GE and Westinghouse were in a different situation, as big R&D-heavy companies facing competition from foreign manufacturers with operating costs many times less than theirs. Even with reasonably good management, the cards were stacked against them. But Sears lost out to domestic competitors, most of whom actually started out from a disadvantaged position, but weren't making as many bad decisions.

 

[bogieb]

Further to that, I was watching a documentary on dollar stores (I believe Dollar General is the big one in the US) where they offer consumers a fairly limited selection of goods at bargain basements prices. The corporations order that select few goods in such high quantities they get bottom dollar pricing.

Seems like that's the shift in retail, and I know my purchasing decisions are heading this way, one retailer (Amazon) to supply the specialty items I need, and a dirt cheap retailer to supply the staples we use daily. Seems traditional retailers are being squeezed from both ends.

We've lost 2 big box stores (Sears & Target (formerly Zellers)) in the last 10 years in my city, but everytime I turn around there's another dollar store opening. We now have 6 Dollar stores for a city of 70,000 people.

My town of 6,000 has a Dollar General and a Family Dollar.

 

[Ashful]

It's probably been nearly 20 years since I went to any dollar store, so I just checked "dollar store" on Google Maps, and there's none in my town. But if you draw a circle 10 miles out, it picks up a few, a mix of Dollar Tree and Dollar General. Closest is 5 miles.

 

[brenndatomu]

My town of 6,000 has a Dollar General and a Family Dollar.

Our town is only about 25% larger, and there is 3 "dollar stores"

 

[EatenByLimestone]

Dollar General has an interesting store location plan. They search out areas that Walmart won’t find attractive and throw stores there. It works for them, their growth has been spectacular.

 

[bogieb]

Dollar General has an interesting store location plan. They search out areas that Walmart won’t find attractive and throw stores there. It works for them, their growth has been spectacular.

Walmart tried for 5 years to build here (we really do draw a lot of people from the surrounding areas since the closest city is 30 miles away). Also, the town next door is a college town so for 2/3 of the year their population goes up dramatically from 5-6k (depending on which website you look at).

A couple of years ago Walmart finally decided to throw in the towel because the town kept changing what they required, including making them physically change site location by a couple of miles becuse they would have been "too close" to a registered historic site (but not within a historic district, or even within town itself). They had the land cleared, the DOT stuff completed and were ready to break ground when the town came up with extra stuff that would cost millions more. So now there is no Walmart but we did get the Dollar General to come in and build a small building in town. Great swap since they pay chit (less than fast food and much less than walmart) and are closed on a regular basis during regular business hours.

 

[Ahoragi]

I wanted to chime in here instead of creating a new thread. Not sure what is going on with Amazon here but the last six orders have all been late and some orders last year didn't show up or were never shipped. The most recent order has been delayed and I received an email asking whether I want to continue to wait or cancel. It was supposed to be two days as with all my other orders but nope. The order before that only shipped one of the two items and I got the refund for the missing item for it to show up a few days later via UPS. They told me to keep the refund despite me offering to pay for it. I cancelled Prime a few days ago as it's no longer worth it. Besides their streaming services aren't that great anymore as everything we want to watch requires a subscription to something else. I don't understand why we pay for this streaming service and have to pay for another streaming service to watch a movie.

I think I'll pass and start reading books.

 

[Ahoragi]

Dollar General has an interesting store location plan. They search out areas that Walmart won’t find attractive and throw stores there. It works for them, their growth has been spectacular.

I think it's more of there being a Dollar General everywhere, even on the moon. They recently explored the bottom of the Ohio River and found a Dollar General down there. My wife is a store manager trainer for DG and she gets paid mileage to every store she has to go and train at. There are ALOT of stores and that is ALOT of extra pay.

 

[ispinwool]

I wanted to chime in here instead of creating a new thread. Not sure what is going on with Amazon here but the last six orders have all been late and some orders last year didn't show up or were never shipped. The most recent order has been delayed and I received an email asking whether I want to continue to wait or cancel. It was supposed to be two days as with all my other orders but nope. The order before that only shipped one of the two items and I got the refund for the missing item for it to show up a few days later via UPS. They told me to keep the refund despite me offering to pay for it. I cancelled Prime a few days ago as it's no longer worth it. Besides their streaming services aren't that great anymore as everything we want to watch requires a subscription to something else. I don't understand why we pay for this streaming service and have to pay for another streaming service to watch a movie.

I think I'll pass and start reading books.

Agreed! Books are my first choice....but the real-in-your-hand-paper books...not the e-books. If I pay for a book, I want to have that book for as long as I want it--not until the e-reader decides to puke or the e-reader company collapses. (that being said, I have borrowed ebooks but usually to pre-read and decide if I want to buy the paper book. LOL)

 

[Whitenuckler]

I wanted to chime in here instead of creating a new thread. Not sure what is going on with Amazon here but the last six orders have all been late and some orders last year didn't show up or were never shipped. The most recent order has been delayed and I received an email asking whether I want to continue to wait or cancel. It was supposed to be two days as with all my other orders but nope. The order before that only shipped one of the two items and I got the refund for the missing item for it to show up a few days later via UPS. They told me to keep the refund despite me offering to pay for it. I cancelled Prime a few days ago as it's no longer worth it. Besides their streaming services aren't that great anymore as everything we want to watch requires a subscription to something else. I don't understand why we pay for this streaming service and have to pay for another streaming service to watch a movie.

I think I'll pass and start reading books.

I cancelled Amazon prime. The minimum amount is not a problem for me, and I never got fast delivery anyway in PEI. I was not watching the TV part or music. I am trying utube premium right now for 2 months free. I'd rather have that. You get no commercials that are twice as loud, and you get some music too.

 

[gthomas785]

We also cancelled our Prime membership recently. Too many instances of receiving the wrong item or shipments being not as promised, delayed damaged etc. Found that Amazon pricing is not as competitive as it used to be for a lot of things.
Unfortunately now amazon is basically the only option for a lot of oddball stuff that you can't buy in Walmart or the grocery store. For those items I will put them in my cart and wait until I hit the $35 minimum. If I can't make myself wait that long I'll have to start questioning my sanity.

 

[stoveliker]

Hearing how Amazon treats their employees (regarding workpace, timing, breaks etc.) which is I think mostly related to their Prime business, I am not surprised that mistakes happen.
I have no Prime, wait to the $35 if I have stuff to get from Amazon (and always go for the latest delivery date, never the earliest; likely the transport is more energy efficient too that way), and don't have many mistakes - possibly because our orders are not pushed for time.

 

[bogieb]

I haven't had any issues with Amazon. I did get an extra delivery about a month ago, but it wasn't Amazon's fault. I ordered sissal rope and it drop ships from the manufacturer. The sissal arrived on time, along with another box with 500' of polypro hollow braided rope. According to the packing slip inside, t was supposed to go to someone in SD, but the shipping label contained my name/address. I just kept it ad no one contacted me about it. I would have shipped it back, but figure as heavy as that box was, the shipping cost wasn't worth it to them.

I do keep an eye on prices for my auto ships (mostly eye care supplies), and where possible, cancel and order from someone else if the price is out of whack.