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Show HN: 1dollarthings.com – an internet dollar store
- leeseibert 11y agoI created this app out of frustration with how hard it is to find low priced items online. You usually have to drill way down before you can filter by price. Do you think this is a useful service?
- jamessun 11y agoI worked on a similar side project a little while ago that focused on items that were below ten dollars. Like 1 Dollar Things, I used your typical affiliate data feeds. It was an interesting development exercise, but I failed to get any steady traffic/interest in the site. I think the idea has some merit, but my execution wasn't good enough. Good luck with 1 Dollar Things!
- leeseibert 11y agoWhat do you mean by "affiliate data feeds"? I am using live API calls. Is that what you mean?
- jamessun 11y agoI consumed product data feeds from companies that ran affiliate programs through companies like Commission Junction, filtered/stored the product data offline, indexed it, and displayed it in any number of ways through the web. In retrospect, I should have spent more time marketing the site and getting feedback from users instead of focusing on the technical infrastructure :-)
- TranquilMarmot 11y agoYeah, but where's the fun in that!
- djhn 11y agoThe fun in that is gone, it has trickled into your wallet.
- overcast 11y agoI think the idea has some merit, and the domain is pretty solid. Though you'll want to eventually snag "onedollarthings.com" as well. The pinterest style tile layout is pretty exhausting at this point though. I think you'd fair better with a tidy listing, and filtering. The ability to have a "watch list" for types of items would be very handy as well.
- joshstrange 11y agoI'm getting an "Application Error" when I try to visit.
- leeseibert 11y agoUh Oh. Looks like I have some work to do. It's up again.
- amorphid 11y agoIt's down again :)
- callmeed 11y agoSite is down but based on the domain and your description, I like where your head is at. Limiting it to $1 items might be too low IMO. One place I enjoy browsing is this subreddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/amazonunder5 https://www.reddit.com/r/amazonunder5
- brookside 11y agoPretty cool thing to exist, but I'm going stay away in effort to keep my life clutter free and junk drawer somewhat empty.
- callmeed 11y agoIt's junk drawers (plural) in our home
- leeseibert 11y agoIt's too hidden I know but if you open the hamburger menu at the bottom, you can choose $1, $2, $5, $10, or $25
- cphoover 11y agodown again
- petecooper 11y agoI can't check your site because it's throwing an application error, but Ali Express has many sub-1USD things, even with postage, and also has an affiliate scheme. A propos nothing, the cheapest thing I've found, ordered, had delivered and found useful was a Raspberry Pi camera mount for 0.19GBP (~0.27USD) shipped. Astonishing and a bit shameful. http://www.aliexpress.com http://www.aliexpress.com
- bpg_92 11y agoDid you look for each one? Or is there a filter for that.
- Ecco 11y agoI've written a blog post on that very subject. Turns out you can have a $0.03 item mailed to you, including shipping, from China! http://romain.goyet.com/articles/free_shipping_from_china/ http://romain.goyet.com/articles/free_shipping_from_china/
- wesbos 11y agoChina subsidizes the postal service to keep up their exports.
- binarysolo 11y agoWonder how long that'll keep up given their current issues...
- Scoundreller 11y agoBut you do have a have a lot of patience. It seems to be getting a lot slower. I just hit a new record: An item shipped on November 25th arrived last week to Canada.
- vanattab 11y agoI had package of green tea I ordered show up 7 months after I ordered it.
- foxrider 11y agonice, but you need a server for more than one dollar for this website
- profinger 11y agoOne issue that I have here, and I can't view it because the site is down, is that shipping will probably make any of these things not worth buying. Most $1 things aren't worth shipping. Unless you filter for only free shipping?
- leeseibert 11y agoYeah I have thought about that. With Amazon Prime users don't think about shipping and with Walmart you can ship to store. But I hear what you're saying.
- vortico 11y agoWhy did you choose a Pinterest-style list rather than a sequences of rectangle boxes and pagination? Sometimes the Javascript breaks when scrolling down (I assume because the server returns a 500 on the response). A refresh would fix it, but since it doesn't know what "page" I'm on, I'm brought back to the top. It's also really slow on my mobile device and old-ish computer, while it's just a handful of images and text.
- vanattab 11y agoI have been thinking of building an online marketplace called "unplaningobsolescence.com" that would only sell products with 10yr+ warranties but I haven't had the time. P.S. yes I know that would be a terrible url for a online store but I like it.
- midgetjones 11y agoDid you mean "unplaning"?
- vanattab 11y agoOr perhaps unplanning. I wanted it to be a play the phrase "planned obsolescence" but its like I said in my post its not a good url. Combining a word that doesn't exist with a word that is difficult to spell probably breaks a lot of the guidance given for good urls. I am open to suggestion. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planned_obsolescence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planned_obsolescence
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- sarciszewski 11y ago"Application Error" Okay, maybe your web hosting shouldn't have been a 1 dollar thing too? (I'm kidding. I'll bookmark this and come back later when the traffic dies down. Seems like a neat idea!)
- harel 11y agoI'll buy that for a dollar
- fareesh 11y agoHeroku error on the page - I suppose paying for expensive hosting like Heroku is a bit difficult when everything being sold is $1 :D
- 0942v8653 11y agoIt looks like you have some things counting as less than one dollar when they are really $undefined -- specifically, video streaming shows from Walmart. Here is the HTML of one of them: <div class="item"><a href="http://c.affil.walmart.com/t/api02?l=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.walmart.com%2Fip%2F23794924%3Faffp1%3D_29G0tM6Kd9jCNF-ZaPzGqT3dPWZDueGbMk7hOeZY0E%26affilsrc%3Dapi%26veh%3Daff%26wmlspartner%3Dreadonlyapi" target="_blank"></a><a href="http://c.affil.walmart.com/t/api02?l=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.walmart.com%2Fip%2F23794924%3Faffp1%3D_29G0tM6Kd9jCNF-ZaPzGqT3dPWZDueGbMk7hOeZY0E%26affilsrc%3Dapi%26veh%3Daff%26wmlspartner%3Dreadonlyapi" target="_blank"><img src="http://i.walmartimages.com/i/p/01/13/02/46/71/0113024671371_100X100.jpg"><h3>Doctor Who: Season 7, Part 2 (2013)</h3></a><div>Price: $undefined</div><img src="walmart.png" style="float: right; width: 30%; height: 30%;"></div>
- leeseibert 11y agoNice catch! Thanks
- leeseibert 11y agoFor those outside the US would something like this work in your country? Do you have the equivalent of a dollar store there?
- PhoenixWright 11y agoAwesome site. Ever since I saw fivestar.io I've been wanting to do an Amazon affiliate site. He gave an update a couple of months after launch and said he was making a nice ~$300/month.