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I buy a lot from Walmart now, to drive business away from Amazon (I would never have typed these words a few years ago...). First thing I do is click Retailer =

by fma 5y ago

I buy a lot from Walmart now, to drive business away from Amazon (I would never have typed these words a few years ago...). First thing I do is click Retailer = Walmart.com.

jonahhorowitz 5y ago
I used to hate Best Buy because I had some poor return experiences back in the 90s, but now it's my first choice for online shopping because they only sell first-party items and they have control over their supply chain. This is particularly important for frequently-counterfeited products like SD cards.
- sethhochberg 5y ago
  Sometimes it makes me feel like a crazy person - I bought some new headphones a few months ago, and walked to a physical Best Buy store to make the purchase, because I had no confidence any online retailer wasn't going to sell me counterfeits, and the manufacturer was selling at full MSRP instead of the slightly-cheaper usual going rate for them. And for what its worth, the store experience was totally fine. I'll give them my money again next time I need something tech related.
- reaperducer 5y ago
  I had some poor return experiences back in the 90s, but now it's my first choice My wife knows the person who is responsible for this, and tells me that the person who implemented these changes knows exactly what you're talking about because that person had the same horrible experiences with Best Buy decades ago. That's the reason things have changed.
- letitbeirie 5y ago
  Best Buy isn't immune from this either. I tried to buy a TV from them last year - after a few days I emailed them to ask where they were and they replied to "check my account for the tracking number." Three days and another email (this time unanswered) later, I received an email stating that my order had been cancelled because they were out of stock. The same item was still for sale on their website with no mention of any delivery delay. I would call it an anomaly but the exact same thing happened when my sister tried to buy a Switch from them a few months prior.
mint2 5y ago
I think I’ll start as well. I used to consider Walmart worse, and never shopped there. But for several years I’ve intentionally been avoiding Amazon when at all practical. But I’m going to avoid them at all costs. Amazon seems both willfully and unintentionally incompetent. They have so many strikes against them. Their prime dark patterns are hostile enough, and I avoided it for years. But I needed a cheap plastic item quickly so I did a free prime trial with the intention to cancel. So I canceled and got billed anyway because according to their rep, on the back end the check box for “auto renewal” was enabled which wasn’t an option my settings screens. Why would it have been? I’d already cancelled and had a cancel confirmation email so why would an auto renewal option still be activated and bill me? It’s willful incompetence. And their hire to fire practices and practice of churning through warehouse workers is terrible. This Klein bottle incident just shows again how little they care about legit users or how easy it is to abuse the system. They made whole foods a bad experience by treating non-prime members as second class customers. I’ve cut back there and now only occasionally buy coffee beans there, and will be cutting back even more. And now Amazon recruiters started reaching out to me for data science positions. No I am not interested in working for a hot mess that only cares about money.
- reaperducer 5y ago
  They made whole foods a bad experience by treating non-prime members as second class customers. To be honest, there's not much difference between Prime and non-Prime at Whole Foods. The Prime specials are very few and far between, and usually not worth very much. There are more signs about discounts in the store than actual discounts in the store. I think the only thing I ever get a Prime discount on is my wife's favorite cheese and occasionally steak. But pre-Amazon, the cheese was $4.99 a package. Post-Amazon, I need a Prime discount to get it down to $6.99 a package.
  - pbhjpbhj 5y ago
    Where did you buy it before, did they stop selling direct? Any idea why?
abawany 5y ago
Remember that Walmart and Best Buy also sell a lot of 3rd-party stuff now. I find it strange that on their site I always have to filter by Retailer=Walmart.com to get their listings and even then, it sometimes filters out some of their own listings.
- TameAntelope 5y ago
  They did this to directly compete with Amazon, I'm constantly baffled as to why they persist with this design. Every time you hear, "<Crazy thing X> sold on Walmart website!" it's always a reseller, not directly from them.
  - reaperducer 5y ago
    I'm constantly baffled as to why they persist with this design. Because "monkey see, monkey do" is pretty much the go-to leadership strategy for a lot of big companies these days. Bad managers manage badly. Senior "leadership" rarely knows the meaning of the world.
- gwittel 5y ago
  Target has started this as well. It’s baffling that companies will so willingly work to destroy consumer trust.
JohnTHaller 5y ago
Walmart has tons of sketchy 3rd party sellers as well, but yes, clicking Retailer=Walmart will get you Walmart. To my knowledge, they don't do the same inventory intermingling that Amazon does.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

by fma 5y ago

I buy a lot from Walmart now, to drive business away from Amazon (I would never have typed these words a few years ago...). First thing I do is click Retailer = Walmart.com.

jonahhorowitz 5y ago

I used to hate Best Buy because I had some poor return experiences back in the 90s, but now it's my first choice for online shopping because they only sell first-party items and they have control over their supply chain. This is particularly important for frequently-counterfeited products like SD cards.

sethhochberg 5y ago
Sometimes it makes me feel like a crazy person - I bought some new headphones a few months ago, and walked to a physical Best Buy store to make the purchase, because I had no confidence any online retailer wasn't going to sell me counterfeits, and the manufacturer was selling at full MSRP instead of the slightly-cheaper usual going rate for them. And for what its worth, the store experience was totally fine. I'll give them my money again next time I need something tech related.
reaperducer 5y ago
I had some poor return experiences back in the 90s, but now it's my first choice My wife knows the person who is responsible for this, and tells me that the person who implemented these changes knows exactly what you're talking about because that person had the same horrible experiences with Best Buy decades ago. That's the reason things have changed.
letitbeirie 5y ago
Best Buy isn't immune from this either. I tried to buy a TV from them last year - after a few days I emailed them to ask where they were and they replied to "check my account for the tracking number." Three days and another email (this time unanswered) later, I received an email stating that my order had been cancelled because they were out of stock. The same item was still for sale on their website with no mention of any delivery delay. I would call it an anomaly but the exact same thing happened when my sister tried to buy a Switch from them a few months prior.

mint2 5y ago

I think I’ll start as well. I used to consider Walmart worse, and never shopped there. But for several years I’ve intentionally been avoiding Amazon when at all practical. But I’m going to avoid them at all costs. Amazon seems both willfully and unintentionally incompetent. They have so many strikes against them. Their prime dark patterns are hostile enough, and I avoided it for years. But I needed a cheap plastic item quickly so I did a free prime trial with the intention to cancel. So I canceled and got billed anyway because according to their rep, on the back end the check box for “auto renewal” was enabled which wasn’t an option my settings screens. Why would it have been? I’d already cancelled and had a cancel confirmation email so why would an auto renewal option still be activated and bill me? It’s willful incompetence. And their hire to fire practices and practice of churning through warehouse workers is terrible. This Klein bottle incident just shows again how little they care about legit users or how easy it is to abuse the system. They made whole foods a bad experience by treating non-prime members as second class customers. I’ve cut back there and now only occasionally buy coffee beans there, and will be cutting back even more. And now Amazon recruiters started reaching out to me for data science positions. No I am not interested in working for a hot mess that only cares about money.

reaperducer 5y ago
They made whole foods a bad experience by treating non-prime members as second class customers. To be honest, there's not much difference between Prime and non-Prime at Whole Foods. The Prime specials are very few and far between, and usually not worth very much. There are more signs about discounts in the store than actual discounts in the store. I think the only thing I ever get a Prime discount on is my wife's favorite cheese and occasionally steak. But pre-Amazon, the cheese was $4.99 a package. Post-Amazon, I need a Prime discount to get it down to $6.99 a package.
- pbhjpbhj 5y ago
  Where did you buy it before, did they stop selling direct? Any idea why?

abawany 5y ago

Remember that Walmart and Best Buy also sell a lot of 3rd-party stuff now. I find it strange that on their site I always have to filter by Retailer=Walmart.com to get their listings and even then, it sometimes filters out some of their own listings.

TameAntelope 5y ago
They did this to directly compete with Amazon, I'm constantly baffled as to why they persist with this design. Every time you hear, "<Crazy thing X> sold on Walmart website!" it's always a reseller, not directly from them.
- reaperducer 5y ago
  I'm constantly baffled as to why they persist with this design. Because "monkey see, monkey do" is pretty much the go-to leadership strategy for a lot of big companies these days. Bad managers manage badly. Senior "leadership" rarely knows the meaning of the world.
gwittel 5y ago
Target has started this as well. It’s baffling that companies will so willingly work to destroy consumer trust.

JohnTHaller 5y ago

Walmart has tons of sketchy 3rd party sellers as well, but yes, clicking Retailer=Walmart will get you Walmart. To my knowledge, they don't do the same inventory intermingling that Amazon does.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]