I personally avoid buying on Amazon now if possible. I still have Prime so occasionally I buy something, but the shipping is rarely 2-day anymore. I’m surprise

I personally avoid buying on Amazon now if possible. I still have Prime so occasionally I buy something, but the shipping is rarely 2-day anymore. I’m surprised when it actually arrives in 2 days. Anecdotally, when browsing I often see many items that look to be exact rebranded duplicates (i.e. cheap headphones) of each other, from companies I’ve never heard of. I’m not against a cheap and low-quality item that is good enough - they are perfect for me. But it’s been years since I trusted the reviews on Amazon, and it’s nice to have items that last and maybe create less waste. I’ve heard of counterfeit items as well, although haven’t encountered any myself. And increasingly the prices aren’t better on Amazon than elsewhere. So many items are made in China. Not a problem outright, and not unique to Amazon or even caused by Amazon. But it’s non-obvious where an item is made. Usually there’s a Q&A where a user responds with where it’s made, but not always. I am looking for a moka pot, and it turns out the classic Bialetti moka pots are not all made in Italy but maybe certain sizes of certain models are, and it’s extremely difficult to get information on specific styles/sizes of a product with the way reviews for all styles/sizes are mushed together, especially when reviews for OLDER models are still included on product pages for new models. I opted to grab a moka pot in person at Target on my next visit since they have one in store. A while ago, I bought a nice Zojirushi rice cooker from Amazon and looked for one made in Japan. Luckily, the brand clearly stamps “Made in Japan” on the front of the machine when that is the case. It was probably a 20%(?) premium for that stamp, and I wonder if it was worth it (so far so good). Amazon shipping is still quite fast and the Amazon return/refund policy is still great, as far as I know. I like the option to return items to Amazon through Kohls, although you can’t return all items through Kohls. But other stores have good return policies as well. Target and Best Buy both have good shipping, store pickup, and curbside pickup options, and with easy returns in my experience. They both have a decent catalog of online only items, and good information on which stores have which products in stock.