Asklemmy

I used to buy almost everything on Amazon - electronics, books, kitchen/office/cleaning supplies, etc. Back then I was a Prime subscriber so I did not pay for the delivery. As for the delivery, it was blazing fast and the item was always in a mint condition. In case of any issues I was able to sort it out within a day or two. And the price was better than the other online or brick and mortar stores.

However, at some point the quality of the products went downhill. Support became unhelpful and the prices got higher than the competition. One time I had some issues with the order. It never got delivered and the process to get my money back was way too long and too complex. Eventually I have contacted my bank and reported the fraud. Eventually I got my money back. Turned out that such issues were not an anomaly and a lot of people reported shady sellers.

Since then I have unsubscribed from Prime and every time I found something I wanted to buy I've checked the seller and if there was a website I bought directly from them.

For past few years I didn't buy a thing on Amazon.

As for the alternatives, I don't have a single one. I have several websites I usually buy from but in general I always do some research and buy the product from the seller that has the best price and is trusted enough.

I avoid Amazon. Deleted my account years ago. They treat their workers like shit, don't pay their taxes, extract wealth and send it overseas, pollute like there's no tomorrow, but most importantly, Jeff Bezos is not a nice man.

My shopping happens mostly online, at farmers markets and local stores.

I'm avoiding Amazon for many years now. To be fair I usually just... Don't buy things?

But when I have to, I try to go local shop first, second hand websites/markets, other websites and eventually Amazon, I guess? It never came to this.

I have spent 10/20% more than the price on Amazon though.

Last but not least, for niece stuff I have used Amazon as a sort of catalogue to find out what exists and then look for things further by other means.

B&H photo is good for electronics

Amazon is always the first place I check whenever I want to buy anything. I order frequently enough that Prime more than pays for itself every year, and I hate making new accounts on new websites to order anything elsewhere unless it's just not available on Amazon.

I don't like that it's this way, but it's the most cost-effective way of shopping for me.

I use it out of laziness. Despite all the shit they still have great customer service. About a year ago I ordered a £150 multi-tool and they accidentally sent me a £200 reciprocating saw. Due to a complicated living situation at the time it would have taken me about 6 months to send the wrong tool back so they just said I could keep it and refunded me so I could buy the other tool again.

The other thing I like is that I’ll just see a price and buy it easily. I’ve often shopped around and found something cheaper but then the whole purchasing process is terrible. They add on a bunch of extra costs, then make me create an account, then add on more costs. By the end I could’ve paid less and got it quicker from Amazon. Not always the case but it happens often enough that I will just go to Amazon half the time.

But I guess the main reason is that I hate being forced to create accounts and so many shops require that for no good reason.

I used to use eBay instead but due to a recent incident I feel uncomfortable using it. I bought an item and after there was still no tracking number for a week or two, I contacted the seller. More time passed and they told me to wait again. The next time I just ask for a refund.

They ghost me and I decide to escalate to eBay, they have great protections right? Money back guarantee right? Turns out, if you do not report the item within 30 days of purchasing, you can't do shit. Ok, I'll just make a fuss to customer service. EBAY HAS NONE. There is a contact page but it is all automated and won't apply to my item. Other than that there is no way to contact them. Abosolutely zero. There are no emails, they sometimes have a phone number but it changes and doesn't even work most of the time. People are even saying yo DM their twitter!

I had a case where an item never arrived from Amazon. I simply contacted their customer service, answered their questions and got a refund within 10 mins.

It feels so shitty that just by trusting the seller for 2 months, I got robbed and there's nothing I can do. Amazon, you are at least guaranteed to speak to a human and get some help.

And also eBay reviews suck, the seller that scammed me had over 90% positive feedback, tens of thousands sold items, so I assumed they were legit. All of their negative reviews were the same issue I had and they are still on the platform.

If you keep picking a single replacement for the big corporation that conveniently carries everything, you're just following Southpark's wal-mart pattern. Take two extra seconds and see if you can buy the product directly from the manufacturer's website, some other niche/specialty retail site, or from a brick & mortar store down the street.

I have successfully almost completely cut Amazon shopping out. We would spend hundred of £s every month and would buy everything off Amazon. But the company is terrible (mistreating workers, avoiding tax, etc etc). They've allowed their site to get flooded with (low quality) trash. Reviews are unreliable. Prices are comparable or more expensive to elsewhere. I do still buy from there once in a while for quick delivery and easy returns.

Alternatives:

eBay - sucks for product reviews, but is good if you know what you're getting (e.g. something branded). Delivery is through the post rather than mistreated delivery drivers needing to piss in bottles. I managed to help a hospice by buying excess stock it had via eBay. Also I'm starting to get everything I can secondhand. Makes shopping cheaper and it's better for the environment.

HotUKDeals - a sales sharing website that links through to other small retailers with good bargains. I find stuff here frequently and always search this site first when I want something.

Overall I'm buying a lot less stuff and I'm really happy with that.

We ditched Prime a few months back after they pulled the adverts fuckery with Video. It wasn’t a terribly difficult decision, what with buying less and less from Amazon over the past couple of years.

What it has highlighted though, is how effectively Amazon has fucked our high streets. You want boot laces? Then your options are one chain store or online somewhere and that’s it. Which I guess has made me more mindful of what I’m buying.

Yes. It's the only big tech that I use by choice. It's too damn convinient, and it makese feel guilty that I'm so reliant on it.

I use it as one of several sites....there are some things they are still the best / most convenient for. For cheap chinese crap (which is often all I need for small projects etc) temu and aliexpress now undercut amazon considerably. For quality items that are ok to buy used, ebay.

ANYTHING that costco sells will almost always be the best choice, but they have a very limited selection.

So in short, amazon is very much still in play, but as one of many, not the go-to anymore.

I use it all the time for convenience. I have 2 autistic little kids and work 10-12 hours a day and it isn't always practical to get to the store. Plus I'm lazy. Amazon is local to my area - friends and family work there (both tech and warehouse).

For people in Germany or Austria, Geizhals is great. It shows you the cheapest seller for every product and has a ton of information for each product that you can filter by.

I do for many things. It's just convenient and their logistics muscle at this point is wild.

That said, I will go to first party online stores for things like hardware most times. It's often just cheaper and delivery is about the same.

An interesting observation: Back when I lived somewhere else there was a local alternative, because it was a country far enough out of the way that Amazon didn't directly support it, and it's interesting that the local alternative wasn't meaningfully worse at the logistics or availability. Amazon's existence does, in fact, heavily suppress competition. You don't need to be as big as they are to do what they do, it's just impossible to do it if they're already there.

So for me, for larger things, i use Amazon to find which products i want and i hunt down the website of the store that makes it. For small stuff, or things that may be from a smaller site, or over seas i order on Amazon. I am sure the smaller sites need the boost even more, but Amazon gives me the extra layer of guarantee of satisfaction.

I've only made 3 purchases on it in the last year and 2 were gifts 1 was an emulator card for GBA, all three were not accessible locally.

I generally don't order stuff online, pretty much ever. I don't really need more stuff.

I've been boycotting Amazon (UK) for a few years now. It's not easy! Sometimes it doesn't take much longer to source items, but other times it takes way longer. I have limits though, and occasionally I end up caving-in and just using Amazon, but it's getting rarer all the time. Now I use them once or twice per year. I tried using onbuy for a while, but we got a couple of faulty items from them and their support completely ignored me, so I stopped using them. Generally, here are some of my most common alternatives:

general stuff and gifts: Argos, ebay, etsy
tech: overclockers, ebuyer, scan.co.uk
electronics: John Lewis, AO, Richer Sounds
books/dvds: hive.co.uk, Waterstones, WH Smith
pharma: boots, simpleonlinepharmacy, well
household: Robert Dyas, Dunelm, John Lewis
pets: zooplus
spare parts: buyspares.co.uk

And for a wishlist alternative I use wishlist.com. (edited to fix formatting)

I try to avoid it. I only buy there what I can’t find locally, or elsewhere on the internet, or anywhere at the price. At this point, I probably purchase less than an item a month from Amazon, and I’m still trying to cut that down.

I do a decent amount but it has been less and less. I avoid buying no name stuff that is loaded with fake reviews. If there is something I specifically want and it is cheaper on Amazon, I'll get it there. Oftentimes it is not cheaper for brand named stuff.

Good for you for avoiding Amazon when you can.

I haven't used Amazon in almost a decade now. The biggest tip I have is just avoid Amazon links. I block them from my search results, only go there if I think they might have a part number that I need to reference.

My next step is to reflect on whether I really need the object, and if I really can't, then I'll contact the manufacturer directly at their homepage. A couple of times the object has arrived in an amazon box, but I can't control that.

Finally, I am cool with shipping taking a reasonable amount of time. I would prefer to wait a bit for my object than support the amazon monopoly.

Don't use it at all. If I need something I get it from the store

I avoid it basically wherever possible, but sometimes people give me Amazon giftcards.

I don't buy a huge amount of stuff off the internet, transacting in person is often more convenient. Imo Banggood, Aliexpress, dhgate, taobao, etc. are often some of the best alternatives, because a lot of Amazon is just selling that same stuff, but for more money.

I use bookshop.org for books, some of the profits go to Indy bookshops.

Otherwise I use Amazon like a search provider, find the item I like then go straight to retailer or manufacturers website.

I do, because the combination of speed and cost matter to me. We don't have a lot of other options in Australia, certainly none that can come close to Amazon's performance in this space.

There's no Amazon where I live right now, but if I were to return to an Amazon country, I'd probably use it again. The convenience is hard to beat.

I normally try to find a niche site in my country specialising in the thing I'm trying to buy (like OP said in the last paragraph)

I have never ordered something from Amazon. It was introduced in my country a few years back, but it isn't really that good of a site (at least the few times I have visited it).

Like many here, I do not want to support a monopolistic company like Amazon. Luckily I live in a country where I have better options. I tend to buy things from plenty of well rated sites. Environmentally conscious sites if I can.

I could see myself buying from them if there genuinely isn't another option and it is something I really need, but that has yet to happen.

Not sure what "a lot" means but there's some animal veterinary stuff that we buy every 6 weeks or so because... well... shit's expensive and not always easy to find locally. It winds up being either Amazon or Chewie that has the stuff in stock and at prices (even with shipping) that are manageable with our budget.

B&H if you're buying tech gear

Not for about 3 years now.

I took a stand against their horrible practices and frequently pay more for goods I could find there cheaper, plus arrive faster.

I actively avoid Amazon, however there's a brand I really like that only sells through Amazon in my country, so I've used it a couple of times when I have no other choice.

I also have an audible account from before it was acquired by Amazon, idk if that counts, but I stopped paying for it over a decade ago

I try my best to avoid it, Although I still end up getting stuff once a month or so. There isn't just 1 alternative, the fact amazon is a 1 stop shop is kind of the big problem with them. my priorities are: Shop local > shop direct from manufacturer > shop from a specialty store > google the amazon product name > buy amazon.

I actively use audible, there isn't really any alternatives (spotify's model for audiobooks is awful, I'm open to other suggestions), it hasn't enshittified yet, it's pretty cheap and I don't feel right pirating something as niche and valuable to me as audible.

I don't use prime video, even when I have access from getting prime (sometimes it's cheaper to buy a month of prime than pay for shipping once). The ads on launch are simply unacceptable and I largely would prefer if their studios close so I surf the high seas.

I haven't used it for personal stuff in years. My employer uses it for office supplies, so I've occasionally ordered work stuff, but even that is as little as possible, and only things where it won't matter if the quality is just so so, because you can't trust that you'll get the real thing anymore. Plus, I don't want to sift through 10k listings of sweatshop garbage to find the thing I'm looking for.

Unfortunately the deliveries to the various pickup boxes is critical. I’ve tried looking into general delivery to a post office or to look at specific (eg Home Depot) pickup options with no success.

Local. It builds community and helps keep everyone fed and housed

I do my best not to feed money unnecessarily into Amazon, because they're well on their way into abusing their near-monopoly advantage.

I can't change how the world treats a company that shrugs off news of their employees peeing in bottles, and doesn't seem to care about heat exhaustion in their own staff. But I can control how I react to that news.

I use separate dedicated online retailers for groceries, hardware, and toys. I generally get free or very low cost delivery, directly to my door, within a week. My delivery timing is actually more reliable than it was with Amazon, back when I still ordered a few things from them, after they started enshitifying.

I'm generally always using a retailer who has a presence in my city, so if I need to return something, I just return it at the store.

The quality of the return desk experience is usually what determines which specific retailer I buy from, for each category.

(Which is ironic because I almost never need to return anything. I'm shockingly good at fixing stuff, so if I get something mildly broken, I just fix it and use it. But I really hate it if it's a hassle on the rare day that I do.)

A fair bit, yeah. I usually buy my motorcycle tires through Amazon, because they're almost always significantly less expensive than better retailers like Revzilla, Dennis Kirk, and so on. My last set of tires was about $100 cheaper after shipping. When I was shopping for shoes (Vibram FiveFingers), Amazon had the widest selection in my size, including prior model years.

But given a real option, I'll usually prefer to shop pretty much anywhere else.