• 6 Posts
  • 621 Comments
Joined 9 months ago
cake
Cake day: January 24th, 2024

help-circle











  • Things don’t break in Europe??? Are you insane? In the UK most people buy all their stuff from fucking Temu, it’s literally top 10 free apps on Google Play here always, it’s much worse than even Amazon.

    I’m anti-consumptuon as they come, I don’t have any subscriptions, most things I own are either 2nd hand, upcycled (repurposed), fixed by me, but you are either a sheltered baby or utterly out of touch with reality if you think it’s possible to avoid using Amazon here entirely, especially in Europe if anything, at least in the US they have some competition to Amazon but here? Nah.






  • Vape supplies are 5x the price on the street compared to Amazon, I buy from some shady online retailer instead but it also takes much longer.

    For pharmacy stuff things I need are impossible to get in any pharmacy, even as I have it on prescription and should be able to get it for free in the UK, in practice it’s just never in stock, online pharmacies require bizarre kafka-esque labyrintha of consultations ans approvals, and one that I was recommended by my gf that she uses tried to selectively scam me by asking for.my card details over the phone, including CVC for the excuse that it was some third party supplier, meanwhile on Amazon it can be delivered the same day for a pretty decent price.

    For computer parts in 99% of cases Amazon is much much cheaper. Any hobby stuff like music gear all comes from Amazon because it’s much more expensive with the manufacturer (if even available directly) nevermind retailers, nevermind in store IRL. Print books (can’t stand reading electronic copies) and especially manga are almost never available outside of Amazon, where again it’s all 1DD.

    I’m in the top 20% earners in the UK so I can somewhat afford IKEA as long as I use it for many years, but for most there’s no real alternative to Amazon price-wise despite the poor quality. Same goes for kitchenware, options in stores are far too limited, e.g. plate drying racks were all too big or too small unless I got the one I got from Amazon.

    Clothing varies, if I only ever go with brands I already know and take days off to actually be able to visit the stores before they all close at 5PM, maybe, but otherwise the best way to buy any brand of clothing is prime wardrobe’s try before you buy thing if you filter to legit brands only.

    There’s just no real alternatives, even if you pay more, you wait more, you choose worse options, sooner or later you just run into a wall because those businesses that used to sell this stuff were gone by the 2010s tops.


  • Maybe this is true in the US, but in the UK the difference in shipping is Amazon same-day or at the very latest 1-day for free, or easily £5.99+ for something between a week and never because they use the most cost-cutting human slavery looking ass parcel carriers. That’s before the fact most things just are flat-out not available outside of Amazon, and if they are, cost 5x.

    I happily pay more for local, and I basically bought clothes only on Etsy for quite some time despite being scammed a number of times, but that’s crashed too now and is impossible to use, and even before there’s no persuasive economical argument to make.

    Most suppliers only sell directly on Amazon, or also on AliExpress if it’s chinese made stuff, but that in itself is a very different beast because shipping from there is in the month+ range.