What websites do you use as an alternative to Amazon?

ExtraMedicated@lemmy.world to Ask Lemmy@lemmy.world – 249 points –

I've been trying to avoid shopping on Amazon for several years. For computer parts, I look at Newegg. For pet stuff, Chewy.

But what about all the miscellaneous stuff? What other websites do you trust when it comes to shopping online?

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Federated Amazon alternative coming soon?

That’s a brilliant idea.

Until you need to reach out support for a fake 1 tb microsd card

That’s oddly specific.

I would think for it to work properly there would need to be some sort of trust rating. I’ve used other (admittedly not federated) aggregator marketplaces and never had an issue. Not saying issues don’t happen, but they’re not guaranteed. You’d still get your standard PayPal or credit card protections if you used them.

There would be reviews/earrings and In time certain federated instances would gain reputation for trust through some type of way. Certain instances could possibly due verification of some sort

Only if you love long shipping times. I don’t see how warehouses or in-house logistics could be federated when there is no house, so it’d essentially just be private sellers going through traditional shipping avenues like USPS/UPS/FedEx/DHL, etc

If that’s a trade-off you’re willing to make, though, then let’s fucken go

That would be fine since itd take monopoly power away from amazon. Could possibly even leverage things like uber package delivery if someone in your city buys what you sell

I can get behind this tbh. Rarely is anything so important that you need it next day. Businesses often need that, but privately, I don’t. I’m patient.

Walmart, Target for brand name household items. BJs for bulk food. Etsy for miscellaneous small weird items, or eBay when I really want some sketchy Chinese knockoffs.

I’d be happy with step one being open front ends, against the amazon api.

A step in that direction - https://www.reuters.com/world/india/indian-governments-e-commerce-network-oncd-expands-into-236-cities-ceo-says-2023-05-11/

Replacing Uber AND Amazon? And on top of that, this same country got sued a few years back for offering cheap, generic alternatives to expensive drugs to their populace. (Big pharma wasn't happy)

India is making a lot of good moves.

Fun side story. My first job as a developer, I was working in a small porn company in downtown Chicago. We had just hired a few people, so being the only techy in the company it was on me to order a bunch of hardware from NewEgg.

It was supposed to be delivered days later. But no, they had an employee, just like a regular dude, hop in his car and deliver the order on the same day. This was probably 2006, so same day delivery way NOT a normal thing.

I rarely get to tell this story because I don't want people to know I started off my (somewhat long) software engineering career in porn and because who cares about this in today's world.

However, OP mentioned NewEgg, so it fits here.

Porn starts a surprising number of careers.

Maybe not that surprising.

It's not really.. Just look at how VHS, DVD and blu-ray became popular..

I despise the porn industry because it's so exploitative. But sometimes there are positive outcomes..

Just to note that the blu-ray was mainly thanks to PS3.

Thinking about war as I read your comment and how it has had the same effect on driving technology and medicine forward... Obviously not in the nicest way.

you can just tell this story without mentioning you worked for a porn company?? lol

Honestly I just order from Target. I know the products are legit, and I can usually do same day pickup.

(Lately I've preferred to shop in person. The stereotype is true -- once you become a mom, getting a Starbies and walking around Target becomes your self-care.)

I'm a 42 y/o dude, not a mom, but I'm right there with you. My friend and I would walk along the aisle by the side of the building to see what kind of junk they have for sale at the endcaps. Then hit up the electronics and nerd stuff, like Funkos and new movie releases. Finally walk down the food section to pick up groceries. All the while with some drinks in hand. We usually avoid the clothing section unless we need something.

I've been been using Target instead of Amazon Prime. Shipping takes a little longer but 5% off with red card is neat. Where it really lacks is quality control over shipping. With Amazon an item getting damaged during shipping was something like once every few years, if even that. With Target since they don't control that part of the chain it's out of their hands, and it feels like 1 out of every 5 orders had something damaged to some degree. The app make it super easy to get a free replacement though.

idk if it still is since I haven't used Amazons app since, but targets app is so much nicer

Edit: off memory the worst case was some aerosol sunscreen was dented so it was empty on arrival and the the app told me I had to do an exchange in store for it. It's not that bad, but just stuff that doesn't really happen with amazon

I'd say just do in store pickup whenever you can. That way, you can refuse to pick up the merchandise if it's too bad.

I’ve found that Target ships counterfeit items time to time, as well as shoddy returned items. Amazon does the same. I typically buy my electronics from Best Buy because i know they sort those items into Open Box deals instead.

I googled it, and that's unfortunately a local shop only available in one country (and it might help others if you specify which country).

I think to be a truly viable Amazon alternative it'd have to be global, for example when I buy from Amazon, I might be buying from somewhere in Europe, and their shipping service handles getting it to me without me even noticing where it's coming from, which is super neat! 😁

God, I hate Amazon, but god, I love Amazon.

This isn't really an answer to the question, but I just saw a Mastodon post about an online store that's opening this October called Artisans.coop

It seems to be a cooperatively owned Etsy alternative, (and I can only assume it's a response to whatever shenanigans went on between Etsy and Silicon Valley Bank.)

I might check that out. I have a small Etsy shop that used to generate a bit of side income for me, mainly just enough to buy the occasional tool or some materials for personal projects, but Etsy has changed a lot since 2018. It's basically just eBay or Amazon with the veneer of "this is totally handmade." They pushed "free" shipping and decreased lead times, which undermines actual handmade products.

My assumption that this was about SVB sounds totally off the mark now that you've put it this way. From your story, it sounds like this is about an entire culture shift that's been alienating Etsy's original community of artisans for quite some time.

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I'm not an Amazon fan either. But you may want to know that Newegg is owned by a Chinese company these days.

I have heard this and mostly avoid shopping there as a result. Is there a "new" NewEgg that's like old NewEgg?

Closest thing would be MicroCenter. I believe they will ship, but their store locations are rare and spaced out. Closest one to me is almost an hour and a half away, but since the Fry's 10 minutes away closed it's my only other option besides BestBuy (barf).

B&H Photo Video is a decent place but stock is always iffy. More of a consumer electronics store than newegg in my experience.

I like B&H too but hate their holiday schedules. They take more holidays than anyone else on the planet so I've gone to my local stores half of the time when I need some photo or video gear.

I mean, it's still another pretty big company, but the Shopify "Shop" app is actually pretty great as an alternative to Amazon.

Basically, all the businesses using a Shopify online storefront are amalgamated and searchable in one app, and the UI is pretty solid, too. I really like that a business can have their own website with a storefront, but also be there for convenience and still be in the same system.

That's actually such a smart move for Shopify to incentivise use of their platform over others.

I go to Amazon to look at what name brands there are. Or Google. Go and order directly from the company. Their customer service is better and they usually have cheaper options. Plus if you need a modification that you didn't know existed, refer back to the the customer service part.

Plus, if you buy directly from the manufacturer, you know you're getting a legit product with a good warranty. Some brands also have stores that double as service centers. If I order Nikes and they don't fit, I can return them to the local Nike store. Many offer free shipping just like Amazon, easy returns, better color choices and no creepy tracking or crazy knockoffs.

Returns is the whole reason I stopped using Amazon. They sent me a pressure washer without a gun to use the pressure washer. I called customer service and asked them to send me just the gun end. It's this part number on your site.

They said ok and shipped it. They insisted for weeks that they delivered it and I told them they did not. I live on my own (just my young son and dog at the time) and no roommates. Plus I have a ring doorbell. It was a whole fiasco. Where I drew the line is they accused me of taking it without telling them. It was a 20 dollar part.

Amazon entirely dominated by white label products from Alibaba, though. Where are you going to find a WXTMO Potato Peeler for cheaper and with better service?

I just skip amazon entirely. The search really isn't useful anymore.

What is your time worth for some cheap potato peeler? I just go to Target and pay the extra dollar. I have it that day and if there is a problem it isn't hard to replace it.

A combination of Micro Center, FS.com, and eBay for computer parts. Anything worth researching I'll try and buy direct from the manufacturer.

Dumb cheap stuff still goes to Amazon because if I need a $2 female USB-B to male USB-C adaptor or something like that I'm not willing to go through more than about 5 mins of searching and I know there's some random blob of letters company on the Amazon marketplace that will give me something that functions. I definitely wait until I have something critical or reach $30+ before actually placing the order though.

Have you tried Monoprice? It's been a while since I've had to order anything from them but they were always my goto for cables, adaptors, etc.

Believe it or not I’ve never used Amazon.

I’m old, I never left eBay. I’ve seen things I want a lot cheaper on there though. I just don’t want to give them my money.

I used to shop on Amazon, but now I'm all eBay too. "It just works"and even though I know it's another mega-sized company, at least it's not amazon.

More than once though, I bought something on ebay, only to have it delivered in an Amazon box (because they fulfill for so many companies). Wish I could think of a way to avoid that.

It is against eBay policy for sellers to ship directly from Amazon. Report them and eBay will, after several months, end the offending account. Include pictures of the Amazon packaging. If you want to go the extra mile, go to the vendor's storefront and search for their items on Amazon. If you find a bunch, tell eBay that the vendor's storefront is full of relisted Amazon items.

https://www.ebay.com/help/buying/resolving-issues-sellers/reporting-item-issue-seller?id=4022

You can also leave negative feedback stating that the vendor simply ships from Amazon at a marked up price.

It is also against Amazon's policy for accounts to use Prime shipping perks to sell items. If your package has a gift receipt, the vendor is violating that policy. The receipt will include their account name, and you can report them to Amazon too. If it doesn't have a gift receipt, they're not violating any Amazon policy, and there's nothing you can do on that end.

I use Amazon to shop often times, and then just buy directly from the vendor. May take a little longer to mail or cost a tiny bit more, but worth it to me

The thing I like Amazon for is finding the vendor and then trying to buy direct from them. Often I've not been able to do that though. But I don't buy anything brand new from Amazon. I buy refurb electronics to keep them out of a landfill. Built myself some decent computers too.

On the opposite end: I recently was looking for a good quality belt and avoided Amazon. Found one the met all of my needs and wants after a bunch of searching. It was ok clearance and so returns were explicitly not allowed. I was nervous about the sizing but I figured I’d take a chance.

When it arrived it was in Amazon packaging.

Turns out they have an Amazon storefront. The belt was also available at the clearance price on there and returns were accepted which meant I could have ordered 2 sizes and keept the one that fit better.

Oh well. The way I see it: the belt was the right size and Amazon didn’t get a cut of the purchase.

For a lot of consumer electronics (and of course camera and video) I go with B&H

B&H has a long history of racist and misogynistic hiring practices and work environments.The owners are ultra conservative religious nuts known for not hiring women, harassing minority employees, paying differently according to race and enforcing segregated bathrooms.They've payed out millions in lawsuits.

It sucks because I used to love wandering around in there browsing.

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2016/02/bh-hit-with-discrimination-lawsuit.html

https://www.natlawreview.com/article/federal-contract-compliance-programs-sues-bh-alleged-discrimination

https://www.eeoc.gov/newsroom/eeoc-and-b-h-reach-43-million-settlement-national-origin-discrimination-case

https://nypost.com/2020/10/18/bh-accused-of-discrimination-by-furloughed-workers/

I like b&h, the only downside side is returns are not as easy

Only thing I’ve ever had to return to B&H was a used lens I got from them that wouldn’t zoom or focus. Utterly painless and had the replacement (different model but still used - didn’t want to buy new because I’m still learning) within a couple days. Have arranged some cross-border returns with them as well through work and it’s been about as straightforward as that sort of thing can be.

They have some kick ass bundles on occasion too. A few months back I snagged a DaVinci Resolve Speed Editor and Studio license key for like $50 more than just the license key itself. I thought that piece of hardware would be a cheap gimmick but it’s a well built piece of kit and an integral part of my workflow now.

I try to go with b&h when I can. Their store in Manhattan is awesome too

Bookshop.org for books

Scrolling down to see if anyone else had posted. Good for you.

https://www.abebooks.com/ great for used books.

Abe books is owned by Amazon, unfortunately. Which stinks bc I loved them too.

Someone else just told me. I feel like an idiot.

Abe books was my go-to in college for international editions of engineering textbooks. $40 for a book that cost $450 for the US edition. Only downside was that all the units were in metric and weren't perfectly converted, so I had to check against a classmate if we had work out of the book. All the info was still the same tho, and it was 10% of the cost, and it let me take open book tests where a digital copy wouldn't cut it.

In Belgium & Netherlands, we have an alternative called Bol. I use it, but I wonder how much more ethical it is in the end.

I know it's not feasible for everyone, or even most people, but I just generally avoid shopping online as much as possible.

That's fine if you're not a geek nor a tinkerer (or a musician), but unfortunately my hobbies aren't sold in stores anymore.

I miss RadioShack, Fry's Electronics, and music stores that don't charge a 30% markup.

I do a lot of tinkering, I just spend months trying to find parts out of random thrift store electronics. It's much more efficient than spending 30 seconds placing a mouser order.

It saves tons of time. Most of the things we buy on Amazon are not even available locally.

I’ve come to the conclusion that buying things online is really not better than shopping in person most of the time.

It is if you live in Tasmania

All of Tasmania has about the same population as my city. I'm in the process of moving somewhere a little more rural so we'll see if I can keep up with shopping in person.

eBay! Craigslist!

Craigslist is more fun but more limited. eBay for the things I can't find on CL. Both really enable you to shop locally too which is excellent

Got any recommendations for websites that aren't sketchy?

I learned years ago to avoid eBay and Craigslist. They're more hassle than they're worth. People suck.

Maybe try eBay again? I gave up Amazon three years ago and have almost exclusively used eBay. Never had any major issues. And if there were any issues, the seller was super responsive. Also can sometimes save a lot over Amazon on certain items. And I always look for refurbished/used to save a good amount.

The only scam now is people basically listing Amazon items and just ordering them for you from Amazon.

Facebook market, but same issues with people. But dealing face to face helps somewhat. I despise it and don’t use FB personally, but my wife does and unfortunately that is where local sales happen now.

You've got it all wrong! They're the best. IDK where the idea that either are sketchy came from. Maybe that there isn't a social media profile attached to the ad on like on Facebook Market?

Folks on both sites are just folks trying to sell stuff. There are scammers trying to sell scams too, but that's everywhere.

Challenge the story society has fed you! Browse the free section of Craigslist today!!

https://www.abebooks.com/

For used books.

Abe Books was acquired by Amazon in 2008. Consider Alibris or Thrift books.

Fuck! I hate when big companies do that! Buy out a competitor and then let you think you're supporting a small business. I just brought some books from them, too.

Thanks for letting me know.

If it's something I know I want to buy from a specific brand, I'd rather just buy from the vendor directly if that's an option.

For painters, dickblick.com sells Liquitex and Golden paint cheaper than Amazon.

I love Chewy! I also like to buy gifts and handmade items on Etsy.

eBay for general stuff, ABE Books for... well books and HMV/Zavvi for films.

You know that abebooks is a subsidiary of Amazon, right? As is ZVAB in Europe. They really have the market by the reins.

I did know as it informs my purchasing strategy: if there isn't a huge difference I buy from eBay (as the big sellers are on both) but if there is then the wallet takes precedence.

I think my oversight comes from my brain's refusal to believe that, in a world with checks and balances on monopolies, the (I assume) largest seller of secondhand books wouldn't be able to buy the (I assume) second largest. That could never happen, right? Right? See also most of Metas purchases.

I have gone to the source and bought off the top 4-5 Chinese sites. Slow, but so far no issues.

Walmart occasionally, but their website is terrible and selection limited.

Microcenter for pc parts.

eBay for a few things.

Adorama and the other big NY camera seller (edit: B&H) often have deals on things like laptops.

Rock auto for car parts. Car-part.com for used car parts when my wife hits yet another deer.

Amazon, still way too much.

It depends on what you're trying to buy. For CDs and Vinyl I go with Discogs, usually. There's also Mllusicstack, though I haven't gotten around to trying it yet.

I tend to use price aggregators more than individual websites because we've reached a point with Internet transactions that you can't really get away with being a dodgy ecommerce website. People can just file paypal issues or complain to their credit card company for help, so just go with the cheapest option and see how it goes most of the time.

The ones I use are pricerunner and pricespy. I'm EU, but I know pricespy has a NZ version, so I assume it's global.

Bol.com. Though it only works in The Netherlands and Flanders.

Niche category, but Board Game Oracle is great for comparing online prices for board games across sites, and seeing what's on sale

I use Ebay as an alternative for some purchases, but I primarily use Amazon.

I really don't like amazon. They are a scummy business that try to exploit their workers as much as possible. But jesus it's hard to find competition.. I sometimes end up using Amazon as it's mostly the less expensive choise unfortunately. My sister buys loads of books from there and I get it. They got better prices for that as well..

I use Target most, I think. For random household stuff I can’t get through Target I use Meijer (it’s a grocery+ store) or the local Ace Hardware and do same day pickup.

Honestly those cover probably 75% of purchases. Everything else I google until I find what I want, then spend a couple hours trying to decide if the site is legit or if I can find the manufacturer direct.

Interestingly Amazon is almost non existent in Switzerland. I think they didn't ship or only with high fees in the first years so it never became famous. We have our own solutions like galaxus.ch or brack.ch. I only ordered twice on Amazon and that just because the products were not available in any other shop.

If you're a gal, you might like Zulily for clothes, shoes and household items. I've bought more than several things there and been very pleased. Delivery takes forever tho'

Target. Best Buy. Walmart, if I have to. The Shop app is pretty good.

You could try checking out Wish, Craigslist, or Ali Express. I've used all three to scrounge for parts to build a server for myself

I usually order form Amazon for convenience, but sometimes use shopping.google.com. I look up every site before ordering though. Some of the sites that show up in the results are sketchy or deceptive. I also sometimes use Ebay if I'm ok with buying something used, or something very cheap of questionable quality (from people who I'm guessing are just resellers of Alibaba crap).

Local online stuff when I can. National stuff like trademe.co.nz. Then I guess Ebay and Alibaba.

There are lots of other marketplace sites (e.g. I was just looking at appliancesconnection.com) - but also generally I either google the name of the thing I'm looking for or look up the name of the seller on amazon and buy it from their site.

hive.co.uk for my UK homies, like Amazon but not a parasite on society generally

I never understood the reliance on amazon. Its the internet, every category of item you could want has a bunch of manufacturer sites dedicated to it. "Websites you trust", hell are yall doing trusting Amazon.

Ease of use. For example, if I need something odd like a rack to hang bikes in my garage, I can find and buy one in 5 minutes and go back to whatever I was going.

What makes it easier? Its online ordering, its the same for every site. Items in cart, go to checkout

Name one site off the top of your head in less than 5 seconds without googling it that you can purchase a bike rack

If im not allowed to google youre not allowed to search on amazon.

Well dude that's the point. There's one site I can go and get something name brand and it's not necessarily going to be total garbage. If you've gotta Google something, then I dunno about you, but I'm checking a sites reputation before I give them my credit card information.

Point is there are a lot more steps and it's convenient to go to that one site that I know of hand and more or less can trust to not steal my credit card information.

Otherwise you might as well just go to a store locally and purchase it, but unfortunately that isn't always an option with everything.

Theres no extra steps, and Amazon has a notoriously bad reputation both with labour ethics and scam products.

There absolutely are extra steps. And you're right it does on both accounts for the last part.

Ive explained all of the steps, you've yet to try and say what the supposed extra steps are.

Here you go:

If you're using Amazon, you go to Amazon, search for a bike rack, choose a bike rack, and order it with one click.

If you're not using Amazon and you don't know where to buy a bike rack, you go to Google/Bing/DuckDuckGo/etc, search "buy bike rack online", scroll through the results, opening website after website until you find what you're looking for, add the item to your cart, go to checkout, enter your name/address/card info/PayPal/etc, and submit.

@Cheems , how'd I do?

I found bike racks with the very first result. I have my card info saved through google to auto fill.

Yall dont understand that searching on google and searching on amazon are the same step.

Hang on. You earlier:

“Websites you trust”, hell are yall doing trusting Amazon.

You now:

I have my card info saved through google to auto fill.

The hell you doing here trusting Google if you don't trust Amazon?

Who else offers free same day delivery? My local grocery stores charge a fee for you picking up an order!

No other company offers the selection or convenience.

I'm working on a vintage bike and needed a few parts. I ordered them last night and they are out for delivery now... on a Sunday.

Any other place would be processing the order for days, charge me shipping, and have me wait at least several days to several weeks to receive it.

I haven't come close to finding an alternative, as much as I'd like to.

I've been getting incredibly cheap clothes at temu.com. Decent quality too.

Like $9 Hawaiian shirts and shirts. I also bought my SO dresses for $10.

They have tons of other stuff too.

I've seen a bunch of ads for that. I was curious about it, but I'm naturally suspicious of new shopping websites, especially those with very low prices. It might be worth a look later when I want to buy something.

I was very suspicious too. But I figured I'd give it a try for maybe $25 and it was okay. I ordered a couple other times and the stuff came as advertised.

However, what does bothere is that this stuff is so cheap that I'm wondering if they are using slave labor. It is a real possibility.

My girlfriend gets stuff from Temu sometimes. It's basically ordering directly from China without the foreign middlemen, so the prices are really low, but the shipping times are really long. The product quality is about the same as anything else made in China, which is to say pretty good, but not the best.

I usually just use walmarts website, you can type in your zip code and find the physical walmart where you live and then filter items there are actually in the store, it tells you the price obviously but also the exact isle its in, so once you find what you need it you can just go get it in like 10-20 minutes based on distance

why? I really like amazon, it's super convenient - like, I dont have to worry about buying gifts anymore - especially for my relatives, they're really difficult to shop for - I just do the amazon gift card.

I order a fair amount of tools, utility goods, and snacks via amazon because they just arent sold around here, or it's just cheaper on amazon when you factor in the fact I dont pay for shipping.

Well if the headlines on human rights violations and fraud weren't enough to make you think twice, I doubt my experience today watching a senior man wrestle a huge TV out of his non-air-conditioned Amazon truck by himself for my neighbor would change your mind.

honestly? no, not in the least. not sure how he qualified for that job if he struggled with delivering packages. delivering packages is 50% or more of what Amazon is all about.