Shipping packages is actually pretty environmentally friendly. The alternative would have been to drive a 2000 lb vehicle a couple of miles to pick up a 1 lb garment bag, making 0.05% of the total weight the payload. The other 99.95% of the fuel is going towards moving deadweight back and forth.
Shipping usually aims to hit anywhere from 10 - 90% payload, greatly increasing the efficiency by which carbon is used.
I did some rough back-of-the-envelope calculations a while back that showed driving to the grocery store used roughly as much carbon as shipping everything you were buying from New Zealand.
Of course what's even more efficient is shipping to a network of distribution centers which are in walking distance for most people, reachable by mass transit by others and reachable during trips that would have happened anyway for the rest.
You assume that waking productive human time (spent walking to/from the distribution center, or waiting for mass transit connections) is worth absolutely nothing.
really? aren't most trips to a store to buy multiple items? a drive to a nearby store is as bad as shipping the product from amazon's warehouse to your address?
also, packaging. both the process and the materials.
yes, but obviously that's not the comparison. shipping services have much longer distances to travel, they have the overhead of the entire system (trucks or planes for the long haul, trucks driving to your delivery address and from the pickup address, the associated costs of all the time spent by all the people involved) to overcome. i'm not sure who exactly wins in the end without real numbers.
and again, packaging should not be underestimated either.
Your goods come from somewhere regardless, and whether they are delivered to a store or to your home they have to travel that distance just the same. But with delivery trucks the miles driven by the trucks are amortized over all of the deliveries made.
No offense taken. Your point is fair. I do think this should be a calculated cost of business for Amazon, and I would buy less on Amazon if I didn't have the convenience that's offered to me by occasionally ordering similar items and expecting to most likely return one without a hassle.
That being said, I honestly didn't think all that much of the broader economic and environmental impact of my consumer behavior in this case and appreciate the comments reminding me of it. Thanks.
Serving the customer does not equal a customer service issue.
Amazon and most online retailers (at least the good ones) fully realize that they're going to have high return rates and account for customers doing exactly what Jason did (my wife does it regularly). This is a cost of doing business. You're competing against brick and mortar stores where people can go in and touch and see the actual product before they walk out with it. Would Amazon prefer it didn't happen? Sure, but Macy's and Barnes and Noble would prefer not to have to pay rent and hire retail employees too.
To be fair, you could easily see this as one of Amazon's "features", much like Zappos. Everyone orders from Zappos knowing that they can not only return shoes for free, but that it is usually encouraged to buy several and return the ones you don't want.
While Amazon isn't quite so blatant about that "feature", their incredibly awesome customer support, zero-hassle returns encourage this kind of behavior...effectively making it a feature.
I often wonder if Amazon's acquisitions of Zappos and Quidsi (Diapers.com, Soap.com, etc.) are simply to experiment with different "features" without risking changes to Amazon.com.
He's likely the customer they want after all. There must be some delicate balance between "buys 2 bags and returns one" and "buys zero bags because returns are a pita".
Not just environmentally but also the small cost that you are passing on to everyone else that buys from Amazon by making them handle the return. If everyone shopped at Amazon this way, they wouldn't be able to sell their goods as cheaply as they do.
Please consider using a brick and mortar store to physically compare products first. Amazon has a nice mobile app that lets you purchase an item very quickly by just scanning the barcode (using the mobile's camera).
Obviously not a big deal as a one-off, but if this is a consistent shopping habit I would really hope you reconsider it.
How about if you use "a brick and mortar store to physically compare products first", you buy the item in the brick and mortar store. They already shipped the item, so you are not hurting the environment further by wasting energy getting another one to you. If everyone shopped at "brick and mortar stores" this way, they would close. People in your community would be fired, and you wouldn't be able to compare products personally.
Obviously not a big deal as a one-off, but if this is a consistent shopping habit I would really hope you reconsider it.
I don't actually shop that way, I take my chances based on Amazon ratings (not a hard thing as I buy mostly electronics and media). My only direct concern is that he keeps Amazon prices low for my own benefit.
I don't really see the point in artificially trying to keep business models afloat that can't compete. If anything, it's harmful to the free market. It might warm your heart a bit, but the overall benefit to society is to cast your vote (your $) for the most efficient business method.
If you use Amazon exclusively then no problem, all is good.
My only concern was that the advice artificially keeps a business model afloat (Amazon) that relies on the existence of brick-and-mortor stores. Its like people using the local hardware store for advice then buying all the parts at Wal-Mart.
What's hurting the brick and mortar store is not the "going in to compare items" part, but rather it's the "buying on Amazon instead of from the local store" part. You may as well say, "If everyone bought online instead of at the store the stores would close."
That might be true, but it might not. If he wasn't able to shop this way, he may have bought 0 bags from Amazon. Amazon would then stock and move fewer bags, reducing their volume discount and driving up the warehousing price for that SKU.
Your advice might actually raise the cost of that item. (Return) Shipping is but one variable in the huge equation that is an Amazon sale. Only Amazon knows for sure.
the small cost that you are passing on to everyone else that buys from Amazon by making them handle the return.
That's not really how pricing works. A retailer sets the price that maximizes their revenue, not based on their costs. If jason_shah stopped doing that it'd probably just mean a (very small) increase in their profit margin.
If everyone shopped at Amazon this way, they wouldn't be able to sell their goods as cheaply as they do.
That wouldn't be very smart off them. I think it's more probable that they would just limit the conditions of returns.
That's not really how pricing works. A retailer sets the price that maximizes their revenue, not based on their costs. If jason_shah stopped doing that it'd probably just mean a (very small) increase in their profit margin.
How do their operating costs not factor into their revenue? Are you saying that when gas prices go up, retailers just absorb the extra shipping costs and don't pass it on to consumers? I was always taught that's not the case. Genuinely curious as I only took ECON101.
Often they don't, 'though gas prices are a special case since they affect every retailer, and their margins are often razor thin as they are.
But consider Kindle vs paperback prices on Amazon for the same book. If costs were the most important thing in setting prices, the former would never be more expensive than the latter; but we see it often is, because demand sets the price, not cost.
And people wonder why there's global warming.