Why I buy things on-line...

Brent Dowell

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Reno NV
[rant=on]
I need something small and simple. Just some bearings for my garden cart that gets towed behind the garden tractor. 3/4" id x 1 3/8"od with a little flange.

Went to Lowes = Nope. No bearings at all.
Went to Home Depot = Nope. Same as lowes.
Went to Ace = Out of stock, but at least they had bearings in the little drawers of mics. hardware!
Went to the auto parts store = Nope, sounds like a hardware item to them.

So basically drove all around town looking for what should be 10$ for a pack of 4 item.

Wasted more in gas and time looking for it than I would have paying shipping over the interwebs.

[rant=off]

But it wasn't a complete waste, I did end up find some other items I had on my list (Chains and load binders) that would have cost a fortune to have shipped....
 
I buy local whenever I can and I salute your attempt. Even if it is the BORG, they are employing people from my community so I try to shop there. Sometimes they just won't let you for any price. Let's keep trying, our neighbors work at these places.
 
I know, I try to buy local, but sometimes it just seems like it's hardly worth it.

When I used to live in town, it was easy enough to just go check out a couple of places. The main item, this little bearing, is a very common and standard type item that the hardware stores should have stocked, certainly not a specialty type item that requires going to a specialty store that mainly deals with the trades...
 
I've found in the past few years, the little miscellaneous items I used to find at the hardware store or even the borg just aren't stocked anymore. They save money where they can and are really pushing the web to store free shipping now days.
 
I am curious. If you take advantage of the ship free to the store option, does that local store benefit from the sale, or does just corporate make out? If the store is a franchise, the franchise owner is incurring the costs to receive and handle the item until you get there to pick it up. If it is a nonfranchise big borg situation, how is the local employee benefiting? I definitely want to support the local stores and local jobs. Inquiring minds....
 
The local store doesn't get much if anything from the sale. The corporation is taking advantage of the regular shipping that goes to the local stores every week, just throw whatever needs to go into the same container with everything else. Then the local store hopes that you buy something else while you are there.

The local benefit is the store will need to have staff to handle any type of business that walks through the door whether web or locally generated.

I take advantage of ship to store because I know I am helping people keep their jobs.

Cheers,
 
Brent i fully share your views. I do try to support the local guys for exactly the reason of these people being neighbors, but the problem i notice is the corporation owned stores are making sure to use the 80/20 rule and use their IT systems to tell them what to stock for the sake of efficiency. To me it all fits the "dumbing down syndrome" pattern. Train people not to want and not to do by not having it available.

But some of the online stores are just as bad.

At the same time i can appreciate that fewer people are fixing things . Just take my BBQ. Heck its now going on 11 years old. Its cast rust free alloy and plastic. So every now and then i take it off the desk. Remove the grids and toss the burner. Buy a new one and away we go. All refurnbished.

Yet my good neighbor he has had three in the time i know him and thats only about 5 years.

Secretly i am waiting for him to toss the new Stainless steel one and i will pick it off the sidewalk and refurbish it.:D:thumb:
 
I've definitely benefited the local economy a LOT over the past year. But sometimes it just doesn't make sense.

It's particularly difficult with technology items I want. If I build a new pc or want to upgrade something, the odds that I can find that part at a decent price in town is zilch.

But for hardware items? That's what I find particularly frustrating. I do miss the old K&K hardware store in my home town of Bettendorf. As a kid, I did a lot of the handy man type stuff around the house, and on my dad's boat's. K&K and there never ending aisles of hardware items never let me down.

Oh well, at least I'm keeping the UPS service in business...
 
Sharon your post had me call back the past too so i got onto google and went looking for the Hardware store i worked at during high school. Now i am as sad as Brent about the dissapearance of these kinds of stores. I wont go into whats happened to the area and one i used to work at.
What an education i got at that place though.
It sold everything....from birdseed in so many varieties, insecticide , glass which we cut to order, specialised tools like a micrometer and vernier and no tai chi type of junk...and when it came to the bits and pieces hw well you never left empty handed. Oh boy what a nostalgia ride....so sad these places went by the way.
Thinking back i remember blaming the large grocery chains.
Funny or strange as it sounds our grocery chains when i was a kid were only allowed to sell food items. Then they started carrying all sorts kinda like a hybrid between lowes and a publix (sorry cannot think of another Us grocer right now) . Thats when they took away the bread and butter lines from the community hardware store. Items such as paint became much cheaper but you got no advice and assistance with them at the hypermarket. Wow how things have changed.

Sent from my MB860 using Tapatalk
 
We have a couple of stores here called Tractor's supply... I've found more bearings with them than anyone else. And back when I was looking for a C-clamp or an E-clamp for one of my tools -- think it was the lathe -- only people in 50 mile radius that had any in the size I needed was a Tractor Supply.
 
As one who has owned local retail stores, I can appreciate how important buying locally is to the store and it's employees. However, the use of Internet for shopping is increasing because local stores are not meeting the needs of it's customers. The only way to decrease shopping via the i'net is for local stores to step up and meet that need. However, that said, I am also aware that many i'net purchased items are not high volume demand items and it would be unprofitable for small local stores to stock them. I am sure, with time, the situation will equalize with each source finding it's level of providing custome needs and all will profit. Trying to regulate the i'net is not free enterprise being allowed to stay free.
BTW: Carol: the employees benefit by having employment.
 
I always go to the local hardware store first and then the borg if the local guy cant fill the need. I know the owner Russ very well and he knows that I prefer to buy local and thanks me when he sees me in the store. That said sometime back I needed some long clamps so I decided to use 3/4 pipe clamps and just leave the 10 ft pieces of pipe in tack. I when to local store and he had the hardware for 1 set of 3/4 an 1 set of 1/2 pipe clamps. I went to Russ and asked him if he had any more in stock and he said no since it was a low use item he only stocked the one. I said "Russ people normaly need a set of clamps" and he laughed and "said well that might explain why we don't sell many of them since we only stock the one."
 
@Frank. Indeed, employees do benefit by having employment. But if the costs are not covered, they won't be employed long. Example: If you purchase on line and have it shipped to the local store and the local store does not see a profit for that transaction, the costs are not covered. Costs passed on from corporate to local vendor is unfair and DOES result in the loss of jobs. Just sayin...

From a personal perspective, I once looked into a woodworking franchise that so controlled the local business, the franchise owner was having to cover costs incurred by corporate without compensation from corporate. Just one of them was passing along an item ordered on line and licked up at the local store. Corporate retained profit on the item and failed to compensate the local store for handling. BTW, materials shipped to the store, whether prepurchased or not, do not come free. The local store is charged for them. This is all I was trying to point out. Know exactly where your local dollar is going.
 
I am like Brent, as I am tired of running all over the place and not finding what I want. Now, if there is some doubt if it is carried by locals I go right to the web. To counter this, what is needed is the locals having their inventory available on the web so that you know if they have what you want. Internet sellers are not going away and this seems like a good way for locals to compete. I think they are going to need to have an internet presence for looking up their inventory. It works that way for me with Grizzly. There is Grizzly store here in Bellingham and I will look on the web to see if they have what I want. I then run over there and buy it. No time is wasted.
 
Makes one miss the mom and pop (convenience and customer service) hardware stores. (that are dying if you still have them) The chain hardware stores seem to be hit and miss, as they are trying to compete with the building centers (not a hardware store). I've had no luck with one particular chain that advertises themselves as the place to go for hardware (even calls itself nuts and bolts). I am turning more to looking online to even find out who MIGHT carry what and call before I drive out there, as enough times I end up going to a commercial type place and using a cash account.
 
Have you tried a local lawn mower place. I just got some 1/2" x 1 3/8" bearings at my local power equipment dealer today, they always have them in stock and at a good price.( and friendly service too)
 
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I have owned both types of stores, franchise and independant. When I had the franchise (Sears, Roebuck) I was paid 10% for anything customer ordered. My independants (gun shop and children's clothing) anything I ordered I made full mark up. BTW, my original response was sorta couched. Some countries do not allow employers to fire or lay off employees when business goes down. I didn't know where Canada was in this issue.
 
Since moving to a small town, I'm finding the need to make more purchases online than ever before. Not always because of the lack of an item locally but also for much better pricing; example: buying a case of ten pair of drawer slides online for what two pair would cost locally. Then, there are many things related to woodworking that I can't get at all locally. I'd like to give a local business the money but, if they don't have it, I'll go where I have to to get it.

In a related vein, we probably purchased more (dollar-wise) online in the past six weeks than in any similar period before. Some purchases gave us free shipping to home and we used free shipping to the store on a few items. The primary benefit this holiday season has been using Discover Card's ShopDiscover links to earn additional CashBack. This is not an ad for Discover, just one customer's experience. Example: linking to BestBuy.com via ShopDiscover gets us 10% CashBack, which means the $800 Bose sound system will net at $720; then, when you look at the redemption value, we can get $50 gift cards for restaurants for $45 of the cashback each. Using the benefits to their fullest when making online purchases is the name of the game. No doubt other cards have similar benefits.

Another online benefit can be email coupons or other types of offers. I'm sure most of you get routine emails from several of the woodworking sites. Saving money where you find an avenue can make getting a few emails pay off. For instance, for a couple of years we've gotten emails from a major restaurant chain with BOGO coupons for up to $15; i.e., buy one entre for up to $15 and the other is free. Of course, they want you to buy drinks to make the difference but there's no problem if you don't. Just sayin'!
 
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