How Amazon has Impacted My Retail Experience
Written by Chris Rah Osiris 
It has changed EVERYTHING
How Amazon has Impacted My Retail Experience.
Amazon is easily my favorite online retailer. Actually, Amazon is my favorite retailer PERIOD. It all started one day after I walked into a Gamestop. I saw the Blu-Ray offerings that were available and proceeded to purchase them at full retail price. (This was during the HD Format Wars mind you). I was a little disappointed by the price, but…I had nothing better to do with my Gamestop gift card. I took home Underworld: Evolution and The Fifth Element. I watched these movies on a SDTV, but I didn’t care. I was purchasing the future of HD entertainment and I would have an HDTV soon enough to watch the movies on.
My Blu-Ray collection did not grow over night. I simply could not afford to pay the prices that Best Buy, Circuit City, and the like were charging prices that I did not want to play. One day I came across Blu-Ray.com and my gaming experience changed for all time. Not only was there a thread about the buy one get one free sale that was going on for Blu-Ray titles, but there was something called Amazon Prime being discussed. I rarely purchased items off of the Internet at the time because I hated paying the shipping fees or waiting an eternity for the free shipping. Amazon Prime changed all of that.
I purchased Blu-Rays every week and received them in 2 days without a hitch. That was originally the extent of my purchases. One day, I got the urge to check the prices on video games. The prices on titles that I had wanted on the time were definitely less than what I was paying at Best Buy and they were tax free. (I hate paying taxes on my purchases). I proceeded to buy another PSP, Killzone Liberation, and Metal Slug. I was back in the world of portable gaming. (My previous PSP had been exchanged to purchase PS3 games and accessories).
Of course this does not seem like an life changing experience, but as always there is more. Time passed and my need for accessories grew. I purchased a memory stick for my PSP at a price approximately $20 less than what the brick and mortar stores were charging. This was all taking place as I continued to increase my Blu-Collection mind you. During this period of time, I was moving around frequently and wanted to take advantage of pre-ordering titles. This was not offered via a Gamestop. You cannot pre-order a title in California and pick it up from a Gamestop in DC. You can pre-order a title from Amazon and have it shipped to whatever address you like though. You take a swamped law student and offer him the ability to have his games shipped to him for a low price, virtually free after I had factored in all of my Blu-Ray purchases, and you have a renewed gamer.
This is not an advertisement for Amazon by any means. It is simply a story about how Amazon helped me remain in gaming while I went through a transition period in my life. I am sure that there are positive and negative stories that can be associated with Amazon, but I for one love the company. I just renewed my Prime account a few weeks ago.
PS I pre-ordered Killzone 2 from Amazon as well.
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January 2nd, 2009 at 7:39 PM
I know how you feel. The moment I stepped away from the long ’shipping times’ and ‘credit card security’ issue a new world opened up for me.
I’ve been ordering like crazy from Play.com until the British Pound reached 1,05 euro (that’s what you pay for one pound) and moved on to dvd.co.uk, simply games and even at some moments gameplay.com and Amazonco.uk.
Retailers need to realise that their losing customers and money. Those aimless people that wandered in, are being told by their neighbours, friends, co-workers about these prices and deals. More and more are learning to check out a forum about such deals and the internet is getting more integrated into homes.
Delivery companies are making a fortune. One of the guys said that if he came back for a 3rd time this week (spread over two weeks prior, he delivered 4 packages), I would have to buy him a drink. The package fit in my mailbox so he never had to deliver it.
For me buying online from places like Amazon, Play.com, simplygames rapidly increased my games collection and hopefully soon a Blu-Ray collection.
January 2nd, 2009 at 7:47 PM
i love amazon. i buy everything off of them almost. sometimes buy.com has way better deals though. and they usually get it to me way quicker. but for some reason i always go to amazon first.
January 2nd, 2009 at 7:56 PM
I can second how great Amazon is for Blu-rays. I got Dark Knight on Amazon for $20. I also purchased a copy at a brick-and-morter store for my brother for his birthday… this one costing $30! I preordered Firefly from there last week and it arrived today. I checked out Walmart this morning to see how much it costs there… $30. It’s insane how much you can save when using Amazon. I’ll admit I still haven’t gone Prime on Amazon and just wait for the free shipping for the most part, but I’m considering it if I start making my gaming purchases there too.
January 2nd, 2009 at 8:10 PM
I love Amazon, myself. Amazon.ca, that is. I always get free shipping and it usually takes 2 business days, sometimes it’s overnight! And that’s the free option… As long as it’s in stock, it arrives quickly.
I can’t imagine how quickly priority shipping would be. Probably click Buy It Now and there’s a knock on the door with my package, I’d bet.
January 3rd, 2009 at 2:55 AM
@ chris
Don’t know if you knew, but best buy can price match amazon. Don’t do it on a weekend cause they are too busy, typically they do it on slow week days. I’ve bought over 20 blu rays that way. Actually walmart.com is typically cheaper for blu ray movies and most retailers like best buy will match them. Also, frys electronics typially will charge the same or less what amazon charges for blu ray. For example, we had dark knight on blu for 21.99 the other week
January 3rd, 2009 at 4:32 AM
I know that some brick and mortars can have lower prices, but they still charge sales tax. I HATE sales tax
January 3rd, 2009 at 10:25 PM
I really like buying off of Amazon as well, especially buying Blu-ray Discs. Their prices are so much better than the retail stores like Best Buy, Circuit City, etc… I purchased 80% of this past Christmas presents from Amazon. Some items, however, I’ll go to eBay because occasionally Amazon’s prices are set a little high, but that circumstance seldom occurs. Great read, Chris!
January 4th, 2009 at 3:48 AM
I signed up for Amazon Prime a few months ago. I can honestly say that it was one of the best choices I ever made when it comes to buying stuff online. I used Amazon almost exclusively for Christmas and got everything here before or on Christmas Eve.
I love it.
January 5th, 2009 at 7:24 PM
I love Amazon, did SO much Christmas shopping online this year.