What is the smallest price difference that would make you purchase from Amazon instead of the local supermarket?

[MullerDuller]

Cadburys drinking chocolate (500g) is £4.15 on Amazon and £4.50 in supermarkets.
Is that enough to justify using Amazon?
I would probably buy two and I do live in a city so the Amazon van will be coming to our street, every day, anyway.
Is 35p (or 70p for two) worth it?

All my Christmas shopping has been done via Amazon, it's saved me countless searching and traipsing around shops. I don't expect to buy anything from the high street this Christmas.
I don't buy groceries on Amazon, I tend to use Aldi for some of it and then go to local bakeries, greengrocers and butchers for the rest.

I used to love a day looking around the shops years ago but I couldn't think of anything worse now.
We eat out a lot so although we don't contribute to shops on the high street we do support local restaurants and cafes.

What is your irrefutable proof of this please?

@Summerhillsquare I know someone who was a Amazon delivery driver. Her job was crap and she wasn't treated great. But technically she was "self employed".
On the other hand in my home town there is one of the warehouses and it seems a very popular and good place to work.
So your statement isn't 100% true really......

I've been trying to use Amazon less - so, for me it's about 10% of the total cost or £2-3 minimum.

I've been pleasantly surprised at how much other online shops are able to compete and how much better their delivery options etc. are now. I've often found it a bit more convenient/reliable to use other shops - which surprised me.

Summerhillsquare · 18/11/2024 14:50
**
Please don't use Amazon regardless. They are a major contributor to the enshittification of everything: treat staff and suppliers like crap, trashing the planet, destroying small business

An awful lot of people can’t afford the inflated prices that small businesses charge. I’d like to use our independents but their goods are literally twice the price that they are on Amazon,

Irrefutable proof? It's not a religion you know, just a crap internet platform 🤣

It would never occur to me to buy food on Amazon, regardless of price. But I wouldn't see buying from Tesco or Asda as striking a blow for local businesses - they are no better than Amazon.

Exactly this!

I'm m lucky enough to live in walking distance of 2 supermarkets and I want to keep them.

I won't buy food items online unless they are obscure fancy foodstuffs - cheese merchants and the like.

I've almost entirely stopped buying from Amazon. There's too many knocked off dodgy goods and I wouldn't trust them with edible items.

Just out of interest, did you not want to "keep" the smaller independent shops near you which would have been ruined once those two supermarkets were built?

I use Amazon for convenience, not for price reductions. And I only use it for non-food items.

If I could get something easily in a local shop for a price within about 10-20% of Amazon (depending on the item price), I'd always buy it from there.

It would never occur to me to buy food on Amazon! I get food from local small shops and deliveries from supermarkets.
i use Amazon a lot - the past few weeks has been lightbulbs, hot water bottle for my son at uni, advent calendars for god children, shower gel for my specific needs, mobile phone case and cat wormer!

@taxguru we have a thriving local centre. Plenty of independent shops selling things other than food. We really value our local centre. The fantastic independents provide excellent service and unique produces and the supermarkets are small branches so focus only on food and don't overreach into the products stocked by the independents.

You're lucky then. Presumably you live in an affluent area??

Yes. We really are very lucky. Butchers, 2 bakery - one fancy, the other more like an independent Greggs, bookshop, plant and florist shop, craft shops, book shops, along with your standard nail bars and vape shops. It's a very mixed area. One side of town is one of the least affluent parts of the country. The other side has houses worth millions. But our high street has something for everyone. 2 miles away is the "proper" town centre which tells a different story. Totally run down. Many closed shops. What remains are the dullest of the chains.

When lockdown happened we gained more small businesses when people started shopping and working locally and we've all seen the benefit. Local people like the change and are supporting it.

I almost always buy from Tesco. Amazon is often more expensive.

Supermarkets routinely do promotions, so why not just stock up when it's a good price?

I never use Amazon unless I physically cannot find a source elsewhere. Ghastly company.

Same. Amazon is awful

I’ve actually been hunting round the shops in town for the past two weeks looking for Xmas things. And then I gave up (aside from a couple of bits from John Lewis) and ordered off Amazon.

Taxguru is right that essentially the ‘shops’ now are just big chains. If they don’t have what you want, it’s not as if there’s a thriving set of small shops to go and buy from. There are a couple of places I still need to try (a good chocolatier and a cheese shop) but if I want variety at a good price, I use Amazon.

@taxguru so you don't have a Screwfix or Toolstation?

Lots of out of town industrial estates have them. They don't do home furnishings or plants but then supermarkets have taken up doing that.

Also due to rents the only independent stores that are able to stay open in my area of London have owners who are over 65 years old who are on old leases.

Within the last year both the owner of an hardware store and plant store died in their 80s and 90s respectively. This means there is no independent hardware store I can walk to to get say one screw. Instead I have to get lots from the Screwfix or Toolstation if it's an emergency, or buy the number I want from eBay if it isn't. The plant store has been taken over by the former owners children and their spouses who appear to be in their 60s and 70s. However they are in competition with the supermarkets. The reason they get custom is because they sell plants the supermarkets don't sell.

I use Amazon a lot - but these days I don't think they're cheaper, they're just more convenient. I hate shopping so appreciate the convenience and don't mind paying for it!

I've used their Morrisons grocery delivery too which was great - though more expensive than ordering from the Morrisons site. Again though, it was the convenience I paid for - suitable last minute delivery slots, all the groceries packed perfectly in brown paper bags.....i'd rather pay more for that than having to take each item out of the crate on the doorstep whilst making small talk with the poor windswept delivery guy.

Am watching Buy Now (Netflix) and its pretty devastating how Amazon in particular behaved. Towards their own staff, every dirty trick imaginable, when the staff simply asked for a climate change plan.

Hey ho Bezos and other have bought Trump, with your money, so he gets to do what he wants.

As ever, these threads fascinate me. 'My high street doesn't have any shops, so I use amazon'. People don't seem to realise the rwo actions are connected.

As preciously stated, I don't use amazon. I do have to use tesco as I can't afford ti buy everything from independent shops.

But, I do spend money in my local farm shop and bakery weekly. I also try to support local businesses like shops, cafes and pubs. Gifts are bought from local shops. It's important to me to spend as much as I can within my local community. It might only be a couple of quid, but it all helps keep the independent businesses and local community going.

Amazon have tapped into today’s mindset. You want it and want it fast? We got you. We sell everything and will undercut pretty much the entire high st in your area. Don’t leave your sofa.

Fast fwd to when we the consumers are older, think the 30’s, 40’s and 50’s upwards and that social aspect of shopping with friends and bumping into others is gone…..then what?

Hang on to the local shops as much as you can because once they are gone, then so are the cafes and coffee shops, bakers etc. Just be a sea of delivery drivers.

I'd pay more to not have to go to the shops tbh