
Amazon blocks non-Prime members from buying certain video games - tomtoise
http://www.videogamer.com/ps4/gta_5/news/amazon_blocks_non-prime_members_from_buying_certain_video_games.html
======
jerf
I don't get it. As an incentive to sign up for Prime it makes no sense; Prime
needs to offer me things I can't get elsewhere (or at least not for the same
price), not return to me things that I can easily get elsewhere. I just spot-
checked Amazon US's price for GTA 5, 39.88 [1], and it's the exact same price
at Wal-Mart [2], so it's not an exclusive deal or something. (Nor did I spend
several minutes hunting for a comparable price; it was the third hit on Google
for "Grand Theft Auto 5 PS4" for me. Google being what it is now, YMMV.)

I don't mean "this is a bad idea". I mean "I don't get it". What's the point?

[1]: [http://www.amazon.com/Grand-Theft-Auto-V-
PlayStation-4/dp/B0...](http://www.amazon.com/Grand-Theft-Auto-V-
PlayStation-4/dp/B00KVSQ848/ref=sr_1_1_twi_gam_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1461343449&sr=8-1&keywords=grand+theft+auto+5)

[2]: [http://www.walmart.com/ip/Grand-Theft-Auto-V-
PS4/41049186](http://www.walmart.com/ip/Grand-Theft-Auto-V-PS4/41049186)

~~~
tehwebguy
My guess:

\- They cost more than the free shipping threshold, giving shipping away free

\- New games are low profit to begin with

\- Amazon sells enough of these that they are already in every distribution
center

\- Every unit Amazon ships probably arrives in a "Prime" amount of time
anyway, giving away expedited shipping for free

This is just bringing some video game sales into alignment with what Amazon
wanted Prime to do all along.

Amazon makes very good money on a sale that they don't control. If the costs
of making that sale (or supporting returns, etc) is too high they benefit
significantly by letting marketplace sellers take all the risk.

~~~
newjersey
> Every unit Amazon ships probably arrives in a "Prime" amount of time anyway,
> giving away expedited shipping for free

Just to add a note that this isn't always true. Sometimes they withhold
shipping even though they have the item in stock at the nearby distribution
center.

~~~
justinlardinois
This is definitely true. Back in the pre-Prime days (ie, 5+ years ago) Amazon
would send your package as soon as they possibly could, and even with the
super saver shipping you'd still often get your order less than the minimum 5
days.

Now I'll order something on Amazon (not a Prime member) and they'll sit on the
package for a week and then overnight it to me.

I'm not a fan. Paying more for faster shipping didn't used to mean that
cheaper/free shipping _always_ took longer, it just meant that you were
guaranteed to get it quickly.

~~~
DannyBee
This may be because it's cheaper/better for them to ship other orders instead
of yours, since they can only handle a finite amount of orders per center at a
time :)

~~~
Spooky23
It's a financial hack. Amazon has low margins so cash flow is king.

They make money off you either way, when they sit on the order for 5 days,
they probably book your revenue a month before they need to pay for the
product.

~~~
MichaelGG
Do they charge your before the order actually ships? I don't think they do.

~~~
jldugger
Charging your credit card might not coincide with their definition of revenue
recognition.

~~~
dmxt
What if a customer cancel the shipment?

------
mikeash
Amazon put a lot of effort over the years into establishing themselves as the
best place to buy nearly everything online. Now they seem bound and determined
to throw that title away. Between rising prices, add-on items, confusing
marketplace sellers, a refusal to sell certain products that compete with
Amazon branded products, and now this ridiculous Prime tie-in, I find it more
and more difficult to find a reason to buy stuff from them.

~~~
rudolf0
Trying to shove "subscribe & save" in my face 3-4 times during the process of
choosing and purchasing a product is annoying, too.

Yes, I get it, you make more money in the long term when people subscribe.

I wish there was a global opt-out for it.

~~~
killbrad
I've never noticed this actually. Example of a product that does this? I tried
Sub&Save for Tide a while back but the one I wanted kept getting cancelled and
I was offered an alternative so I stopped trying and went with buying it at
LocalStore,Inc.

~~~
phil21
Yep. This has made Subscribe & Save nearly useless for me. The convenience
factor is entirely wiped out when I run out of laundry detergent because I
missed the e-mail stating the product is now no longer eligible.

Amazon became a killer app for me (and most, I presume) due too the UIx. You
clicked a button and you generally got pretty-close-to-cheapest priced product
delivered very quickly.

Now it's just getting complicated, and you have to expend energy to ensure
you're not getting actively ripped off by looking at only Prime items/etc.

------
gdulli
Ever since there started being discounts for Prime-only members I knew it was
the beginning of the end of my using Amazon.

My last online order was with Walgreens. I never tried them before but I
googled for the product I had in my Amazon cart, it was cheaper at Walgreens,
I added a few things to get up to $35 for free shipping, those things were
also cheaper than on Amazon. I got the delivery faster than my last few free
standard shipping orders with Amazon.

For a long time Amazon was the "default" in my mind for shopping online and I
see now there's no reason it should be that way anymore.

~~~
the_mitsuhiko
> Ever since there started being discounts for Prime-only members I knew it
> was the beginning of the end of my using Amazon.

For me the opposite happened: i'm now shopping more at amazon than before
because I decided to subscribe to prime again. Here (Austria) prime now
delivers in one or two days even to the most remote regions which previously
was something they did not really do. I also get instant video, amazon music
and a bunch of other stuff thrown in for free and the returns are amazing.

The value I get out of it is very much worth it. I don't see any other online
store catching up with this service any time soon.

------
__david__
This is a weird move. I think if I didn't already have prime, I'd just go
somewhere else rather than be motivated to subscribe. Hopefully this is just
an experiment—I suspect this is ultimately going to be self defeating.

~~~
rogerbinns
It is majorly self defeating. A transaction on Amazon has very little
friction, because they already have your payment details, you have a history
and you know the quirks of the site.

By forcing people to consider alternatives, it is making people experience
that initial friction elsewhere, but once they are setup there the friction is
less. It won't take very long to discover other retailers have better prices,
better shipping and less quirky sites.

Essentially this is nice gift to Amazon's competitors. Amazon will find out
just how "sticky" those competitors are, but this stills seems silly.

~~~
jonlucc
Also, Amazon should want to know _everything_ I buy to better offer me value
that allows them to get more sales from me.

------
CM30
Wait, what? This is ridiculous. Amazon is a shop first and foremost, and this
is exactly the sort of thing that I'll drive me to other alternatives.

It's especially silly for games, where the console manufacturers offer their
own stores (both for digital and physical copies of the games). Heck, if
you're buying them digital, it's about as little friction as using Amazon,
since they have your payment details from other online services you use
through the system (like Xbox Live).

~~~
dingaling
It's not just games: I tried to buy a Panasonic bread machine on Amazon UK
back in January but it was a 'Prime Exclusive'.

I bought it instead from Argos nearby for the same price.

A few days later it was no longer 'exclusive'. Presumably just more Amazon
psychological experimentation.

Edit: model is SD-2500

~~~
longwave
Similarly, Pampers nappies have only been available to Prime customers for
some months now.

~~~
ekianjo
Not everywhere. In Japan they are available to everyone still.

------
potatolicious
This seems oddly customer-hostile, which is something I've grown to expect
from tech companies but not Amazon in specific.

One can't help but wonder if the damage this does to the brand outweighs the
strategic gains through Prime subscriptions. After all, selection and
availability is a _huge_ part of Amazon's secret sauce to success, more so
than customer service, shipping speed, or any other concern.

If customers lose the ability to assume that they can get anything on Amazon,
it's hugely damaging to the brand.

~~~
mindslight
Amazon is the only place I _have_ seen blatant user-targeted dark patterns.
"Order within the next hour to ship today". Four hours later: "order within
the next 2 hours to ship today". Never mind the lowest-bid delivery acting
like this is the first package they've ever handled (a phone call, really?),
or email spam from checking a price.

I believe a short time after a company acquires a reputation, customers
develop a blind spot and you can count on reality being the _opposite_ of that
reputation.

~~~
paulmd
I think their shipping windows are often just messed up. I've had the opposite
situation too, where it says that an item must be ordered within the next 2
hours and then when I get to checkout the window is already passed for the
day.

I'm wondering whether the ship timer on the item page isn't quite accurate,
and the one on the checkout goes through and does a warehouse-by-warehouse
check to see where the nearest warehouse that has stock _and also isn 't
closed_ is. As east-coast warehouses close you might get additional
availability windows from west-coast warehouses, and their algorithm might not
be doing an exhaustive search of when _the last possible warehouse that has
stock_ will close.

I'm not saying that it isn't a dark pattern, but there are still some
"incompetence" explanations before we need to jump to "malice".

~~~
rgovind
Typical conversion rates hover around 3-4%. That is if 100 items were viewed,
only 3-4 times they are bought. So, to decrease load on your sourcing engine,
it makes sense to cache the "next 2 hours" calculation results and recalculate
exactly during checkout.

------
vinceguidry
If Amazon decided to go the Costco / Sam's Club route and charge just for
access to their store, I'd probably just shrug and pony it up. I mean, I
already pay for it now, and I'm not doing any analysis to find out how much
I'm using it and what it's saving me vs. other options.

There are essentially two different kinds of experiences I have when buying
goods and services online. Amazon-tier and everything else. I prize the
experience of using Amazon so much that they'd have to double the cost of
Prime before I'd even start to consider switching.

Amazon has become part of the infrastructure of my life, like Google and my
local coffee shop. The switching costs simply and utterly dwarf the cost of
doing business with them.

------
pyb
I've also noticed Amazon now uses dark patterns to try and force buyers to
sign up for Prime. The current strategy is clearly to pressure users into
signing up Prime by absolutely any means available.

------
ocdtrekkie
Complained about this a year ago, few people cared:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9565929](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9565929)

What's so amazing is that they're only hurting their own business. Nobody sane
is going to buy a $99 Prime subscription to buy a $10 Blu-ray or a $60 game.
We're just going to discover that Target or Best Buy sells it online for the
same price and offers free shipping, and buy it there.

------
kdamken
So does anyone have a less crappy alternative to Amazon? After canceling my
prime membership this year it's gotten even worse trying to use them. Their
shipping fees for non-prime users are _insane_.

~~~
xigency
Even if you can get free shipping on Amazon items, the amount of time they
spend stalling the shipment is ridiculous. It's better to boycott Amazon
because of their anti-consumer attitudes.

~~~
adrr
I doubt they purposely stalling the shipment. When they are waving orders at
their DCs. Priority of standard shipping is last. Some companies charge to be
in the first waves, like newegg and their expedited processing.

~~~
xigency
Well, there are both a Quora response and a Forbes article decrying their
regression in free shipping (or non-Prime) timeliness, with some people
suggesting that it is intentional. Most recently I made an order of three
items from Amazon and had the chance to cancel all three items two weeks
later, before it made it out the door during the "preparing your shipment"
phase, and buy them from a local retailer the same day.

Several years ago, it was the case that any items bought from Amazon were
processed within two to three days, and the shipping carrier was responsible
for any delays. It seems like a strategy to convert more customers into
$99/year Prime subscribers.

I don't know why either. It seems like they are reminding their customers that
online shopping _is not_ more convenient than the alternative.

------
raverbashing
To be honest people shouldn't be complaining they can't get it from Amazon,
but getting it from someone else

It's that simple

~~~
mikeash
Why not both? Complaining is useful to the target of the complaint (if they
care to pay attention) and often gets results.

I don't understand why so many people seem to think that complaining is
somehow not a legitimate reaction to this sort of thing.

~~~
raverbashing
It is certainly a legitimate reaction

But as much as I like Amazon I'm not going to give them free consulting in
such a divisive decision

------
jalami
I canceled my Prime membership a while back now for multiple reasons, but this
is frosting on the cake. In order for me to cancel my auto-renewal I had to
jump through scary 'cancel your membership' prompts to find the question about
auto-renewal. The company has gotten slimier and slimier.

Exclusive markets are are what's wrong with browsers, video games, apps and
the Internet today and now it jumps into the physical world as well. This
isn't even about true exclusivity, which is a problem in itself, but more akin
to crippleware. Non-prime members (still your customers) now have a worse
experience than before. If companies that provide content and products just
made it easier to find and purchase content and products, they wouldn't have
to worry about locking in their customers.

------
pessimizer
This is another experiment to test their monopoly power (like the conflict
with Hachette.) If it's successful, expect it to happen across more product
ranges. Their monopoly power is built into their valuation; if they can't make
it pay, they will eventually crash.

------
MichaelGG
And remember, Amazon blocks even Prime members from buying Chromecast or Apple
TV devices. Then they lie about the reasons, ranging from: "we're out of
stock" to "too many user complaints" to "we aren't licensed to sell this" and
on and on.

Amazon no longer cares about the customer as top priority. If you're a Prime
member, quit. I've been a customer since 2003 and now am looking at
alternatives. I even try to find books outside of the Kindle store, though I
note they have strong lockin there. (I never thought it'd be a problem, since
Amazon used to always put the customer so far up a pedestal.)

------
thieving_magpie
In Bezos 2016 Investor Letter, I didn't think "We want Prime to be such a good
value, you’d be irresponsible not to be a member." meant this.

------
Cozumel
Only seems to be the US site, at least for now! It really makes no sense
though!

[https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00KL4AROO/ref=s9_simh_g...](https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00KL4AROO/ref=s9_simh_gw_g63_i2_r?pf_rd_m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&pf_rd_s=desktop-1&pf_rd_r=31K02W4P4CMAV0GFPD5K&pf_rd_t=36701&pf_rd_p=867551787&pf_rd_i=desktop)

~~~
the_mitsuhiko
Amazon UK had prime exclusive content for a while already. Some baby products
for sure.

------
Yabood
They actually do the same thing with other items as well. I was trying to buy
a Dell monitor the other day, and it was reserved for Prime members only.

------
justinlardinois
As someone who buys video games on Amazon relatively often and isn't a Prime
member, this is nothing new. Every now and then a game will drop in price a
bit but be Prime Exclusive, and then a week or two later it will go back to
its original price and be available to everyone again. It's mildly annoying,
but I think this article makes it sound like a much bigger deal than it is.

------
spo81rty
Maybe they are doing this on some very low margin products? Are brand new
video games low margin?

~~~
alttab
My guess is they are moving loss leaders towards customers that have a higher
life-time value, and want to minimize sales to unloyal customers that cost
them on a transaction basis.

~~~
takno
They lost me from Prime when they started doing ads before the programmes and
messing up every other delivery. If they want to lose the hundreds of pounds
of orders I continue to make, and the hundreds more pounds of AWS spend, they
have certainly managed to find an approach to achieve that

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akeck
They are doing this with physical CDs as well. For a recent album, I could buy
the MP3 version, but I could not buy the CD without a Prime membership.

------
mkhalil
My assumption is if they had enough Prime members buying these exclusive
titles they could probably just sell at cost from day 1, therefore driving
more traffic to their website. This would obviously hurt local game stores
considering they could never do that without a "membership". Although, some
stores like BestBuy already do this sort of thing.

------
awinter-py
Weird but not surprising -- not that different from HBO / netflix negotiating
exclusive streaming rights to content. Spotify and youtube's 'deal'
departments are more important (and more controversial) than their coders /
PMs.

If you don't like this, steer clear of strings-attached content platforms.

~~~
knd775
These games aren't exclusive in any way. They can be bought from a large from
a large number of other retailers for a comparable price.

~~~
awinter-py
well, they're exclusive in 1 way -- amzn seems to be enforcing the party line
that these are 'exclusive items'. If you're a shopper with limited attention,
the headline matters more than the comparison shopping outcome.

------
zzleeper
Is there a reason for non-console players to even buy in DVD form anymore,
instead of Steam or similar markets?

I mean, I get that if you live in Canada or Australia your bandwidth sucks and
you have caps, but for most cases download speeds are way faster than DVD
shipping speeds.

~~~
throwanem
I've heard a few people express concerns around whether they actually own
Steam games, and whether those games might suddenly be pulled or otherwise
made unavailable without the courtesy of a purchase price refund.

I'm not entirely unsympathetic, but on the other hand, to the best of my
knowledge that's never actually happened, so...

~~~
scintill76
Maybe not Steam or games, but Amazon has remotely pulled back digital books
they sold to their customers (with refund though):
[http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/18/technology/companies/18ama...](http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/18/technology/companies/18amazon.html?_r=0)

~~~
throwanem
I know. That's Amazon, though, not Steam.

------
Filligree
I can't sign up for Prime. They don't offer it in the country I'm in.

So this amounts to saying that they don't want my money. Very well; there are
other options.

~~~
snegu
Highly unlikely that they're going to implement this in countries that don't
have Prime.

~~~
Filligree
There is no Amazon site for Ireland.

I can buy things from any of their sites. However...

\- Amazon.co.uk refuses to ship a number of items outside of Great Britain.

\- Amazon.com has expensive shipping (obviously), and now this thing.

\- Amazon.de doesn't usually help. Besides, I can't read German.

Looking at the Grand Theft Auto example, it's available from Amazon.com but
not Amazon.co.uk; the latter, as mentioned, refuses to ship it to me.
Amazon.com... might not; I can't tell, now can I? It refuses to let me add to
cart without having a Prime membership.

So it looks to me like they've done exactly that.

~~~
6581
> Amazon.de doesn't usually help. Besides, I can't read German.

The German Amazon site is available in English too.
[http://www.amazon.de/gp/switch-
language/homepage.html/ref=cs...](http://www.amazon.de/gp/switch-
language/homepage.html/ref=cs_switchlang?ie=UTF8&language=en_GB)

~~~
Filligree
Well, the site controls are. The item descriptions usually aren't.

------
strathmeyer
"Become a Patron member for exclusive content!"

------
throwzitaway
I initially read it as 'non-Prime numbers' \- it got me thinking.

------
dk1138
I imagine it won't take them many AAA releases to have the numbers to see if
this was a good idea or not. I'm fine with Amazon finding more ways to make
prime worth it without taking away features from prime members or increasing
membership cost.

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bdcravens
Sounds no different than WalMart/Sam's Club.

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joesmo
Still not as bad as when they stole my Prime membership money.

