Based on my limited experience of visiting Walmart, I think most of their low end products are of significantly better quality than low end products from Amazon.
Agreed. I get cheap Stanley tools at Walmart that have a no questions asked lifetime replacement. Walmart is still cheap, but becoming more like Sears once was in quality (on some items).
As for Amazon, I like them too. I know they have a lot of cheap Asian stuff. But sometimes, that is exactly what I want (cheap but good DC stick welders).
I guess the issue is with the knock-offs and dangerous items on Amazon. That's fraud. No question about it. Walmart does not have this issue at all. Amazon should do something about it.
> As for Amazon, I like them too. I know they have a lot of cheap Asian stuff. But sometimes, that is exactly what I want (cheap but good DC stick welders).
I'm of the same mind - sometimes (ok, a lot of times) I want the cheap stuff from China; in many cases, it's the only way to get it at a reasonable price.
I could buy a 40A Bosch relay from China for $1.00 (if that) - or I can go to AutoZone and buy the -exact- same relay (because guess where AutoZone sources it from?) for $15.00. Now - why should I do that?
Multiply that out to a ton of other products.
Now - some things I know I can "Buy USA" with - like DC gear motors. I can go on Amazon, and get a particular DC gear motor for say, $15.00 each. Or I can source something similar made by an American company (let's say Ametek), perhaps using DigiKey or Mouser - and for virtually the same motor, pay $100.00. Yeah - ok. I'll get right on that.
I was once trying to source new gears for a surplus Pittman gear motor I had purchased for a few dollars - the company wanted me to buy 50 pieces of the gear, at $2.50 each. I told 'em thanks but no thanks.
People wonder why parts are bought from China - well, there's your answer.
As individuals, You and I can purchase such items without running into the tariff issue - whether we go thru Amazon or AliExpress or some other direct-from-china method. Now, that doesn't work for businesses of course, so they have to use other methods.
My concern, though, is that we're going to end up in a world where if you are a consumer and not a business, you won't be allowed to purchase from overseas suppliers - due to either uproar over inferior products, or dangerous ingredients, or industry pressure. You'll only be able to shop at USA-only "consumer stores" - and forget about being able to get any of the "off-brand" or "strange" items only available in China (that aren't even carried on Amazon today - a lot of these, you have to dig thru AliExpress, or other direct-from-asia retailers - though the best way tends to be thru taobao and similar - but it's really easy to get hosed, too).
Yes. The problem I have experienced from a customer service perspective is that marketplace sellers who ship dangerous or otherwise clearly defective/scam products (eg I had a power wallwart explode on first being plugged in) just respond to any and all complaints by processing an immediate refund. This doesn't seem to get picked up properly by amazon and presumably their margins are good enough that this strategy works for the sellers (at least for a while).
In fact, Amazon is so overrun with low quality products that I'd even go as far as saying the average Walmart product is better quality than the average Amazon product.
Amazon is AliExpress with a domestic retailer's markup. At least with Walmart I know that when they stock something on their shelves, they care about liability and bad PR.
This. At any brick-and-mortar store, the store itself takes some responsibility for the quality ("won't fail dangerously or slowly poison your children" quality, not "won't fall apart after a year of use" quality) of their products, if only because it's more clear that they'll catch some blowback from stocking illegal products in their stores.
Speaking of Walmart, I just noticed something very interesting. When I buy something in-store at Walmart, but pay using Walmart Pay, the credit card I've enrolled in Walmart Pay records this as an online sale when it comes to deciding what cash back rewards categories apply to it.
