I've stopped buying huge swaths of things from Amazon for this reason. I'm basically down to buying four categories of things:

1. Items whose brand absolutely don't matter so long as they work as intended (e.g., books, home goods like hangers).

2. Home goods it wouldn't be worthwhile to knock off (e.g., KIND bars, toilet paper).

3. Smaller brands whose market share and item appeal are not worth cloning (e.g., a mechanical keyboard breadboard kit).

4. Things I'd order from banggood /aliexpress anyway, that Amazon will get to me faster (e.g., some diodes).

For everything else, I'd rather get it at a local store or order it from Target/Best Buy/Whoever than risk the Amazon purchase.

> 3. Smaller brands whose market share and item appeal are not worth cloning (e.g., a mechanical keyboard breadboard kit).

Even things you might think are niche enough not to attract copycats (ham radio DIY kits requiring soldering and multimeter use) absolutely do, and a lot of it ends up on Amazon, though eBay is by far a worse offender.

I went out of my way to buy direct from a small vendor, Sewell Direct, instead of buying their product through Amazon.

When it turned out that I couldn't use the product in my application, I canceled my order before it was shipped. They ignored that and shipped it anyway. Then I had to pay return shipping. If I had bought through Amazon, I could have returned it free.

Moral: When customers seek you out to help you out, don't be assholes.

Amazon's one click, customer service, shipping infrastructure, and return policy simply embarrass all their competition. Decades of investing in these things is paying off. No wonder it's physically painful to visit a new site: forms, typing, janky shipping, janky returns...

These things seem so easy once you see them all working, but companies don't have the resources or the interest in catching up.

I disagree. Their return policy average at best. Returns are only free if the item is damaged, defective, or incorrect. At Costco or Best Buy, I can return an item because I didn't like it. Even when returning items for "incorrect description", for example, it's super obnoxious when you have to return things over half the time because everything is shit.

I can go to Walmart and get a higher-quality product. I can buy tons of things at Walmart that I can't from Amazon due to their self-sabotoged supply chain. Food, kitchen products, personal care products, batteries, electronics, clothing, tools, etc etc. (How pitiful a time we live in when I am writing praises about Walmart. Sigh.)

The only reason Amazon charges you to return is to cover shipping. A brick and mortar does not accept returns via mail so you have to stand in line at the customer service counter forever. If you’re comparing apples to apples, Amazon returns are accepted in person at several retailers which eliminates the return shipping fee.

For 4 it's always a better value proposition to get from eBay, when cost with shipping is all accounted. And you'd be surprised about 3, e.g. check out the standing desks.

I posit that we're sliding back to the 1990's Amazon: only good for books. But it doesn't matter because they are interested in being a Google with customer service and making a profit that way.

You also have to make sure the books aren't a print-on-demand counterfeit.

I was looking for a copy of "Just So Stories" by Rudyard Kipling. Knew I wasn't going to get anything like the original publication of a 115 year old book, but the counterfeiter exceeded my expectations and sent me a badly photocopied, horribly cropped, freshly printed, piece of crap.

I don’t buy anything edible/consumable on Amazon because of counterfeits. No vitamins. No granola bars. No protein powder. I don’t trust Amazon at all and it’s just not worth the risk. I’d rather spend a few more bucks and buy those items from a place I trust.

Regarding 1) a few days ago a URL was posted on HN about counterfeit books on Amazon.

If shit goes south for AAAAA1 they close it and then start doing business as AAAAA2.