Depends on what you need. You can buy olives at a supermarket olive bar for $9 a pound (wet weight), or you can buy 5 lbs for $4/lb dry weight (8 lbs wet/shipping weight, so $2.48 per lb measured equivalently) on Amazon and have them there in 2 days. There's also many goods you just can't buy in suburban/rural locations - my wife makes fabulous miso, but good luck finding 2 different kinds of seaweed and bonito flakes at your Walmart. If you don't have an Asian market in proximity Amazon is literally your only choice (and they're actually not cheap there). For pet supplies they drastically beat the selection of a Wal-Mart and drastically beat the prices of a real pet store (eg stuff like Feliway or Nature's Miracle).
Yes, for certain commonly-consumed heavy or bulky goods, i.e. anything that's either mostly air (like toilet paper) or mostly liquid (like detergent) they aren't your best choice. That's not all goods by any means.
Also you're comparing the mileage of a bus (the UPS truck) to a passenger vehicle. The UPS truck is delivering goods for a hundred other people on his run today, the gas spent transporting your package is an absolutely insignificant fraction of that. If you're really worried about ~my carbon emissions~ then you should really be thinking about ditching that car and getting yourself to work on one of those 5 mpg busses.
Yes, for certain commonly-consumed heavy or bulky goods, i.e. anything that's either mostly air (like toilet paper) or mostly liquid (like detergent) they aren't your best choice. That's not all goods by any means.
Also you're comparing the mileage of a bus (the UPS truck) to a passenger vehicle. The UPS truck is delivering goods for a hundred other people on his run today, the gas spent transporting your package is an absolutely insignificant fraction of that. If you're really worried about ~my carbon emissions~ then you should really be thinking about ditching that car and getting yourself to work on one of those 5 mpg busses.