Hacker News Reader

Comment by wmichelin | Hacker News Reader

Why isn't there an Amazon but with local fulfillment? Local merchants can flag that they're selling certain items on said marketplace, but to users they're transparently browsing a single cohesive marketplace a la Amazon.

I think that a fully localized Amazon would keep much of the convenience that customers love, but would remove the capitalist bottleneck in Seattle.

View on HN

Big issue is who is responsible for returns.

One of the major reasons I order from Amazon is ease of returns. I don’t want to have to go to 5 different stores to return a shipment or have 5 different return policies to think about.

Google seems to be trying to do this with Google Shopping. Search is excellent but it's really not that easy to browse, still haven't bought anything because I can't seem to figure out how to checkout with store pickup on it, and it doesn't have all stores nearby, only select chains like walmart, target, advance auto parts etc.

So yeah, sloppy execution, in typical google fashion.

bookshop.org sort of does that, but their prices can be much higher than Amazon's. To the point where you'd actually save money by buying the book on Amazon and just giving your local book store owner a check for $5

Sounds like a variation of the Starbucks problem. Starbucks is very cheap, the expensive sugary drinks would be even more expensive at any other coffee shop and their cheap coffee is typically cheaper than the competition by at least a few cents too. So if you're not a consumer with very particular tastes there's no real incentive to get coffee elsewhere when not only is Starbucks going to be cheaper but it's also everywhere and thus probably more convenient for your as well.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com