Amazon Will Start Charging Prime Members for US Grocery Orders of Less Than $150 | Hacker News Reader

Amazon Will Start Charging Prime Members for US Grocery Orders of Less Than $150

bloomberg.com

58 pointsmfiguiere76 comments

Seriously? As the cost of Prime goes up the more I wonder why I use it...

Once I'm not using Prime, my reliance on Amazon for free shipping evaporates and then I no longer am using Amazon exclusively for general purchases.

I did not renew my Prime membership this year after Amazon raised the annual price again. We have too many streaming services in our house as it is, and we don't order enough from Amazon to take advantage of the free shipping.

I've also found Amazon's prices getting less competitive, especially for things you'd usually buy at placed like Target (drive up pickup is amazing). Combined with the endless search results that are likely counterfeit and full of fake 5 star reviews, it's just too much work to buy things from Amazon for too little benefit.

As a consequence I've found myself ordering more from retailers directly, without any real downgrade in shipping.

I love how target has solved the Amazon as competitor issue with just incremental improvements. I much more strongly trust target’s product curation staff over amazon’s anything goes mentality

I just hope that Target doesn’t follow Walmart in copying Amazon’s flawed shared inventory system. I hate having to constantly check for other 3rd party sellers who both sell the same (potentially fake) product AND use Amazon warehouses and fulfillment. It’s for this reason that our household has been gradually moving more and more of our purchases to Target.

I can’t just mindlessly buy stuff on Amazon anymore. Haven’t been able to do that for years now ever since they hit Day Two in 2015. For me, it’s transformed into a slightly better eBay. There’s nothing totally wrong about eBay, but I don’t trust it enough to buy products like food and medicine.

+1 the counterfeit items on Amazon are getting out of control. It's so stupid that there are so many millions of cheap knockoff products in any category with an overflowing number of fake 5-star reviews.

I've been using Fakespot but at the same time I have always wondered wtf Amazon is doing about it at all.

I'm not doubting that there are a shit ton of counterfeits on Amazon, but I am wondering how I've managed to avoid them so well. I have literally never received something from Amazon that I thought even had the possibility of being fake.

Could it have to do with the specific categories I shop in? Maybe the stuff I buy from Amazon just isn't profitable enough for the bad guys to bother counterfeiting?

Same here. I don't doubt people's experiences, but I have never received a counterfeit product while shopping relatively heavily and in various categories (electronics, baby clothing and food, books, kitchenware, stationery, etc.).

Maybe you do have one that’s counterfeit but is functionally ok? I had several items that didn’t pass (a Braun thermostat and a wheeled kitchen stool).

I suppose that's possible, but if the thing I got works just as well as the thing I ordered, what's the difference?

Unfortunately there's a lot of niche stuff on Amazon that Target won't have -- 3d printing filament e.g. And there aren't that many 3D printing stores in town here. In fact there are none.

Same experience here in India. I didn't renew my Prime membership last month and soon found myself making all my purchases on Flipkart (Walmart) and actually found it to be better overall.

Now Amazon India's supposedly experimenting with a $12 (999 Indian rupees) "Prime Lite" plan, and even that is unappealing to me [1].

For entertainment, Amazon Prime in India is a weird concoction of content and placeholders for other streaming services that you have to pay extra for. They intend to be some sort of single-stop gateway to multiple streaming services, but end up being a total mess.

[1] https://techcrunch.com/2023/01/14/amazon-prime-lite-membersh...

I am actually surprised how flipkart continues to be mediocre. Amazon is usually cheaper, has better product reviews, and has more selection than flipkart. Walmart has owned them for years at this point. Like step it up already.

I turned it off last year and barely noticed. Free shipping if over $25 of amazon packages. They generally arrive “early” every time if you’re in a city because the stuff is already in the local warehouse and the delivery truck is already headed your way and artificial delays might not be a great look

Yeah, they don’t want to hold your orders in a warehouse anyway. I think it only makes a difference around Christmas time tbh.

Delivery times at Christmas with prime were over 2 weeks so no help there

I've cancelled my prime membership when they announced the latest price hike. It ends in February, but I've already started ordering from other places more, comparing prices for everything, and buying from Amazon way less. For me, Amazon is now largely failing as a retailer - expensive, full of fakes and low quality items, really bad search, even their customer support isn't what it used to be.

same cancelled prime and most orders over 25 so was free anyways so it was money well saved at 15 a month for basically same end result. They seem to be testing scaring you with saying 2 3 weeks delivery time but in reality shows up in 2 days (using same logistics)

Time for Walmart+ maybe? They seem to be providing a lot of extra benefits like Prime as well, with the added advantage of lower prices and heavily stocked supercenters everywhere around me.

My prime membership expired last week.

This is a recurring pattern of tech companies: offer a service at a loss, and then after capturing the market, raise prices or penalize for inactivity. People complain about Facebook harvesting user info, but in fakebook's defense, it is still $0 to use without any obvious degradation of the service or penalties for inactivity (people who use Yahoo , Hotmail, Dropbox, etc. sure learned how much it can suck having all your stuff purged cuz you fail to login). Same for Instagram, twitter, etc.. You are better off storing your files on facebook than dropbox (or twitter by converting the data to an image).

> offer a service at a loss, and then after capturing the market, raise prices or penalize for inactivity

I mean, as much as I dislike it, it makes sense business wise. Let users try it, find it useful and then make money out of it. People who love the product will continue, who don't use it much will move to competitors who might be making a loss any way, or stop altogether.

Do you expect them to make a loss forever or try to be profitable in the first month when users wouldn't even know if it makes sense lifestyle wise?

FWIW, I don't see the benefit of Amazon Prime anymore and might discontinue it when my membership comes for renewal.

> in fakebook's defense, it is still $0 to use without any obvious degradation of the service

This is untrue; service has degraded significantly. Pretty much every change made to the feed of your friends' activity has made it worse.

Drat. I dislike getting groceries delivered (it seems lazy of me, it's a headache, they occasionally mess up, and it's much more expensive than walking to a nearby store), but...

I've about decided to go back to the grocery delivery I was getting for most of the last 3 years. I'm seeing way too many people in grocery stores just coughing out a phlegmy cough, without even trying to cover -- like they're oblivious to the ongoing pandemic, or even pre-Covid basic cold&flu courtesy.

I was in my co-working space last week and the guy closest to me was coughing his lungs out, then as I packed up to leave, someone came into the elevator — after me — and blew their nose a couple times on the way down.

I’m not going to lose my mind over it. The simple solution is to let my team know I’ll be AFK, go home, and take a bit of time away from the space until the germs make their way through.

But there’s still something so surreal about living through a pandemic and people immediately returning to business as usual, going to work sick. And even more bizarre is that these are remote workers. They can stay home and no one would need to know any better.

Oh well. This is just what humans do. Who knows what kind of stupid stuff I get up to. I’m not smart enough to even tell you, but I assure you I do it.

I solve this by going on a weekday morning. With WFH this isn't too bad, get up a little early, hit the grocery store by 7-8am, back and put away by standup at 9.

The only time I do grocery delivery is if I'm down with some kind of illness.

It's amazing they survive.

> seeing way too many people in grocery stores just coughing out a phlegmy cough, without even trying to cover -- like they're oblivious to the ongoing pandemic

What both pro-vaccination and anti- vaccination camps share, in Western countries, is their hatred of wearing masks. Of the few that do, they do not use n95s.

Great outcome for Instacart and DoorDash.

My Amazon Fresh deliveries will be less frequent and heavier items I don't want to carry.

And great for Walmart who’s not charging for deliveries above 35$ with Walmart plus.

That's basically what Amazon Fresh was doing back in 2017. I think the threshold was either 35 or 40 dollars.

Amazon has gotten way worse since then.

Prime is practically useless, and probably a net-negative, if you don't care about their video offering. In the US it's a $15/month expense. Meanwhile, you still get free shipping for orders >$25, and needing to group them a bit makes you more selective in what you actually end up buying because you really need it. Rather, than willy nilly buying whatever pops into your head all the time. Then, even if you really need an item quickly within a couple days, there's always a free trial of prime waiting for you that you can then cancel.

Not sure how they think they’ll compete with instacart at those prices. It’s literally cheaper to use instacart/fresh direct even with the delivery fees

At least they're not artificially inflating the cost of items to have you pay over $150 like Ubereats.

They must have done some analysis which says that a lot of people buy more than $150 at a time, or frequently and a bit below 150 that they could buy more than not. Anything less than that might not be profitable for them.

At this point Prime seems to be targeting families only. As a single person I'm not sure of the value I'm getting with all the things I don't want (TV shows etc) and the high minimums ($150 for groceries is too much for one).

I canceled my Prime subscription last year after the headline benefit, two-day shipping, had turned into "well, we'll try for two-day shipping, but we achieve it 0% of the time, and there's no recourse".

Yeah this is going to lead to me cancelling as well. Amazon takes up to 6 days now for “prime” shipping.

Amazon is a garbage company that you can’t count on the items not being fakes/knockoffs.

I typically find the same items on Taobao and Alibaba for a fraction of the price. I've been returning some items as they accept returns if you "find a better price elsewhere."

There were some weenies who said this was abuse of the service, however, the option to return an item because you found a better price elsewhere is literally not a terms of service violation, it is a prefilled option.

I have been a member for over a decade and probably return half of my purchases because they are low quality and over priced dropshipped goods. Paired with the now aspirational two-day delivery in my coastal metro, I couldn't be happier shifting my purchases back to Costco and other domestic alternatives.

> I have been a member for over a decade and probably return half of my purchases because they are low quality and over priced dropshipped goods.

And you didn't get flagged as a bad customer?

I return half of my purchases now because the quality of the service as well the selection of products has deteriorated.

If you bought eggs from a vendor for 10 years and in the past 3, they provided half of the viable eggs per carton, you wouldn't be a bad customer for returning the cartons in which you are not receiving the value for which you have paid. Unless you use the most abusive and bad faith interpretation of what a customer is I suppose.

That’s what alibaba is for: you can count on the items being fakes/knockoffs.

aliexpress sellers actually answer messages, customise orders, i had great service and even a refund once!

agreed, had great service on aliexpress, got a Dear sir ma'am it's our pleasure to refund you and keep the item please order from us again have a great day! Got a chinese only xiaomi device once and they threw in free accessories because i asked to customize and add to price and they just gifted it and threw it into the shipping box.

> had great service on aliexpress, got a Dear sir ma'am

Hey, the standard of English is improving!

I remember meeting a street vendor who was quite functional in English, but who always addressed me as "gentleman".

Ditto. Pretty rare that I buy anything under $25 now so I’d get free shipping anyway. Why even Prime at this point?

I thought prime was more for single people that buy stuff and want it quickly, and families go to costco.

There is something un-natural about a prime delivery for a $5.99 order. There is no way any of this sh* is sustainable.

On the other hand:

https://twitter.com/pretentiouswhat/status/16192278747494850...

>I just placed a grocery order from an Aldi 2km away on Meituan and it arrived in ELEVEN MINUTES. The drive itself takes like 8 minutes. That means the driver was already in the store, and the staff took 3 minutes to assemble my order? Why would anyone leave their home? lol

Today, China with cheap labour. Tomorrow drones.

One time I had a king sized (foam) mattress delivered for next day with prime. It was huge and heavy, the postman could just drag it from the truck into our garage, cursing.

Shipping was $2.99

10 orders in a neighborhood in 30 minutes is like 60 usd. 25 to driver. 35 for driver and truck costs. over 8 hour shift that's like 250 to amazon. Number's check out as sustainable. and that's after fees from FBA seller, which on high orders could be 10-50 or more per order, any shipping upsells to customer, and prime fees from customer. Very sustainable and profitable.

You mean something being delivered from one part of a city to another in 1-2 days should cost, on average, with the economy of scales, significantly more than $5.99?

Being able to pick an optimal time, I can have my person delivered across the city for $20 or so. That’s with all sorts of liability and no “one delivery serves many” model to maximize profit

I think you’re overestimating the value of transporting a small, light box

I think they are talking about a 'free' delivery of goods valued at 5.99.

The value of transporting a small light box depends on what's in the box.

Whole Foods started charging $9.99 for orders a year or so ago.

I still sometimes order from them but try and avoid it. I sometimes use Fresh, sometimes do WF in the store (pickup or just going to the store), and also shop locally more.

> WF in the store

AKA shopping. this service is useful, but as others have said it was never sustainable. would you do someones shopping for $10?

Wouldn't use this as a frame. You wouldn't buy an entire server and add a static ip and host someone's site on shared hosting for 1.99 a month. Things at scale are priced much differently. it's 10 to deliver because 5 deliveries in an hour is 50 an hour with 20 30 to the person and 20 30 to whole foods. This is why businesses work because the 10 is great value for you and the business keeps multiples of that so also profitable.

What a weird way to frame things. Grocery delivery is just a job specialization reality. There are many things I wouldn't do for others what they currently cost me, but that doesn't meant they're automatically unsustainable.

In Jan 2021, I filled out a survey (got $10 WF GC) asking me about my preferences. If a fee were charged, would I use the service less and where would I go? Would I prefer a higher fee but one hour delivery, free delivery for off peak hours, would I tip less, shop in store, would I rather have no fee but not get the same discounts as in store, etc.

It was very thorough and it looks like over the subsequent two years they implemented changes related to their line of questioning. Amazon already charges $9.99 for Whole Foods and $14.99 if you want delivery in an hour.

That's unfortunate; we order their pre-made Amazon Kitchen meals[1] but not $150 worth. I already pay the $10 delivey fee for Whole Foods when I need to get flowers.

[1] https://a.co/cP3Ev87

I hope added fees on orders won't eat into what people are willing to spend on tips to drivers.

(I found the default fee seemed way too low during Covid, so I'd bump it up, while still penny-pinching to avoid the smaller fee for a more desirable delivery window. When the added delivery fee is unavoidable tacked-on, maybe that will feel more like I'm paying for the delivery, even the driver isn't paid as well as I think they should be.)

What? I am ordering something from a service.

The wage negation between the person executing the order and the service is none of my concern.

Let's consider Company A building a SaaS product. Company B (person or LLC) wants the product with 3 additional features.

Company A hires me, I write the features and they provide the service to Company B.

I don't expect Company B to tip me.

Are you in the US? Do you tip the driver when getting pizza delivered? Other prepared food delivered?

When you order Amazon Fresh, and there's a default tip for the driver on the order, do you zero it?

An earlier additional consideration was during the worst of Covid, there was initially no vaccine, and we didn't even know how it spread. Lots of people WFH, but delivery drivers could not. So a tip could've additionally been gratitude or acknowledgement that them being out there working was saving people. A lot of other people working then, we don't have an opportunity to thank/acknowledge, but this one was easy.

I use a Kroger delivery and it is a tipless service. I pay $65 a year to have access to it.

I never tipped before, so no problem there

Tips on Drivers?

Oh America. Start paying your people a proper salary and stop obfuscating real prices from your customers.

It’s a bit crazy to hear how expensive prime is in the US when I consider I pay less than $3.50/month for it in Japan.

As far as I can determine the benefits are the same.

Naturally. If it isn't profitable enough, charge more. Basic economics. Any prior promises can be complete ignored and invalidated.

Coming soon… Prime Plus!

Honestly it would make more sense to have levels or alacarte. I don’t use half the crap that comes with prime.

The problem is, I kinda wonder how many people would actually fork over for the additional benefits (eg: streaming video)

Prime Now!

https://youtu.be/BGEAiUeiaKs

Prime Prime

prime pro, prime pro max, oh wait..

prime platinum, gold, silver, etc.

What about a quiet understated luxury prime membership. Only change is they show only tasteful ads and just a small logo change: Amazon'

And instead of MIHOLL and ZESICA or SENSARTE, they use fancy made-up brands from lower case characters.

Prime', Prime'', Prime'''

Prime′, Prime″, Prime‴, Prime⁗

Reply on news.ycombinator.com