Walmart, Staples, Best Buy, Microcenter, Ace Hardware (there is usually a local one near you that is a Mom & Pop with the affiliation so they can do online orders and inventory management, etc), Walgreens, Lowes/Home Depot, Digikey, Ikea, eBay, or if you don't mind waiting you can just skip the middle man and go right to Ali Express.
Also, it is always a good idea to check the manufacturer's site if you know you want something specific -- they almost always have a 10% - 25% off new customer/newsletter signup deal.
FWIW, I've noticed now that both Walmart and Target online stores have their own version of third-party sellers. I don't know if they do the same as Amazon (combining inventory in fulfillment centers) but just something to be aware of.
Yeah that is annoying, but at least with Walmart (I don't usually shop online at target) you can restrict to things available at the local store, which ensures you don't get anything dodgy.
Walmart+ combined with the InHome subscription has been pretty valuable service for me after moving to the city and getting rid of my cars. I never have to step foot in a Walmart again combined while still getting same in-store prices and never having to tip for delivery.
Additionally, buying directly from the company used to be painful, who knows what's going on there? 20 years later, basic eCommerce is relatively well understood and someone that makes a product can easily have their own site that functions well.
Add a password manager and it's just a couple clicks, really no more work that amazon.
So for a huge amount of my stuff, I'll see if I can buy directly from the person/people that make it.
E-commerce is more than a site. You need to handle the inventory, shipping, returns, customer service etc. Amazon, when working well, could take care exactly of those things, and cut out middle men such as distributors. But to appear next to these ridiculous brands seem no longer a good choice.
Sure, but in the context of ecommerce then and now, it's a much better world.
Before, if you wanted to have a web store, you basically had to have a kid build you a website, updating was slow, every transaction processing system was different, (or they just took it in a web form and processed your card by hand on the visa machine in the office), the website didn't process inventory so someone had to keep that up-to-date. Then, they'd take your address and box to the post office and get a label. Hopefully, you didn't fat finger it, there was no data sanitation on the form and the post office isn't checking. And, if you didn't get the right product, they were out of stock, it was damaged . . . w/e, the return process was an email, goofy web form, or phone call to get a person on the phone to manually handle whatever went wrong, and that's if they weren't just a scammer and were actually going to ship you your stuff.
Now, any business that wants to have an online store front can grab a template, upload some pictures of their inventory, and the site handles payment processing, buys and prints a label, schedules a shipping pickup, handles the return process including generating return shipping labels. Often, the processor has a quick payment resolution system.
Amazon was really good at some point because they had enough people to build those things and make the experience pretty good, like, you just knew that you wouldn't get ripped off, you could send it back, hell, order two and pick the one you like and send one back. Youu didn't even have to enter your card number into some dodgy site or stop to type your shipping address and risk sending it next door with no recourse because amazon already has that seup.
But now, a lot of that barrier to entry is gone as companies have made the various parts of the stack available for a small percentage of each transaction. You can go to a website that works, order something, pay with paypal or stripe which have some customer protections, just select the shipping address on file with the processor and get an email with a tracking number a minute later. If you don't like it, you can send it back and the site will probably even integrate with usps/ups/shipper of choice help you to create a label and arrange a next day pickup.
And when you buy directly from the company, you can assume they are validating their product and it's not a fake, you know there's been no inventory mixing. You know what you are going to get.
And, to top it off, with a password safe, you can track accounts at 500 places so it's not really that much of a hassle to have multiple accounts, and that's only if you have to make an account because the payment processor of choice (of which they probably have several), even requires you to make an account on their site.
My point being, that other than amazon being a single point of shopping, they really don't offer anything that a small business can't for a relatively small effort.
I remember for buying something on eBay after winning the auction you would have to personally mail the seller a check, they would deposit it and wait for it to clear, then send you the item. On top of that the seller would have to deal with figuring out the ebay fees, and everyone involved just pretended taxes didn't exist. Fun times.
In a few central european countries, Galaxus is a good alternative. I'm a little afraid to mention it here, because more users means more incentive for sellers to buy fake reviews, and currently one of the best parts about it is that I can trust the reviews. Many of them are well written, too.
But they do quite a few other things I like: If you choose that delivery is not urgent, they will wait for all articles to be available and send them as one package. You can pay a little extra to have the carbon footprint of your order offset. They have their own paid staff that answers questions on products in addition to the community. They pay their own writers to review products and write guides for selecting the correct product in a category, and they seem very genuine, it doesn't read like marketing BS.
So generally, I feel quite good about shopping there. And it seems their style fosters a community of buyers that care about buying the correct product for their needs, and wanting to inform others about their experience.
For my mentioned items of lightbulbs and batteries, I generally buy them at a physical store (Lowe’s / Home Depot for light bulbs, batteries pretty much anywhere).
