Honestly? AliExpress wins for this stuff. The shipping is always much more expensive than the actual items, so I batch purchase stuff like this. Funnily enough, sometimes, despite paying only one shipping cost, it arrives in multiple shipments.
replyPersonally I buy that stuff locally anyways to support my local economy.
replyEven if it does cost me a bit extra, continuing to have local businesses is worth it to me
I prefer online retailers because there is a lot more choice there. I can't find an inflatable knee pillow in local stores. The supermarket close to me even stopped selling batteries.
replyThis is true. Many "weird" purchases that used to be available from someone local are now impossible to get. Not sure about the supermarket not stocking batteries though... That's just insane.
replyYou have a small shop that sells zip ties? The only place I would expect to find something like that is a big box store or a hardware store (which are all chains now).
replyLots of art stores (not just chains) have them. Not as much variety as Amazon, but still.
replyBuying from a big box store still does support local jobs though
replyLike yeah, Walmart isn't really much better than Amazon in the grand scheme of things, but I would rather people be able to get stable employment at a Walmart store than have to fight it out as gig workers delivering for Amazon.
Maybe I'm overthinking it though
Walmart employees are historically on food stamps. Neither is sufficiently better than the other imo
replyI'm not saying that Walmart is great, but maybe that Walmart+food stamps is better than just food stamps?
replyIt's not like being a delivery gig worker is great income either
yup
reply