I needed 7/16" ink ribbon for my antique Burroughs adding machine. Bought it on eBay. Order was fulfilled by Ribbons Unlimited, a small business that just sells ink ribbons for typewriters. Took a week to get it, but I wasn’t in that much of a hurry.
I was buying some rolling papers. They were $10 on Amazon. I decided to check eBay, they had the same exact pack but it was $15. Decided to go with the eBay purchase to avoid Amazon. 2 days later I get an Amazon delivery. It’s my rolling papers, shipped straight from Amazon with a $5 dollar markup going straight to the eBay seller. So not only did bezos still get his cut but i paid an extra $5 for the privilege.
That happens from time to time. Hell, I’ve even had that happen two weeks ago with Newegg for a rare cable I needed.
Still though, on the whole, you can get in touch with some real brick and mortar style sellers, and often times it’s cheaper. I saved like $20 on a pack of water filters for my fridge recently.
Use eBay.
I needed 7/16" ink ribbon for my antique Burroughs adding machine. Bought it on eBay. Order was fulfilled by Ribbons Unlimited, a small business that just sells ink ribbons for typewriters. Took a week to get it, but I wasn’t in that much of a hurry.
I was buying some rolling papers. They were $10 on Amazon. I decided to check eBay, they had the same exact pack but it was $15. Decided to go with the eBay purchase to avoid Amazon. 2 days later I get an Amazon delivery. It’s my rolling papers, shipped straight from Amazon with a $5 dollar markup going straight to the eBay seller. So not only did bezos still get his cut but i paid an extra $5 for the privilege.
Same thing applies to lots of stuff on Amazon. They are just things off of AliExpress marked up a lot.
That happens from time to time. Hell, I’ve even had that happen two weeks ago with Newegg for a rare cable I needed.
Still though, on the whole, you can get in touch with some real brick and mortar style sellers, and often times it’s cheaper. I saved like $20 on a pack of water filters for my fridge recently.
eBay abuses sellers, too.