Would you pay $120 for Amazon prime?

tkbslc wrote in post #16689599
I thought we were talking about Amazon prime.

Amazon Prime plus all the other expenses of...life.

Starbucks plus all the other expenses of...life.

A pack of smokes plus all the other expenses of...life.

A gallon of milk plus all the other expenses of...life.

A gallon of gas plus all the other expenses of...life.

A Snickers bar plus all the other expenses of...life.

A bag of potato chips plus all the other expenses of...life.

Pandora subscription plus all the other expenses of...life.

Cable TV plus all the other expenses of...life.

Internet plus all the other expenses of...life.

Cell phone plus all the other expenses of...life.

Car payment plus all the other expenses of...life.

Insurance payment plus all the other expenses of...life.

Mortgage plus all the other expenses of...life.

Daughter's ballet slippers plus all the other expenses of...life.

Son's soccer cleats plus all the other expenses of...life.

New tires for car plus all the other expenses of...life.

New tires for wife's car plus all the other expenses of...life.

Oil changes plus all the other expenses of...life.

Crap. Alternator went bad plus all the other expenses of...life.

Serpentine belt plus all the other expenses of...life.

I could go on and on and on and on. Heaven help ya if ya don't get this.

Prices have pretty much leveled off where Amazon is really not all that cheap anymore. However for me driving to Walmart would cost about $5 round trip. Maybe $3 for a trip to the grocery store or $20 to the nearest Best Buy or the nearest mall. I can't imagine spending even $2 in fuel to buy a $3 item such as a roll of tape I might need ASAP. So it's different for everyone but if most people factor in the cost of fuel plus wear and tear on the car the savings can add up.

I have neighbors who drive to stores almost daily and one friend drives an electric car that cost him a fortune for the privilege of saving on fuel. Maybe some people enjoy going to the stores and looking around at things. Personally I'd rather watch TV while the UPS man hauls my stuff around. I would however expect more for the added cost such as more competitive prices on grocery items which tend to be way overpriced.

I agree with the above in that Amazon's prices are less and less competitive when compared against B&M stores, at least for stuff I buy. That's more because of the latter cutting prices as a last gasp effort to compete, though.

The huge caveat remains that Amazon doesn't charge sales tax in some states, including mine. For big-ticket purchases, that is a crippling disadvantage to local stores, as it will cause me to go with Amazon every single time. As that loophole continues to close in the remaining states, however, the golden age of saving big via Internet shopping will come to a close IMO.

I've spent tens of thousands at Amazon and had Prime for many years, my ordering has lessened in the last few years but I recall Prime always had my orders here in two days and overnight meant overnight.

I accepted a Prime membership offer for one month and placed three orders. Not one of those orders made it on time and two were sent UPS Ground and took a week while the third was sent USPS combined with UPS and took four business days for a one day charge.

I won't even pay 79.00 at that rate of success and I cancelled the free trial.

Surely you don't blame Amazon for that list.

cdifoto wrote in post #16689615
Amazon Prime plus all the other expenses of...life.

Starbucks plus all the other expenses of...life.

A pack of smokes plus all the other expenses of...life.

A gallon of milk plus all the other expenses of...life.

A gallon of gas plus all the other expenses of...life.

A Snickers bar plus all the other expenses of...life.

A bag of potato chips plus all the other expenses of...life.

Pandora subscription plus all the other expenses of...life.

Cable TV plus all the other expenses of...life.

Internet plus all the other expenses of...life.

Cell phone plus all the other expenses of...life.

Car payment plus all the other expenses of...life.

Insurance payment plus all the other expenses of...life.

Mortgage plus all the other expenses of...life.

Daughter's ballet slippers plus all the other expenses of...life.

Son's soccer cleats plus all the other expenses of...life.

New tires for car plus all the other expenses of...life.

New tires for wife's car plus all the other expenses of...life.

Oil changes plus all the other expenses of...life.

Crap. Alternator went bad plus all the other expenses of...life.

Serpentine belt plus all the other expenses of...life.

I could go on and on and on and on. Heaven help ya if ya don't get this.

tkbslc wrote in post #16690611
Surely you don't blame Amazon for that list.

Sad. Really. Just...sad.

cdifoto wrote in post #16690630
Sad. Really. Just...sad.

Agreed. It would be sad if your annual income minus your snarky list of expenses < $40

tkbslc wrote in post #16690714
Agreed. It would be sad if your annual income minus your snarky list of expenses < $40

You're a marketeer's wet dream.

Used to be $25 to get to free shipping, now it's $35. I had a prime trial for a year and found myself buying lots of $1-5 stuff I ended up not always needing. Strikes me that the free shipping thing could be a benefit they throw in with their credit card rather than charging more for it. With them now talking about charging tax and limiting what they will ship (tried to buy my son an air rifle from them once which is legal to ship to my state, but they wouldn't). Looks like they're becoming less and less the place where I go.

I don't know what's the deal with the overnight shipping, I can still see it for $3.99, unless this is because my account possibly still has the student pricing (can't remember when it renewed).

Even after I go back to the regular pricing of $79, I'll keep it. $120? I don't think I can justify that much. I don't order too much from them nowadays; back when I was in college, the savings from a single book vs the bookstore paid for a regular year of Prime, easily.

Last year I lived in Arizona for half the year. At some point they cut a deal with the Arizona state government and started charging for sales tax, so I had more incentive to get my stuff elsewhere, if it wasn't urgent. I wasn't too happy, but not unhappy enough to cancel. Then I found out about the add-on program, which I have no idea if it was new, or if I never had the need to buy super cheap stuff from them, so if I wanted to buy a $5 pack of car fuses I HAD to bundle it with $20(ish) of stuff, no option to pay for shipping for the item, but even worse, I couldn't even tack it on to something that included shipping, so if I were buying those fuses and something like $12 blank DVD spindle, I still had to buy more stuff to be able to get the fuses; I found that quite irritating, that fiasco almost drove me to canceling my membership (and I wasn't buying fuses though, it was something else like a computer cable or a DVI-HDMI adaptor type thing).

Sometimes too much is too much. Considering that free shipping from B&H is usually a 2-3 day deal (turns out, Ohio is a lot closer to NY than Arizona!), I don't need to pay extra for shipping unless it's a time critical item. I suppose this is the opposite from when I lived 110 miles from a cluster of Phoenix warehouses, ground shipping was overnight, so as long as they shipped the same day, I'd get it the next day, I noticed that whenever I paid for overnight and it came from Phoenix, all they did was make sure it shipped the same day, as they still used ground shipping. A while back I loved to buy photography stuff from Amazon, but it seems like their selection has dwindled down (at least the stuff that is sold by them, not fulfilled by them), they're still a great hub to buy all sorts of chinese junk (not just the usual Yongnuo/Neewer/etc remotes, flashes, etc, but also amateur radios and general chinese things), which I'm not sure if it's a great thing, or it will just turn it into the next eBay.

I use to buy gas for $.50 a gallon, but now they want over $3 for the same thing. I'm not driving anymore.

Landcruiser wrote in post #16696121
I use to buy gas for $.50 a gallon, but now they want over $3 for the same thing. I'm not driving anymore.

Yeah too bad it's not comparable.

Landcruiser wrote in post #16696121
I use to buy gas for $.50 a gallon, but now they want over $3 for the same thing. I'm not driving anymore.

In regarding consumerism, it's all about perceived value, NOT the actual dollar amount. This is a somewhat complicated concept to understand for some...

I don't really use Amazon Instant Video because I have Netflix and Hulu Plus but 2-days shipping has been wonderful, especially the deliveries on Sunday. Items shipped from Amazon, exchanges and returns there is also pleasing. Good customer service. Happy with $79 yearly which is how much I wouldn't mind paying up for. Now, when Amazon is considering about upping Prime fees to $100-120. I might be cheapskate but for me, $40 more is a bit too much. So, no, if Amazon is going to raise, I would discontinue after membership ends .

greenrocks wrote in post #16697577
I don't really use Amazon Instant Video because I have Netflix and Hulu Plus but 2-days shipping has been wonderful, especially the deliveries on Sunday. Items shipped from Amazon, exchanges and returns there is also pleasing. Good customer service. Happy with $79 yearly which is how much I wouldn't mind paying up for. Now, when Amazon is considering about upping Prime fees to $100-120. I might be cheapskate but for me, $40 more is a bit too much. So, no, if Amazon is going to raise, I would discontinue after membership ends .

I've been just as happy with Amazon Prime video as I was with Netflix. There are less overall titles, but 98% of Netflix titles are garbage. Amazon at least has a handful of decent movies from the past few years. The kids selection is pretty comparable.

I do Hulu+ and Amazon and I haven't missed netflix at all.