Day #10 – 3rd June 2020

I still haven’t bought anything from Amazon, and what’s been the most surprising thing to me is that I’ve barely even thought about it.  This is a surprise to me because it has made me more aware of just how pre-occupied I was when I had the free trial of Prime and was wringing every last drop out of the free-ness of it.  Now, I’m not constantly thinking of things I could buy before it’s ‘too late’.  This is a good thing, and hopefully bodes well for the challenge.

Another reason that I may not have been thinking about making a purchase from Amazon is that I was waiting for some books to arrive that I’d ordered from Penguin a few weeks ago.  There were two reasons for my order, one is my total weakness for books, and linked with that is the fact that they were on offer: 5 books for £25, even with the delivery charge, I figured it was worth it to pay money directly to the publisher and to avoid giving Amazon more money.  However, it did not go without a hitch, and when I hadn’t received the books a couple of weeks after ordering, I contacted Penguin, who very kindly refunded the delivery charge and said they would look into it.  Another week passed, and I emailed: no response, I felt frustrated, but as much as I LOVE books, I was well aware that there were more important things going on, so I waited another week.  My patience started to run out and so I Tweeted them…still nothing, this was now bordering on frustration, so I emailed again (and followed up with a Tweet) and I finally got a response last night, apologising and saying that they’d sent a replacement set of books to me.  The books arrived first thing this morning (see above pic), and I’m not going to lie, I felt like hugging the postwoman when she delivered them (of course, I did not do this, but I gave her a very enthusiastic thumbs-up from the window).  I appreciate that this was not Penguin’s fault, and am pleased that it was sorted in the end, but I must admit that the whole experience did prompt me to make comparisons between this experience and what Amazon have done whenever I’ve had issues in the past, and I have to say, Amazon have generally been excellent, and I have had very little cause to complain.  I also never had to send more than one message to get an issue sorted, however, I am willing to give Penguin the benefit of the doubt, I’m sure they are working with a skeleton staff, due to coronavirus, and so I don’t see this experience as anything more than bad luck.  It’s also got nothing to do with the further 10 books I’ve got saved in my basket for after payday (😉).

Day #2 - 26th May 2020

I guess the saying ‘when one door closes, another opens’ is true. While out for my run this morning I passed a house that had a bookcase on the driveway offering free books!! On my way back I stopped to have a look (& to check that the note definitely did say that the books were free) & found the books pictured above. It was a lovely surprise to come across 1st thing and made me think that maybe finding alternatives to Amazon might not be quite as tricky as I feared.  Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think I’ll just have to send my wish out into the universe & free stiff will magically appear, but neither does it mean I’ll go crawling back to Amazon before the month is out!

It’s also a reminder that I don’t always need to buy new, especially when it comes to books.  There used to be a secondhand book stall on Brighton seafront (before they built the big viewing platform) & whenever we were visiting, I would end up buying bags of books from there, I loved it.  I guess this means I need to do some research into secondhand book shops/fairs in my area for once lockdown is over.  Although, to be fair, at the last count I have almost 200 unread books, so maybe more books is not what I need!!

The challenge begins

Monday 26^th May 2020

At the beginning of 2020 (you know, before there was a global pandemic and we could move about freely), I set myself the challenge of not buying items from Amazon anymore, it had been a long time coming, but given that I was no longer eligible for Amazon Prime Student (half-price Prime?  Yes please), my use of Amazon had been waning anyway.  However, having read articles about the pressure Amazon staff are put under when picking orders etc., and concerns about the carbon footprint involved, the start of the new year seemed like the perfect time to eschew Amazon and find other ways to buy stuff (or to try and buy less stuff more generally).  This was on the back of having successfully navigated the festive season without a single online purchase, I’d put my money into the High Street and it had felt good, so I thought, why not go further, and try to remove Amazon from my life once and for all, and until mid-April, I was absolutely smashing it, and hadn’t bought anything from Amazon since we moved into the new decade.  But then, in the depths of lockdown, with friends’ birthdays fast approaching, I went back to my old ways, and bought presents for those close to me.  At the time it felt important to be able to do this, especially as it was (and remains) impossible to know when we would be able to see each other again, so I bought some presents, which were then delivered directly to those friends, and I felt good for being able to reach out and do something special for them.  Then it was my husband’s bday, and although we rarely do presents, I wanted to do something nice, especially as we couldn’t go away as we’d planned, so I ordered him a couple of presents (which he loved, by the way).  Then Amazon offered me a free one-month trial of Prime, and I figured that the month would see me out of lockdown (or at least closer to the end of it) and I knew I had a few more bdays coming up, so I signed up – making a note of when it was due to end to ensure I cancelled in time.  Since then (30 days ago), I am ashamed (and more than a little surprised) to say,  I have placed 12(!) orders.  Looking back over my list, I can see that there were some household items that we needed, some were presents, but there are some that fit into neither of these categories and could be said to be more of a want than a need and this is where Amazon wins.  They make it so easy to just click to buy something and then before you know it, it’s been despatched and it’s on your doorstep.  However, I am not holding my hands up and saying that Amazon made me do it, I take full responsibility for my purchases, but as my free trial of Prime expires, I am putting a stop to it and re-setting my not buying from Amazon challenge.  To be clear, I’m not saying people that buy stuff from Amazon are bad or wrong, I have just decided that I don’t want to do it anymore.  I want to find other ways to consume, and (when it’s possible) support local businesses and the high street more generally, will it be less convenient? Almost certainly, but I think it’ll be worth it, looking over my list of previous orders from Amazon, (spanning almost the whole century), I can barely find anything that I needed at such short notice, that I couldn’t have got it elsewhere and so it’s time for me to re-think my spending/consuming and make some changes.  Hopefully by keeping this blog, it will help me to stay on track!