62 comments

[ 2.5 ms ] story [ 66.5 ms ] thread
But the cost of Amazon Prime have to be factored in as well
Riley Walz is easily one of the most creative people in tech today.
Isn't postal arbitrage how the original Ponzi scheme started?
I would delight to receive birthday cards in Maruchan Ramen form.
A cheaper option (if we’re going to do away with the restriction that the post card should be sent by the sender) would be for the recipient to hook their printer up to the network, and just send bits.

It is better, actually, you can even scan a real hand written post card.

Don't give money to amazon that is better spent on an amazingly efficient postal service. Amazon is subsidized by imaginary money until they put all their competition out of business(including USPS).
Turns out, at least in my area, for the grocery items you need to buy at least $25 worth to qualify for the free shipping.
Just sent my friend a bag of gravy mix, thank you!
Ah, luckily the climate doesn't mind that oil was extracted, a phone case was produced out of it, shipped from China, to end up not even being used but just as a "greeting card".

Why yes, I am fun at parties.

I feel I should point out that USPS has a lower rate for postcards (currently $0.61), so the threshold might be a bit lower.

I know that this is tongue-in-cheek and would be pretty funny to receive, but it isn't an apples-to-apples comparison. The experience of getting a little message printed on receipt paper is nothing like the experience of receiving a note or card in the mail. Through the mail you receive something physically from someone with their handwriting and some personality to it. Getting the Amazon message is more like printing out a text message on crummy paper.

Also, I don't have Prime, so it definitely isn't cost competitive for me anyway.

Not to mention that I would much rather give my $0.61 to a public service like the Post Office than to Amazon.
I've used something like this list to get "over the hump" for $35 to reach free shipping without prime.

It's horribly annoying to have a product that is $34.99 and you want it, but it'll cost shipping unless you get the damn Volkswagen screw; and then Amazon ships them individually anyway.

Here in Ireland, a stamp is 1.85eur.

So. Many. Possibilities.

Is there a simple way to search for everything and order by price descending? I'm in Australia so those items aren't much use.
lol everyone in the comments is taking this way too seriously
Somewhat off-topic, but when I click on "Case-Mate - Case for 2009 LG Xenon - Marsala"[1], the "About this item" section simply states:

About this item

- Do

- Not

- Buy

- This

- Product

What on earth is going on here?

[1]: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09D51KNQM

To the author, would you consider changing the “key photo”? I sent the weblink to a friend, and the key photo in iMessage is the pregnancy test and they got the wrong impression about the site/prank. Pick the lemon or can of beans perhaps?
I can almost guarantee that everyone mentioned in that blog post is a habitual Amazon user. They're all renewing Prime each year at full price and making a ton of regular purchases. The family has even turned on the FOMO by making Prime a family social network with social pressure to stay. I see it as a self-own, personally.
This is just being rude to delivery drivers.
Why stick to strictly under $78? Something that costs $2 with free shipping has a built in $0.78 discount if you consider its free postcard function.
Has this person tried it?

Doesn't Amazon shipping have to go to the billing address on the credit card?

Being able to purchase on a credit card and have it sent anywhere makes it that much easier to use stolen credit cards.

In Poland, OLX (basically equivalent eBay) commonly has promotional campaigns, where you can buy something from a select category with 1 PLN shipping to box machine (around $0.30).

So people figured out, that you can abuse it to send anything to anyone in the country. Just create a fake listing for 1 PLN, let the receiver "buy" it (there is some extra service fee, but like $1) and there you go - probably the cheapest shipping possible, much cheaper than regular ~$5-7 box machine package.

Last time I checked (a few years ago), it was cheaper to send letters and small packages from South Korea to Germany than from Germany to Germany. The delay was also not that big (maybe 1-2 weeks instead of 3-5 days). I already envisioned an arbitrage business for this: a simple page where people upload their non-urgent letters as PDFs, and I just print and mail them from Korea.
I'm super surprised there is still free shipping for small things. In (some) other parts of the world, they will charge significant delivery fürs for anything below $50 or so. It basically changed during Covid, and since every shop is now doing it, there's no competition on that.
A more recent question I have is how Amazon is skipping DeMinimis fees which are now massive on 50 cent or $1 items from their "Amazon Haul" which come from overseas

It arrives in a few weeks by Amazon's own carriers, not USPS/UPS/FedEx

Who is paying the $80 DeMinimis fee on the $1 cable I got last week from China?