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by losteverything 3276 days ago
I guess the cold war started.

I hope it isn't true. Amazon is not walmarts enemy: they should focus on low prices and growth using new technology. Their ceo said they reached employment peak [1]

Truckers and delivery people dont hate each other or have any competitive spirit among each other. Pay me to make a delivery. End of story.

The ups and FedEx guy(s) and i all bitch about the same thing: why cant these healthy lazy people go to the store. Day after day the same people get packages. What do they do all day, shop$!! Its so funny it could make a screenplay.

Truckers dont care either.

[1] http://abcnews.go.com/amp/Business/wireStory/walmart-traditi...

5 comments

i order almost everything off amazon. i admit that i feel strange about this for many reasons, but laziness doesn't really come into play. time is the most valuable thing i have and stress is a major health issue. by ordering off of amazon i completely sidestep having to deal with traffic, lines, driving, miserable employees, poor service, not finding what i want, terrible products, etc. that's a lot of stress and time that i save by having packages delivered directly to me. whether that is a net gain or loss for society, i am not for sure, but it certainly is a net win for myself.
I am a hypocrite. I order too

My point was that delivery people dont give each other the finger - we could care less. We talk shop amd know each other by name. I really doubt a trucker hauling today to a Amazon site and tomorrow to a walmart site cares.

After years of delivering stuff people can buy we get jaded- and that is what we all complain about. (to ourselves)

One example. Woman gets Fresh. Weekly. As carrier is lugging 4 green totes her adult son watches. The carrier is a 59 year old woman. After the last tote, the carrier says to the woman, "i know now why you order online- your son won't help you with the groceries."

I'm sure it would be preferable for the son to pick up the groceries, and the 59-year old carrier to be unemployed.
Delivery people are on the front lines of society's clear delineation of the "served" and the "hired" or "servers"

People with money buy convenience through delivery. This was not available pre-Prime. Cumulatively the richer "served" are served by the poorer "servers" in this case delivery people.

Same for drivers.

Although your statement is true the son should have helped...

Also you keep losteverything employed, and help the environment (for infrequently returned categories of purchase): http://ctl.mit.edu/sites/ctl.mit.edu/files/library/public/Di... http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1361920912...
Amazon is definitely Walmart's enemy, at least directly. Indirectly, it is last mile shipping that is Walmart's enemy. Last mile shipping is far more efficient, and has to win in the long run. Imagine if the dominant paradigm for garbage collection was that everyone had to take their own garbage to the dump.
FWIW, I often order online due to availability. A lot of times I can't find what I am looking for locally, at all. Wal-Mart is the worst offender, their selection across the board is more and more homogeneous and dull.
In what universe is Amazon not Walmart's enemy?
Win on price; innovation; technology;people;

Imo Amazon is smarter and more nimble and if Wal-Mart starts this stuff it may backfire

Look - if iy wasn't for Amazon people would not expect to get anything on line, and thus walmarts revenue in online would not be as much. (The pie is huge because of Prime)

I've always saw Amazon and Walmart almost as large cats with overlapping ranges. Like they've seen signs the other is around, but haven't actually had any run-ins or direct confrontations.
Cats are extremely territorial. If there is overlap, it is perceived as trespass and confrontation is inevitable. Which is what we are seeing.
Walmart's fight is far more for vendors than shoppers.