Wow. Amazon.com is now offering same day shipping – same day shipping — in seven major cities across the U.S. with more on the way in the near future. If you live in New York City, Philadelphia, Boston, Washington D.C., Baltimore, Las Vegas, or Seattle then you’re already in one of the same day delivery zones.
According to the press release, “Thousands of items are now available for Local Express Delivery. Amazon Prime members pay just $5.99 per item for the service.” Amazon Prime costs $79 per year and extends free two-day shipping or overnight shipping for $4 per item to subscribers. I have it and it’s totally worth it if you order a lot of stuff from Amazon.
Non-Prime members will pay quite a bit more for same day shipping, with items carrying a shipping fee based on the type of item ordered and, in some cases, the weight of the item. Certain items, like CDs and DVDs for instance, cost $10.99 per same-day shipment plus $2.99 per item. So order three CDs and it’ll cost you whatever the CDs are priced at plus $10.99 + $2.99 + $2.99 + $2.99. Not cheap but, hey, the heart wants what it wants.
Each of the seven eligible cities has a cutoff time by which products need to be ordered. In Seattle, where Amazon is headquartered, the cutoff time is 1:00 PM. In New York City and Philadelphia, it’s 10:00 AM; in Boston, Washington, D.C. and Baltimore it’s 10:30 AM; and in Las Vegas it’s 11:00 AM. Future cities include Chicago, Indianapolis, and Phoenix.
Amazon Launches Same Day Delivery in Seven Major Cities and Expands Saturday Delivery Options [Amazon.com]
How is Amazon able to do this and not say they have a local presence–and thus avoid collecting States’ sales tax?
uh…i thought they do collect sales tax, or are they just charging me 6% of my total everytime i bought something from them for no reason…
It depends on your state. Most people don’t pay sales tax with Amazon right now. I guess that could change.
You have to pay tax if Amazon has a facility in your state.
As a prime member I got all excited, but then I saw no San Francisco :(
Hopefully they roll this out to other major cities.
does same day shipping mean same day delivery? seems like 2 different things to me.
It’s same day “delivery”. See the 1st sentence of the 2nd paragraph of the article.
Geaux Tigers!
As a prime member I think this is awesome. As a DC resident, I have no clue how they will be able to do this with our crazy traffic.
blah, that’s exactly why i was thinking los angeles wasn’t on the list ;P
this will never happen in LA hah
DC has crazy traffic? You’re kidding right?
According to a study done by Forbes Magazine in 2008, DC had worse traffic than LA.
http://www.forbes.com/2008/04/10/congested-commute-cities-forbeslife-cx_mw_0410realestate.html
I used Amazon quite a bit until about a year ago when I had to deal with their customer service. It was such a frustrating experiece that I have never used them again.
I can get same day service at my local bookstore for the same price or less. I can also get excellent customer support there if and when needed.
This also keeps my local bookstore(s) open so I have a place to go look at books before purchasing them.
Just want to say I’ve had excellent customer service from Amazon. Although, I’ll admit I had to dig to find a phone number. I called them, described my damaged digital camera, they sent me another one overnight (maybe two day), along with a prepaid sticker to return the other one. No questions asked.
Couldn’t ask for anything more.
WTF they need San Francisco
and LA
do you guys prefer same day delivery + 8% tax or next day shipping?
Please Amazon don’t put one of your hubs in California.
Agreed. I will hardly ever use the same day shipping. Amazon, please listen to poitch. I stand corrected.
They can reach within a day from Reno, not as big of a deal :)
I don’t think it’s likely to happen in the Bay Area. Obviously to do the same day shipping they have to have local warehouses. I am a prime member since it’s inception and most of my stuff comes from ARIZONA or Nevada. I don’t think they have anything local.
I have Amazon Prime and the 2 day shipping is perfect for me to prevent those impulse purchases. I probably wouldn’t use same day shipping much but it could be useful in a pinch. Certainly it would be better than driving somewhere in Atlanta for immediate fulfillment and adding to the traffic & pollution problem.
Urbanfetch or kozmo.com, anyone?
Kozmo was a great case study of excessive exuberance – there’s a great documentary about it which you can buy on… amazon :)
Hogwash. I was a prime member, then found out their promised ship dates were often wrong. Many times, perhaps even half the time, the product arrived later than promised.
Fool me once…
This sounds like a complete profit center for Amazon. No one has said how many product are shipped same day just because. This makes it impossible to me to see how justified it is to get excited or pay extra money just to get it shipped sooner.
Once they promise same day delivery, I’ll start getting excited. With the holidays coming, I just might pick up some Amazon stock because I know lots of people are going to be stupid enough to buy into this.
Actually, this is same-day delivery…which is obviously more impressive than same-day shipping.
I don’t get the point. Except for emergencies.
Is overnight better than 2 day? Is 2 day better than 5 day? What don’t you get?
ugh… what about San Francisco?
Welcome to the 20th century. Viking (mail order catalog) was providing same day DELIVERY (not shipping) of office supplies as early as 1999, maybe even before that. Their cut off times were even better than Amazon’s. And their performance was exceptional.
Brick-and-mortar obsolete? Not hardly. Sure. For a narrow set of goods that are high-value, low weight. But going down the list of things I have bought recently:
1) bike pump ( cost ~$8 )
2) food ( webvan anyone? )
3) used books at the bookstore that I have trade-in credit for.
4) cake for kids party
5) party supplies
6) coffee ( at coffee house )
Don’t see a single thing on the list that I would buy online … the shipping costs are more than the value of the item in many cases.
Maybe if I was buying DVD’s and CDs all the time…
Impressive. Amazon continues to push the limits. Sure, I won’t want this for every purchase, but I’ll pick the same day service every now and then.
I always knew that they hate SF Bay Area.
I noticed your Amazon Kindle ads in the top banner ad position and right banner ad position on this page. You all recently wrote an article titled -
“FTC Values Sponsored Conversations at $11,000 Apiece.”
that stated…
“The revised Guides specify that while decisions will be reached on a case-by-case basis, the post of a blogger who receives cash or in-kind payment to review a product is considered an endorsement. Thus, bloggers who make an endorsement must disclose the material connections they share with the seller of the product or service. To be clear, a blog post (or Tweet) in exchange for cash or in-kind payment to review a product is considered an endorsement.”
So shouldn’t you disclose that Amazon pays you somewhere in your article?
Link to other article:
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/10/05/ftc-values-sponsored-conversations-at-11000-apiece/
Seems like a neat idea, but that’s pretty damned expensive for a CD I can just stream/download online…
Amazon are great for choice and price but over here in the UK I think the whole web retail market will suffer this Christmas as we’re going to have a postal strike. I’ll certainly think twice before ordering anything online that I can get in a shop instead, as the backlog is already building up.