Hidden cameras and secret trackers reveal where Amazon returns end up (usually trash)

[Adder7806]

Apparently at grocery stores, if for whatever reason at the counter you decide against purchasing some meat, they'll toss it right in the trash. No returning it to the appropriate section.

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I was about to checkout at Target with a full cart of food when their computer system went down. They threw away EVERYTHING. That unopened quart of Ben and Jerry's - trash because it was touched. Dry pasta noodles - trash because someone touched it. It's insane.

 

[Deleted member 1476]

This is giving me pause about returning a monitor with one dead pixel. Not to Amazon but Newegg, but I have no reason to believe other companies aren't doing this.

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If I'm buying something expensive I want it to be perfect, I'm not paying to get a subpar product. I recently had to buy a phone and it came with a small crack under the screen, I sent it back without thinking twice, that shit was expensive.

 

[hateradio]

You can buy returns by the pallet, and many re-sale shops do. We have one nearby called "Gimme a $5" where everything is $5 Thursday, after a couple of days 4, 3, 2, all the way to 1 on Wednesday. And every week they start over with new pallets that people race to dig through.

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That said, there's a lot of stuff that I don't think you can re-sell like any personal health items once opened, from toothbrushes to vibrators to shampoo and all of that goes to the landfill. And then there's stuff that no one wants once its been touched like pillows and candles and food. So on the whole I completely see why huge quantities get tossed.

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That's insane. So this has been public knowledge all along. :(

I do see stuff at Target that looks used and stuff, so I thought they put stuff back on the shelf.


Damn. I guess it's better to just return an empty box and keep the item. Fill it with trash for weight. I wonder if that's doable 🤔

 

[EternalDarko]

The sheer amount of waste here is utterly ridiculous.

 

[Chakoo]

Does this mean that 11 copies of Digital Devil Saga were probably thrown into the trash?

I ordered 1 copy of Digital Devil Saga & received 12 copies for $20. I alerted Amazon & they'll pick it up. Did I make the best choice?

I recently ordered Digital Devil Sagaafter watching a video on youtube from Superbutterbuns and Clemps about the series. I figured I loved P4G and P5 and enjoyed Devil Saga on the ds so I may as well experiment with other SMT. I decided to order the game off amazon. The package came in today and...

www.resetera.com

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Wow I guess they sent you the whole box from the publisher/distributer. I had this happen one time with best buy. I bought the awful Tony Hawk Ride when they were on clearance for $40 just to see how bad it was and they end up shipping me the box from the distributer which had 4 of them in it. I contacted them and sent 3 back. Thinking back even if they told me to keep them I would have still told them to take them back, lol.

 

[julia crawford]

Does this mean that 11 copies of Digital Devil Saga were probably thrown into the trash?

I ordered 1 copy of Digital Devil Saga & received 12 copies for $20. I alerted Amazon & they'll pick it up. Did I make the best choice?

I recently ordered Digital Devil Sagaafter watching a video on youtube from Superbutterbuns and Clemps about the series. I figured I loved P4G and P5 and enjoyed Devil Saga on the ds so I may as well experiment with other SMT. I decided to order the game off amazon. The package came in today and...

www.resetera.com

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Fuckkkk..... not DDS........................

 

[KDR_11k]

Don't most retailers do that? Not many people want to buy something where the packaging was visibly opened before.

Well, I guess except Gamestop but that place looks like a dump anyway.

 

[WetWaffle]

Does this mean that 11 copies of Digital Devil Saga were probably thrown into the trash?

I ordered 1 copy of Digital Devil Saga & received 12 copies for $20. I alerted Amazon & they'll pick it up. Did I make the best choice?

I recently ordered Digital Devil Sagaafter watching a video on youtube from Superbutterbuns and Clemps about the series. I figured I loved P4G and P5 and enjoyed Devil Saga on the ds so I may as well experiment with other SMT. I decided to order the game off amazon. The package came in today and...

www.resetera.com

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OP REALLY played themselves there. What a chump lmao.

 

[BarringGaffner]

Just more good shit for Wall-E.

 

[Kyougar]

This isn't new or a secret, really.

Modern warehouses are designed to be highly efficient with their incoming, storing (for as short as possible), and outgoing goods. Returns would completely fuck up the order and schedule. For certain mass-produced items, it would be more costly to integrate them back into the fold, than to destroy them.

Selling them for cheap not only costs money but undercuts your own high-price items. A customer who buys a returned clothing item for 10 bucks would not buy it now for 200 bucks (if ever)

Another thing are Manufacturer rules that you can't sell items below a certain threshold (undercutting them)
At least in Germany, you still have to pay taxes for the full price, even if you gift the product away. There was a documentation a few years back about a bakery that had to destroy the day's excess bread, instead of gifting it to a food-kitchen, because he couldn't afford (or didn't want to) to pay the taxes on gifted bread. Destroying them: no taxes, gifting them: you have to pay taxes.

All fucked up

 

[leder]

surely this is accurately accounted for in their farcical climate pledge, right? lmao

Apparently at grocery stores, if for whatever reason at the counter you decide against purchasing some meat, they'll toss it right in the trash. No returning it to the appropriate section.

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Not at my store. Anything like that goes to the food bank. If someone tried to return meat, yeah that goes in the compost

 

[Dr. Monkey]

you right, this is the real issue. another example of humans doing their part to destroy the planet.

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Yes. This is true. But we need to find a way to keep companies from making cheap, disposable goods and another way to keep them going in a landfill. Right now it's cheaper to throw things away than it is to donate, recycle, repurpose, etc.

The core problem is that no one - lawmakers, business folks, etc - wants to think long term, and too many people can't afford to think long term (buying better quality goods). Long term thinking is more expensive and less popular.

 

[Tavernade]

Sometimes it is impossible to know if you like/can use something the way you are thinking you can until you see it in person and since it is online, sometimes things have to be returned. Returns are just part of retail.

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Then you shouldn't be buying it. There's a reason all the sizing information is available online.

So they'll have to check what the problem is, create a separate listing for that one, keep track of it specifically, ... It is just not worth it for the chance of finding a customer that doesn't feel ripped off.

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Exactly this. People expect companies to spend more money to resell things at lower prices? Some stores can get away with mystery grab bags, but not many.

 

[MrRob]

I don't want to get an item that someone else returned.

 

[evrythngwastakn]

Trying to ween myself off amazon more and more. I really wish more brick and mortar retailers would up their "order online, pick up in store" infrastructure to suck less.

 

[TheZynster]

I mean.........its a huge reason why people used to dumpster dive. My uncle pulled a full working centipede arcade machine years ago and it worked perfectly.

Now companies purposely destroy product before throwing it away half the time so that it discourages diving.

 

[Seirith]

Then you shouldn't be buying it. There's a reason all the sizing information is available online.



Exactly this. People expect companies to spend more money to resell things at lower prices? Some stores can get away with mystery grab bags, but not many.

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Sizing has nothing to do with it, sometimes things are crappier than they say in the listing, sometimes things don't work right. sometimes things arrive broke, later than needed, bought and needed but something changed and it is no longer needed. Also, not everything has sizing or has correct sizing. Also, in terms of clothing an item can "fit" but still not feel right.

Returns, online and in store are not a new concept.

 

[Deleted member 11413]

This should be in every thread asking whether they should send back an item Amazon sent them extra.

 

[nihilence]

As bad as it sounds, sometimes this is due to regulations, safety and vendor agreements.

There may be policies that make it prohibitive to resell. For overall safety, or protection against complaints it may be easier to dump. And, vendors may credit the seller if they agree to destroy. Some brands also strictly do not allow open or user items.

I work in retail, and have to follow certain rules m

 

[DrEvil]

They also put things up for auction in many major cities here in canada.

Here in london there is an auction company which regularly has amazon returns, walmart returns, and best buy returns.

I've gotten a ton of switch games for like 10-20$ that retail new for $79.

 

[Caz]

They also put things up for auction in many major cities here in canada.

Here in london there is an auction company which regularly has amazon returns, walmart returns, and best buy returns.

I've gotten a ton of switch games for like 10-20$ that retail new for $79.

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Does this company have a name?

 

[DrEvil]

Does this company have a name?

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McKenzie's Auctions

they don't ship though, so you have to pick it up locally the next day basically.

 

[Deleted member 11413]

Apparently at grocery stores, if for whatever reason at the counter you decide against purchasing some meat, they'll toss it right in the trash. No returning it to the appropriate section.

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Well yeah that's very different, that is a food safety issue

 

[Einchy]

I mean.........its a huge reason why people used to dumpster dive. My uncle pulled a full working centipede arcade machine years ago and it worked perfectly.

Now companies purposely destroy product before throwing it away half the time so that it discourages diving.

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Used to watch a dude who'd dumpster drive and GameStop would always scratch up all the games they threw away or cut all the cords. RIP all those games.

 

[Surakian]

I wish they would set up their own stores/centers locally to sell products that are safe to resell like clothes and electronics.

Used to watch a dude who'd dumpster drive and GameStop would always scratch up all the games they threw away or cut all the cords. RIP all those games.

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Yes, it is because we are required to field destroy certain products through some crazy legal reasons. It sucks but it is also a way to prevent fraud/theft by employees (I.e. we dump the product like games or Funko POPs as is then pick it up later to resell it online).

Even at my old job working at small non-profit retail store, we had to destroy and trash any products. My boss would let me take home some stuff if we could get away with it but we also would have custom workout clothes and we'd dump bags and bags of the ones that were never picked up.

I would just take it all and drop it off downtown near homeless camps, but had my general manager known, I could have gotten into major trouble because they write a lot of this stuff off in taxes when they are physically disposed of.

 

[Joni]

Sizing has nothing to do with it, sometimes things are crappier than they say in the listing, sometimes things don't work right. sometimes things arrive broke, later than needed, bought and needed but something changed and it is no longer needed. Also, not everything has sizing or has correct sizing. Also, in terms of clothing an item can "fit" but still not feel right.

Returns, online and in store are not a new concept.

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You would have a lot more issues returning something to a store for anything but it not working though. And that is likely the online model we need to get to.

 

[Regulus Tera]

Apparently at grocery stores, if for whatever reason at the counter you decide against purchasing some meat, they'll toss it right in the trash. No returning it to the appropriate section.

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The amount of time the cashier would take putting the product back in the correct location is time that that particular line is not operational. It's just cheaper for them to eat the cost of the waste than actually shutting the line down for a few minutes.

 

[Seirith]

You would have a lot more issues returning something to a store for anything but it not working though. And that is likely the online model we need to get to.

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Most stores I have ever shopped at take returns for any reason with a receipt for 30-90 days.

 

[DeathyBoy]

I mean at the best of times they won't take it back for resale, they certainly won't in a pandemic. Honestly...

 

[thediamondage]

Thats why I think the better environmental message is to get people to buy and spend (and return) less, you are doing far more for the environment with that simple step than most other actions. I really applaud the recent Hollywood chic message some actor/actresses have of pledging to never buy new clothes again.

I wouldn't be surprised in a lot of cities as well if a big percentage of recycle containers everyone puts out every week gets landfilled.