I Don’t Think Amazon Even Cares Anymore

I’m really starting to think that Amazon doesn’t even care anymore about how they package books for shipment. Maybe they just don’t care about me in particular since I try to buy from my local independent whenever I can, but sometimes I do buy from Amazon (particularly when it’s the only place I can get a book) and I’m seeing their packaging efforts really go downhill.

From my most recent purchases I’ve encountered at least 5 or 6 instances where they just tossed the books in a box without any kind of packing materials inside. This could be fine if the box was approximately the same size as the books, but it usually isn’t. The instances I’ve seen recently they just tossed paperback books in a box that had at least an inch or two of room between the sides of the paperback books and the box. As anyone with at least half a brain could imagine, the paperback books got banged up during shipment.

They have to not care at all. I mean, they used to wrap plastic around the books to make sure they didn’t move and even put a cardboard stiffener inside that to ensure sure the plastic wrap didn’t warp the books. Sometimes they even put a little paper or whatnot in the gap between the books and the box to make sure things didn’t move. But, to just toss books inside a box with no packing materials of any kind? No one does that unless they just don’t care.

Granted, sometimes they do still pack right. Sometimes they do still use at least some packing material. However, I’m seeing less and less of this as time goes on. They are just getting worse about even trying to pack books correctly. I’ve even gotten one shipment recently where they used a box that hadn’t even been fully put together before they used it. That’s right, one side of the box hadn’t even been glued together and they just went ahead and used it anyway.

Most mystifying about this is their somewhat recently implemented ‘packaging feedback.’ They started prompting you to tell them how well they packaged stuff, almost like they knew they were having problems at their warehouses. That would be great, if they were actually listening to the feedback. However, I’ve been consistently leaving feedback detailing the problems I’ve been having and I haven’t seen any improvement. I haven’t even heard back from them about any packaging feedback I left. The only thing I can think is that they put this up there so people can vent and feel slightly better about a lack of care that Amazon has no intention of changing. I have no idea if that’s true or not, but it seems most likely given the fact that the packaging feedback seems to do nothing.

Frankly, this is just poor and I see no good excuse for it. I’m already disappointed enough in Amazon for some of the other things they do. This just drives me further away from their company.