I Guess You Can Buy Anything Online

This month I moved to a new city and decided rather than hiring a mover which was amazingly expensive, I would give away/sell/donate most of my larger items and buy new when I arrived at the destination. One of the items I gave away was my bed (i.e. mattress/boxspring/frame).

I started to go mattress shopping and found it to be a pain as I remembered it was 10 years ago which was the last time I purchased a mattress. I think there is a mattress cartel in the U.S. as you can’t easily compare prices as every bed has a different name per shop even though it’s the exact same as the previous store. It’s amazing that bedding manufacturers have been able to get away with this for decades. Imagine if the iPad was sold under a different name from store to store.

I started to look online and only one merchant seemed to come up in search results. And after a few searches the company followed me via targeted online ads all across the Web. In fact, even browsing CN displayed ads for this online mattress showroom.

I decided to purchase the mattress from this online merchant and paid for overnight delivery (which was very reasonable at $49). I figured the worst thing that happens is that I have to exchange the mattress for one at a different comfort level. Reviews for the merchant were overall positive although there were many negative reviews but most of those were regarding shipping and what seemed like poor customer expectations for delivery dates.

The bed arrived this week and overall I was totally impressed with the transaction. The bed was well wrapped for transit and looked/acted exactly as they describe on the website. I went with a bed that had good reviews and the reviewers comments were spot on.

From a deal hunter perspective, the company offered 7% cash back with Bing which was excellent as it covered the overnight shipping cost. It really is too bad that Bing decided to shut down their cash back service.

Since my move, I’ve purchased many items for the new apartment online – many with Amazon. Why drag home large boxes from Walmart/Target when Amazon will deliver the items directly to my home in a couple of days?

Now I need to buy a car and am wondering if I should look at completing that transaction online as well!

What items did you think you would never buy online but later actually bought online and had a good experience with the transaction?