Web Is Only Good For Buying Books And Stock

from the forget-the-rest dept

Jim Cramer’s latest column explains why he thinks the web is only useful for buying books and stock. You can forget about any other goods. He blames Amazon. Once Amazon was successful with books everyone simply had to try to sell everything else. The fact is, he claims, that books are an item that can be sold on the web. Most other products simply aren’t good products to sell on the web.


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Comments on “Web Is Only Good For Buying Books And Stock”

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4 Comments
mhh5 says:

to clarify...

He actually divides goods into “known” and “unknown” categories. Books, DVDs, computers, airline tix, etc. are all “known” items — ie. you know exactly what you’re going to get when you order them. Clothes, cars, food, etc. are “unknown” items — ie. you should probably try them out before you buy b/c quality can vary and these items may not exactly suit you. (Porn falls into the “known” category for guys…) So I think I agree with these categories. But as more and more things are “trusted” or well-known, they’ll be suited for sale online. Dot coms just jumped a bit ahead of themselves….

Ryan says:

Re: to clarify...

Excellent point, but I don’t believe that all of those dot coms jumped ahead of themselves. There are just some things that most people will always want to experience before they buy. You can have a picture of bananas or lettuce on WebVan, but you can never be sure exactly which bananas or lettuce you will get and what kind of condition they will be in until they are at your door – no checking out the quality before you buy. I do think that some stuff, such as certain clothing, will start to become more popular with time as people either get lazier or trust the internet more. In my opinion, it will probably be the former….

mhh5 says:

Re: Re: to clarify...

I disagree with you on Webvan. As genetically engineered food becomes more accepted, the difference between batches of bananas, etc will diminish or be easily categorized. People will be able to order a specific variety of vegetable/fruit/etc that will suit their tastes. People buy pre-packaged salads and generally assume consistant quality from bag to bag. As our food becomes more and more “manufactured” and “quality-controlled”, we’ll trust it to be ordered online….

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