There Has To Be a Better Way To Shop Online

Culture Study Podcast

Arts, Society & Culture

4.5 • 789 Ratings

🗓️ 22 May 2024

⏱️ 44 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The very first episode of this pod was on how clothes got so shitty — and it prompted a whole bunch of you to write in with your questions about how the entire experience of obtaining those clothes became so shitty. Some of it is just what’s going on in the fashion world more broadly (and a continued refusal to believe that anyone larger than a size 12 wants cute, well-made clothes that fit and wants to pay you money for them) but some of it is just the weird ever-changing world of online shopping, which encourages our worst impulses and often leaves us with earrings that look nothing like the picture and make our earlobes turn green. To answer your questions (about best online shopping practices, about email marketing tactics, about how to quell or at least abate your anxiety shopping) I wanted to talk to the best and smartest shopper I know: Caroline Moss.Show Notes:Follow Caroline/Gee Thanks Just Bought It on Instagram and join the larger community on FacebookSubscribe to Caroline’s free Substack, where she’s rounding up all the good Memorial Day salesTrustpilot.com to see if a company is indeed a legit companyThe Amanda Mull piece on returns I referencedDumpster Dive King on Instagram + The Trash Walker + a NYT piece on the work they doHere’s the Honey browser extension and phone app (AHP remains dubious but will dutifully try it out)The Shop App that Caroline uses to keep all orders/notifications in one place (will also try out)THE TUB SHROOM!!!!!We’re currently looking for your questions for future episodes about:Home renovation shows + class! (Our guest is Jonathan Menjivar, host of Classy. If you haven’t read his interview in the newsletter, it’s fantastic.)What’s the deal with JEANS right now (alternate title = Jeans: Help. Co-host isVirginia Sole-Smith, so it’s gonna be great)For our continuing series on romance novels: QUEER ROMANCE and ROMANCE BOOKSTORESArtificial Intelligence (we’re gonna see if we can figure out an actually interesting theme here, so send us your weirdest or most mind-boggling questions)The economy, a.k.a. why is everything so damn expensive right now (my dream here is like an Odd Lots guest who doesn’t have private equity brain, please let us know if you have suggestions!)Anything you need advice or want musings onYou can submit them (and ideas for future eps) here (and here’s the subscriber-only priority form)For today’s discussion: How has your approach to online shopping shifted? How do you quell your anxiety shopping? What’s your version of Caroline’s tap shoes? TELL US EVERYTHING.

Transcript

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0:00.0	I read somewhere. I'm about to make up a fact that I read somewhere. I heard some.
0:05.5	Yes. I think I'm about to say something with authority. I think like more than any other generation, like, and I don't know if this has changed since COVID, but like millennials, young Gen Xers and older Gen Zers are motivated more than anything by convenience.
0:26.7	Yes.
0:27.6	There's a lot going on in our lives.
0:29.4	And I think we don't have a lot going for us.
0:32.0	We don't have a lot going for us.
0:33.9	It's really nice.
0:34.9	And we've often convinced ourselves that purchasing something is the
0:38.6	best way to fix a problem. Like if we can just optimize part of our process, if I can just have that
0:44.2	little shelf between my washer, dryer and my cabinet, like my life is going to be better. And you know what?
0:50.2	I don't think that that is untrue. I'll tell you that. I don't think that.
0:54.5	I think your life is going to be better. Your whole life, the part of your life where you're
0:59.3	searching for laundry pods and like a lint catcher, yeah, it's going to be a lot. That part
1:04.3	of your life is going to be a lot better.
1:14.0	This is the Culture Study podcast and I'm Anne Helen Peterson.
1:22.9	And I'm Caroline Moss. I am the host and founder of Do You Thinks Just Bought It, which is a online community based on product recommendations?
1:47.4	It's amazing. It's like my favorite thing. Like you are always so strongly featured in my Instagram stories. And I'm like, like, it's just a delight. I love it very much. And I'll also say that it's like a way of thinking about buying things that is like thoughtful. You know, it's not just like, here's a sale, here's a sale. And we'll talk more about this later, but like it is very much about getting you the right thing instead of getting you the cheap thing. Is that a good way to describe it? I think so, yeah. And you were
1:52.2	just a really good shopper and good recommender. Like, it's just you're a perfect person to lead
1:56.9	this community. I'm so happy that particular talent of mine is finally paying off.
2:03.0	Don't you feel like that's something that we used to say about like our mom's generation?
2:06.6	Like there was always like a friend in the mom group that was like the good shopper.
2:10.7	Yeah, for sure. Was it your mom? No, no, no, no, no. My mom either. She doesn't like shopping.
	...

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