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Is Amazon Prime worth it if I don't buy a lot from Amazon?

T

TheNinja

Lifer
I like to read some of the EBooks and notice maybe are free through Prime. Is it worth it for the books? I might do some streaming of shows but not too much. Any deals out there for discounted Prime?
 
it all adds up
i originally got prime for the streaming, then found that many things i'd drive to a store to buy were the same price on amazon, so with free two day shipping, i have been buying some things
and then my wife got the Kindle Fire and so now she can use the Lending Library, so i guess they have another customer locked in, yes
 
You'll have to do a cost/benefit analysis of your use of Amazon to justify it for yourself personally. If you don't order much, the benefit of free 2 day shipping is largely meaningless, but if you want access to the shows and movies you can stream with Prime or you'll save money on e-books you'd be purchasing anyway, it may be worth it to you. It all depends on your own personal use of Amazon and which benefits you plan on taking advantage of.
 
Krazy4Real said:
It's worth it. You'll end up buying more and more from Amazon as opposed to from other places.
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True story. You don't buy much from Amazon NOW, but that changes when you get Prime. When you buy every single gift for Christmas on Amazon with free 2 day shipping, you laugh at the fools in the stores.
 
Yes, I think it is worth it, especially if you can add family members to your Prime account.

Between 3% Cash Back using Amazon credit card, and not trying to find fillers to meet $25 minimum for free shipping, I think Prime pays for itself, even without free video and ebooks.
 
its huge formy family, but all depends on your specific buying habits. if you would otherwise spend 80 on books and shipping costs if they weren't free. even if the number is close, the glory of free 2 day shipping has value in itself
 
Short answer: Yes
Long answer: YYYYYEEEEEESSSSSS
Side answer: SD (Slickdeals) has deals where you can get it for free sometimes (maybe even now?) troll around on their board to see if you can get it.
 
You have to go in on it together with some other people to make it worth it IMO. I got used to ordering $25 or more from Amazon to get the free saver shipping, and I was okay with waiting a few extra days to save money.

Prime is great, but so far I've only had a 1 year free trial from my wife's edu email address and just started my own 6 month free trial from my own edu email (they dropped it from 1 year to 6 months recently). Haven't had to pay for it yet and I'm not sure it's worth $80 for a year since I don't buy a lot of stuff. Even if I do buy more from Amazon, I just don't buy stuff very often at any rate.
 
Just don't be like those people who buy crap because they have Prime, when they wouldn't drive to a store to buy it. That's just wasting money.

A lot of people with Prime do it.
 
I should add, not only do I not buy a lot of stuff from Amazon, but even during the past year when I had free Prime, I still didn't buy a whole lot. A bit more than usual, most notably a big memory foam mattress topper (still free shipping!), but not enough to justify $80 for a year.

I looked up some common everyday items that I might be able to buy from Amazon instead of getting them from a store and they are usually more expensive. Amazon is cheaper for certain items, but stuff like cat/dog food and paper towels is better bought at an actual store.
 
I use it quite a bit, not sure if I'll renew my membership, particularly after Amazon starts charging tax for California purchases...
 
Prime is worth it to me.

I've placed 31 orders so far in 2012.
I placed 70 orders in 2011.
And I place 40 orders in 2010.

So I'm using Amazon more and more for my business and the projection shows I'll break last year's record by June.

Most of the time, I get the stuff in a day or two. There are however times when they don't come until the 3rd day.
 
If you have/get a kindle and are reading a book a month it's way worth it. If you're absolutely using it for just streaming probably not. Anything in between needs more thought.
 
I'm in my first year of the Prime experiment. I figure I need to spend about $2,000 a year from Amazon to break even on my Prime membership. $1k in purchases for the actual membership cost and another $1k since majority of the orders would've qualified for >$25 free shipping. So far after 5 months, I'm below what I need to break even having only spent about $630. If this keeps up, I will not renew.
 
I chose to not renew mine when items needed for xmass still would not be delivered on time.

Could order outside Amazon and pay for shipping and items would arrive. Amazon said it would take a week even with Prime. Cost benefit was not there
 
ponyo said:
I'm in my first year of the Prime experiment. I figure I need to spend about $2,000 a year from Amazon to break even on my Prime membership. $1k in purchases for the actual membership cost and another $1k since majority of the orders would've qualified for >$25 free shipping. So far after 5 months, I'm below what I need to break even having only spent about $630. If this keeps up, I will not renew.
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:hmm: You don't seem to put any value in how fast the free shipping is, or how cheap the 1 day shipping gets. If you're just using the argument "free is free" then it probably wouldn't be worth it. I put value in getting it free in 2 days vs. free in 3-5 (or more). Not everybody is that impatient though, so obviously it doesn't matter as much. And on a few occasions I've needed something damn fast so it's helped that too.

Definitely not worth it for everybody, but I get enough use out of it.
 
EagleKeeper said:
I chose to not renew mine when items needed for xmass still would not be delivered on time.

Could order outside Amazon and pay for shipping and items would arrive. Amazon said it would take a week even with Prime. Cost benefit was not there
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That's really odd, because I prefer Prime for this exact reason. My brother's b-day is on the 21st, so I usually have a big order mid to late Dec for everything. Always shows up fast. In a past year I even forgot something and ordered on the 20th and still got it before Xmas which I felt was damn impressive.
 
to me, it's worth it just for the worry free 2 day shipping. i do a lot of research when buying online and usually get it from amazon.
hell, 80 bucks a year is a fraction of money i used to hand over the bar when i drank.
 
gorcorps said:
That's really odd, because I prefer Prime for this exact reason. My brother's b-day is on the 21st, so I usually have a big order mid to late Dec for everything. Always shows up fast. In a past year I even forgot something and ordered on the 20th and still got it before Xmas which I felt was damn impressive.
Click to expand...

Toy chest and train table set. In boxes, 4'x2'x6" for train, chest was 2'x18"x4". Ordering on 32st for delivery prior to XMas. No joy. WalMart to store could not due it. But both arrived Sat in middle of snow storm. Shipping cost extra $35 but look on grandson face in AM when he saw the train was worth it. 5 hrs assembly. 2 yrs old and he helped me put the toy chest together. Then he got his blanket and climbed in.
I had put in a 10 hr day on Friday and flown 3k miles that evening to play Santa
 
Between the free shipping, streaming movies (not a big deal), access to Amazon Mom (cheapest place I've found diapers), and the Kindle lending program it was worth the $80 for the year. Just a couple times now in the last few weeks there's a couple odd ball things that I needed that I could have bought locally for $40 or $50 + tax, but for $25 + $4 for free next day I had them at my door the next afternoon.

Not bad.
 
I love prime. I was scared I'd end up buying too much crap from amazon, but I don't. I just love having stuff in two days. The last two things I ordered I think actually arrived in one. It is definitely awesome.
 
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