访谈录 Interview 2007-07-28&07-30, 网上购物真省钱？（在线收听）

A lot of people say you can’t beat the convenience of buying what you need on the Internet, no need to leave your house. But would you be better off if you used a little bit of shoe leather instead.

Not too long ago, people only shopped online for rare collectables and hard-to-find books, today they turn to the web for everything form dresses to diapers to deodorants, all delivered directly to their door.

I like shopping online coz it’s easy and you just don’t have to leave the
comfort of your own home.

The main reason I buy things online is to save time, so I don’t have to get dressed, get in my car, get my kids packed or get a sitter.

It’s just really makes my life a little bit more easier, (which) who, who doesn’t want that?

Fueling the birth of the online shopping boom were steep sales. E-tailers try to lure customers away from the mall by offering drastic discounts.

They'll have these promotions, if you buy it online, then it will be cheaper.

Online retail sales now top 100 billion dollars annually and continue to grow nearly four times faster than sales at traditional retailers. But their strategies have changed. Instead of cutting prices to the bone/ today, you see a lot of the E-tailers competing on service levels and customer service. Things that make it easier for you to simply make your purchase with a click of mouse and not have to worry thereafter.

The Wall Street Journal recently compared shopping for basic items online to the stores, and they found that the Internet rarely saves you money and can sometimes even be more expensive, meaning doing your homework is more important than ever.

Sales are the greedy glazer, and you often see promotional pliers dangling in-store prices as being better than online, and conversely you can often find online prices that beat the brick-and-mortar stores'. So you really just have to shop around.

Donna Rosato is a writer from Money magazine who's looked into whether online shopping really saves you cash. Donna, good morning, nice to have you here.

Great to be here.

Before we talk about dollars and cents, Here used to be, it was all about electronics and travel, that’s why people went on line. Now it’s everything.

It is everything. Actually, last year for the first time in history, people bought more clothing online than computers.

So I mean that, it’s anything you want, you can find online. The question is can you find it cheaper? And you did some comparison in shopping. (That's right!) Some household items and then some food. Let’s start with the household items.

In what we found in general site, if you are gonna be shopping online, you are actually probably not gonna find a better deal for household goods. For example, if you a look at this, Scott 8-pack of paper towels, I went to several online websites and I couldn’t even find the option of having an 8-pack. Then I went to my local Wal-Mart, and not only did I find it, I found it about 2 dollars cheaper than I found it when I was shopping at some of the online sites.

So there goes the myth of saving money online. (That’s right.)

What about some of the other products?

Well, we have the Irish Spring soap, it was. I went to my local drugstore, it was two dollars and 49 cents, and I went online, it was exactly same price online, but I would have paid a 5-dollar shipping fee. So…

Alright, food atlas is a big fan of buying everything online, (Sure!) I need to look at the meat and smell the fish and things like that. What did you find when you compared online to in grocery store shopping?

Food is interesting. Food was about exactly the same price, as you know, online as it was in the store. I did find the Cottage cheese at one place slightly cheaper than my local store, but I still had to pay a shipping fee, and that the shipping fee get anywhere from 5 dollars to 10 dollars, so you’re always paying more. So you've paid for that convenience.

And people say, you know, it’s okay for a little convenience, it’s worth the extra money. How would you argue with that?

You can't argue with that. Though I will say you have to keep in mind, that if you are gonna order things online, it doesn’t always come perfectly, sometimes for food leaks, (Right!) sometimes it’s not what you order, so it can be convenient, but there can be snag, um, some glitches as well.

Best way to research the best deals, you have some websites that you like a lot.

That’s right. If you're gonna shop online, one of the best things that can help you is going to a site like PRICEGRABBER.COM, BIZRATE.COM, and what that does is to help you search for the best deals. They, you can search for clothing, jewelry, and almost any kind of consumer good.

And you have got DEALTIME.COM, TECHBARGAINS.COM. You like Overstock.com. One of your tips is to actually get the lowest price online, and then go to the brick-and-mortar store, and get them to match the price.

That’s right. You can negotiate anything. And you can even negotiate, if you find a good deal online, most, especially the large chain stores, they are gonna want you to be their customer, so print out that deal that you've found, bring it into the store, you can currently get a good deal.

And why is it often a good idea to buy it online and pick it up at the store?

If you buy it online, and pick it up at the store, you can save the shipping fee, which is usual the big drawback to shopping online that you always have to pay a shipping fee. And the bigger the pro(duct), the bigger the item, the more you are gonna pay in shipping.

You say always use a credit card and do research, well, that’s important, make sure you know what company you are dealing with.

That’s right, that’s right.

Donna, thanks so much for the information.

Thanks.
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