Why Do They Even Bother?
December 12, 2006
11:57 a.m., MT

Whenever I've found a good product at a good price in a physical store, I invariably try to find the company online. With our preference to live outside of what most people consider civilization, it simply isn't convenient to always drive to a store to buy more of something. Besides, there's always a chance the store will stop stocking it; then one's made a trip for nothing. Last, buying online saves both consumer and maker; the maker avoids shipping, storage, and possibly other costs I'm unaware of, while the consumer saves transportation costs as well as middleman markup. It's also much more convenient for the consumer.

So why, oh why do so many of these companies put up a web site that is little more than a prettified online blip? I've lost count of the company web sites I've found, only to discover that there's no earthly way to buy their products directly from the site. A link that enticingly says, Our Products leads to a page that, if I'm lucky, identifies what their products actually are; more often than not it's just more bland, corporo-blather about their products and how wonderful they are. Those who say Contact Us! don't count, because I shouldn't need to insert their middleman into the transaction. And after obliging some of the corporations' preference, I find that most often it doesn't work; I never hear back from anyone. Wanna guess how excited I am about giving those companies more business?

To be fair, I've found sites that do an excellent job not only of selling their stuff, but organizing it (which includes having top-notch search capabilities). Some even go so far as to segregate wholesale and retail sales, and still make transactions easy. And they manage not to charge me outrageous prices, nor to pad their profits with grossly inflated shipping and handling fees. I would love to see more sites like this out there.

Maybe I'm trying to do business in areas that haven't quite caught on to Web 1.0 yet. They get that e-commerce is important, but don't seem to grok that one has to actually make merchandise available online for it to be e-commerce. I would much rather not find a company web site than come across one that looks promising, but keeps their selling limited to the old brick-and-mortar realm.

End of rant. Back to candy-making I go.

[Yes, I know my own e-commerce method is in some ways even more sucky than what I'm grousing about above. But I'm not a big corporation with a 4- or 5-digit monthly internet budget; I'm one person doing all the aspects of my business by myself, out of my home. Even so, I'm working on improving it.]

Sunni

Comments: 14 people have contributed to the conversation

On Tuesday, December 12th, at approximately 12:46 p.m. Mountain time, Gospazha said:

I hear you, Sunni. I'd add to your list of gripes companies who say "our product is available at X, Y, and Z" but when you call them, they have no idea which actual stores carry their products (i.e. we have no way of determining which of X stores actually carries our product - that's up to the store's manager). Or they tell you "we just sell to our distributors - they determine product placement."

More often than not, if the info isn't already on their website, calling them is such a waste of time.

On Tuesday, December 12th, at approximately 1:55 p.m. Mountain time, Kirsten said:

Do NOT get me started.

Forget it. You've got me started.

I would like to find someone at King Arthur Flour and let him or her have it in both ears! How the hell can they not know who sells their damned scone mix? I have e-mailed back and forth with them on more than one occasion to find out where to buy their scone mix in Arizona, California, Oregon, and Washington. They have sent me to two or three different chains of which I've visited more than two or three stores in three different states with NO KAF SCONE MIX TO BE FOUND!

Sure, I can buy it on the web from their site, but the shipping charge per scone mix when last I checked was rather ridiculous unless you were buying in really large quantities. I am not paying $4.95 shipping for a $7.95 bag of scone mix.

And yet, I miss my scones. Those were the best scones I ever had...

On Tuesday, December 12th, at approximately 3:22 p.m. Mountain time, Kathryn said:

It's this kind of frustration that led me to embark on my "F$%& Off Corporate America" project. I'm learning to make more of what I need myself, so I don't have to depend on some huge manufacturer for a product they're only going to reformulate or discontinue eventually. I'm learning the most amazing things, and having a ball in the process.

On Tuesday, December 12th, at approximately 6:42 p.m. Mountain time, Ian Scott said:

Kirsten - what is special about that particular scone mix?

If interested, I've got recipes for great scones - Irish soda farls and others. Yum!

And easy to make too.

On Wednesday, December 13th, at approximately 3:23 p.m. Mountain time, Sunni said:

Oh yeah, Gospazha, I hate that. Kirsten, I too have a love-hate relationship with KAF. I haven't tasted Ian's cooking, but I'd be willing to give his scones a go. Ian, if you want you can post a recipe here, or if you prefer, I'll link to it from your site.

Kathryn, you're a woman after my own heart! Please share more of your story here, if you'd like. Or do you have your own site chronicling your project?

On Wednesday, December 13th, at approximately 7:42 p.m. Mountain time, Kathryn said:

A site chronicling my project... hmmm... this could just be the incentive I need to revive my blog.

We're jumping around quite a bit from food to clothing to tools to household items. We no longer buy mayo, ketchup, mustard, pickles, blueberry syrup, salad dressings, most bread and most sausage. And I've finally learned how to make a decent chicken stock, so there's no longer any need to purchase it readymade. We grow some of our own produce and do some canning and dehydrating, though not enough. Oh, and my husband makes his own pasta. Now if we could just figure out a way to make rotini ourselves... sometimes you just need a noodle product you can stick a fork into... [actually, I think I may have just figured that out... I'll have to report back on how it works]

I make all our socks and I've just recently learned to make a sweater without a pattern. A friend has kindly loaned me a loom, so I'm finally learning how to weave, and I spin and dye my own yarn. Next up is to finally learn how to draft sewing patterns.

My husband has learned basic blacksmithing (he also does all our plumbing, wireing and computer repairs). I'm learning some basic woodworking,and our big project for the Christmas holiday is to tan a cow hide, so that will be another skill added to the list. Then of course I'll have to figure out how to make shoes...

I still want to learn to make soap, shampoo and lotions, and I'm dying to try using a solar oven as soon as the weather warms up again. Basically, I want to learn how to do everything! None of this is about frugality... it's half about having control over the final product and half because we just plain find it fun. It's nice to share this with someone who doesn't find it totally bizarre.

On Wednesday, December 13th, at approximately 8:06 p.m. Mountain time, Ian Scott said:

Wow, Kathryn.. sounds like you have a thirst for knowledge and some great skills! Yes, point to your blog, and post some of what you've learned.

"I still want to learn to make soap,"

Well, I learned to render lard recently. Although I don't know how to butcher a pig, the butcher knows how, and he also provided pounds and pounds of the lard, unrendered.

I have so much of it, I was thinking about learning how to make soap with it myself.

I guess my question to you would be... do you want to learn how to make soap from scratch, which might include learning to butcher a pig?

Hehe.

On Wednesday, December 13th, at approximately 8:08 p.m. Mountain time, Ian Scott said:

Sunni, I'll post some scone recipes shortly - you're free to republish them or link to them - whatever you'd like.

It's late here right now, and I'm wavering back and forth between sipping more wine and reading blogs, or going to make some Irish soda farls....

Not sure which wavering will win yet.

On Wednesday, December 13th, at approximately 9:04 p.m. Mountain time, Kathryn said:

Ian,

I may have a few impressive skills, but I have a long way to go to catch up with my friend Sharon, affectionally referred to as "Pioneer Girl". She's the one who raises and butchers her own meat. I'm still too much of a city kid to find the idea appealing... my idea of making soap from scratch involves making real good friends with a butcher.

One of these days I'm just going to have to screw up my courage and go hunting, and skin and butcher whatever I manage to kill. I'll consider myself a gen-u-wine heroine if I can do it without hurling.

You do make a good point though... what good is all this "Fuck-off corporate America" stuff if I make things with ingredients I purchase from corporate America?

On Wednesday, December 13th, at approximately 9:38 p.m. Mountain time, Ian Scott said:

Kathryn... hehe..well, even _I_ do not know how to butcher a pig

But I know folks who can... and I even know a woman.. who not only has done some modelling in her past because she is so amazing looking - but she knows more about field dressing a deer than I do... and can out fly fish me anyday.

Sometimes Kathryn, I don't think it's about ensuring you have every survival skill going - but that you have good friends that know things you don't know, and that there is likely some trade available between folks with different skills.

In other words, find a farmer that will raise a pig/cow/whatever - at a fair price to you, find a butcher that has the skills to butcher.. and then learn what you need to learn from there.

I'll bet some butchers and farmers don't have the time to render their own lard, even if they know how to do it.

Reminds of when I was a teenager, two decades ago.. my dad and I took up a hobby of bee keeping.

We had several hives on some land that we negotiated with a farmer for - in return for a couple of hundred square feet of the use of some of his land that was not suitable for anything, we agreed to give him 1/4 of the honey crop.

At the end of the season, the farmer got a good amount of honey for his own personal use, we had enough to last our family for a year, and I then sold the remainder to families of my schoolmates.

The "profits" went toward the upkeep of the hives.

On Thursday, December 14th, at approximately 8:51 a.m. Mountain time, Sunni said:

Kathryn, from what you've said, I grok your motives and actually share them. From what I've read and heard, making soap is fairly straightforward, but can be made difficult; I've been longing to try it for years too. And while I can appreciate the irony in "making things from stuff purchased from Corporate America", I also wouldn't underestimate its impact: as you yourself said, you've greater control over the final product you desire. I failed to appreciate the quality of my mother's homemade clothing when I was young; but I've spoiled myself on candy now ... I can't eat most manufactured chocolates any longer.

I know blogging takes time that encroaches into your activities; but you can see there's a lot of interest in what you're doing. Does Sharon have a web presence?

I would imagine that there'd also be interest in buying some of your products, should you be so inclined. I know I'd like to support another freedom-loving entrepreneur, especially one whose products don't have a lot of chemicals that my body seems to dislike.

Thank you again for sharing your information with us!

On Thursday, December 14th, at approximately 10:04 a.m. Mountain time, Kathryn said:

Ian - I love the idea of being part of a community of self-reliant individuals who share their skills (not the least because having a neighbor who could butcher my meat for me would spare me the ickiness of having to do it myself), and I hope one day to either join such a community or build one. Also... I've just added beekeeping to my list of things I want to learn.

Sunni - I don't completely underestimate the impact of doing these things myself, even if I use purchased materials. If nothing else, I'm proving to myself that I CAN do these things, that I have the skills and resourcefulness to provide for myself. And it's an awful lot of fun to see how far we can push this, i.e. learn bookbinding with purchased paper and davey board, then learn how to make your own paper, then learn how to make the covers with found materials... learn how to spin the linen thread... pretty soon you're raising your own flax and training yourself in blacksmithing so you can make a treadle arm for the spinning wheel you're building yourself. This may be an incomprehensible urge to most people, but I get SUCH a charge out of working with my hands, and making my own tools just adds to the kick.

I know what you mean about the homemade candy. I've recently spoiled myself on salad dressing, and now can't bear the taste of commercial varieties.

Unfortunately Sharon does not have a website, she's far too busy being the goddess of self-sufficiency. I've thought about making products for sale, but haven't settled on anything yet... I'm still having so much fun learning, I don't think I'm quite ready to buckle down and start producing for the market.

You did a bad thing last night, Sunni. Your suggestion about posting my project on the web kept me awake for hours; I now have three and a half pages of ideas for blog posts. Thanks! And thanks!

On Friday, December 15th, at approximately 3:31 p.m. Mountain time, Ian Scott said:

Sunni, I just realized that I had a previous post with a basic Irish Soda Farls (sometimes called scones) recipe:

http://ianism.com/?p=381

I'm going to cook some up on the griddle tonight

On Friday, December 15th, at approximately 3:33 p.m. Mountain time, Ian Scott said:

Ooops.. a correction, in case it is not clear... the recipe is for Irish Wheaton bread, but down below, I explain how to make the farls - basically the same recipe except that it's all white or all purpose flour instead of whole wheat.

Having said that, one could also make whole wheat scones using the same ingredients for the whole wheat bread.

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