Comment by ghaff 10 months ago
Mattresses have been especially bad for a long time. For refrigerators, you can look at consumer reports and wirecutter--and you can reasonably do some evaluation at your local big box appliance store. I wouldn't buy based on a random web search though.
I imagine that the logistics of moving a bunch of stupidly large items is also part of the markup.
Sure, I can buy a mattress from a factory in China, but getting it to my door is a whole other thing.
Last time I bought a mattress, admittedly, an overpriced one. I got to test out a sample at the store, and then a truck with two guys showed up, put on special booties to keep my house clean, carted away the old mattress, placed the new one, etc. I even took advantage of their 90 day guarantee to swap to a slightly less firm mattress, and the whole process was repeated for no cost.
Hiring a truck and two men to deliver a large item, and then haul another large item to the dump, and then pay the dump fee for a mattress (a lot more than standard dump fees), is something that would cost a few hundred dollars otherwise.
I'm sure that they made a profit off of me, but I have my doubts that there are riches to be made in the mattress industry given that there seems to be VERY low barriers to entry.
> For mattresses, the whole industry is a scam.
Pillows as well. Mike Lindell (the My Pillows guy who sank himself with "election manipulation claims") didn't get his fortune from nothing. The markup is insane there as well... if you want decent pillows go to Ikea.
I'm sure it was marked up still, but the best and last pillow I've ever bought is buckwheat hulls. Basically a fancy sack of grain, but I'd guess procurement was more costly than filler plastic fabrics/foams. It was an immediate cure for neck pain from side sleeping and it's quite cool, too. For me, anything stuffed with fabric is going to be a waste of money anymore.
Wirecutter's gone downhill after the NYT purchase as well. The Spruce seems somewhat better (but is also part of a huge web site family, so caveat emptor)
Either you do deep research, or you find a trusted friend to advise you. The Internet is largely useless at this point.
I think Wirecutter is still a decent source; they probably won't steer you too far wrong if you're not too picky. But nothing, including your trusted friends, is an all-knowing oracle if only because their tastes and priorities are probably different from yours. Certainly pre-Internet there were few enough reliable sources of recommendations--maybe some specialist magazines but even those were far from perfect.
I think you hit the nail on the head. They won't steer you far wrong, but they also may neglect excellent options. For example, they recently published a "best water bottle of 2024" list. They chose to rate Hydroflask #1 and mentioned Yeti in a brief comment about "other bottles to consider" near the bottle. No mention of Kleen Kanteen at all. Yet they do cover the current trendy options of Owala & Stanley Quencher. I don't think it's really objective -- not in the same way that rtings.com is for the electronics categories they review.
https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/best-water-bottle...
That's almost certainly true. Depending on your preferences, there are just a ton of perfectly serviceable options out there, including what you're handed at trade shows. I have some Nalgenes that are sort of the standard for hiking (and fit my water bottle parkas) and otherwise mostly random stuff I've been given.
The problem with reviews from individuals (trusted friends or complete strangers), is that for major purposes they only get to deeply evaluate a single product. So they could tell you if they are happy with the fridge they bought, but they wouldn’t be able to do a detailed comparison between multiple fridges.
This will lead to you getting a product that’s good enough, but there may be a superior quality/value option that you don’t know about
It has always felt to me that Wirecutter focuses on only one end of the Pareto curve ("what is the very best XXXX that money can buy, within reason") and ignores the middle of the curve where most people are actually shopping ("what is the best XXXX that I can get for $XXX"). It also seems to reliably ignore brands from Mainland China (Hisense, Midea, etc). I guess It makes obvious sense to court rich (or at least price-insensitive) readers.
Whether or not it started that way, yes, it makes sense to recommend brands that New York Times subscribers are familiar and comfortable with. I'll buy a GE Profile refrigerator or Bosch dishwasher. Not some Chinese brand I've never heard of and have no idea what the service situation will be with. Makes perfect sense to me and I'm in that demographic. Especially with major appliances and things I can buy at the local big box store seems to make perfect sense to not buy things you have to go to Alibaba to obtain.
It's not about being price insensitive but recommending things that are relatively mainstream and that don't seem risky, especially for major purchases that have to be installed and potentially serviced.
(Did have a service issue on my recent GE Profile refrigerator but it took one phone call and was a no-brainer.)
But you're probably right in general. Wirecutter mostly doesn't recommend unknowns it thinks are potentially bargains. Which I probably wouldn't do in its position either.
Their top pick for an air conditioner is a Midea: https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/best-air-conditio...
That's not true at all.
They usually have a midrange "top pick", followed by a "budget pick" and an "upgrade pick".
It's not "the best money can buy" at all -- that's what they reserve their "upgrade pick" for. E.g. look at humidifiers:
https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/the-best-humidifi...
Also it's full of Chinese brands. The top two humidifiers are Levoit, from Shenzen. Or if I look at dehumidifiers, Midea is their #1 pick:
https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/best-dehumidifier...
So I don't think anything you said is true. Maybe for some individual products, but certainly not for the site as a whole.
Well, nor should they because those items tend to disappear from the market within months and not be widely available. So that's a feature not a bug.
You don't want to research and recommend a product from a random seller on Amazon that won't be available six months from now.
Their budget recommendations are, correctly, products that have proven to be reliable and available.
It's easy, browse to GE on big box hardware website. Select the model you want. Avoid everything else.
One problem with this kind of strategy is that brands often become enshrined when you aren’t looking. While the last time I was looking for kitchen appliances GE was pretty good, how do I know that in the past few years they haven’t been bought out by a private equity firm and started having their brand slapped on random low quality products?
if there is a trial period better get cheapest and highly reviewed mattress. Even if it's a scam you get to know it within x days and can return it.
I try to buy natural materials like latex or cotton - which cannot and are not mass produced (difficult to roll and transport from across the world)
Try visiting a hotel that uses them, for reference.
> Mattresses have been especially bad for a long time.
Yes. Refrigerators, at least, are made by a relatively small number of companies with established brands. They have EnergyStar ratings, and there's some objective evaluation.
For mattresses, the whole industry is a scam. Mattresses actually cost about US$50 to US$80 in bulk. Search Alibaba. Almost all consumer-facing companies are resellers. Markups are huge. Essentially all the mattress review sites are paid promotions.