Quebec's Government Urges Online Shoppers To Local Retailers Instead of Amazon (financialpost.com) 99
"The coronavirus crisis is giving Quebec's nationalist government an excuse to attempt what may be impossible," reports Bloomberg.
"The Canadian province is embarking on an uphill battle to chip away at Amazon's position." Reckoning that weeks of confinement will permanently accelerate the growth of online shopping, Premier Francois Legault wants to boost Quebec retailers' digital sales, and is urging the population of 8.5 million to buy from local firms. His government took a first step by building an online directory of retailers called Le Panier Bleu -- or Blue Basket, a reference to the color of the French-speaking province's flag...
"People will be able to see what's available in their region," Economy Minister Pierre Fitzgibbon said in an interview. "There's a solidarity developing, I want to capitalize on that...."
To run it, the government recruited a board including the former president of Lowe's Cos. Inc. in Canada and Alexandre Taillefer, a private equity partner who years ago floated the idea of a Quebec response to Amazon's dominance... About 13,000 businesses were referenced as of April 24.... "Our goal is to shift some of the searches Quebeckers do on Amazon or Google to a search engine presenting essentially 100% Quebec content," he said during a webcast of the Chamber of Commerce of Metropolitan Montreal. If just 1% get diverted, "it will have been worth it."
Economy Minister Fitzgibbon describes it as a way to "enable our small retailers to do well against companies that have huge marketing resources."
"The Canadian province is embarking on an uphill battle to chip away at Amazon's position." Reckoning that weeks of confinement will permanently accelerate the growth of online shopping, Premier Francois Legault wants to boost Quebec retailers' digital sales, and is urging the population of 8.5 million to buy from local firms. His government took a first step by building an online directory of retailers called Le Panier Bleu -- or Blue Basket, a reference to the color of the French-speaking province's flag...
"People will be able to see what's available in their region," Economy Minister Pierre Fitzgibbon said in an interview. "There's a solidarity developing, I want to capitalize on that...."
To run it, the government recruited a board including the former president of Lowe's Cos. Inc. in Canada and Alexandre Taillefer, a private equity partner who years ago floated the idea of a Quebec response to Amazon's dominance... About 13,000 businesses were referenced as of April 24.... "Our goal is to shift some of the searches Quebeckers do on Amazon or Google to a search engine presenting essentially 100% Quebec content," he said during a webcast of the Chamber of Commerce of Metropolitan Montreal. If just 1% get diverted, "it will have been worth it."
Economy Minister Fitzgibbon describes it as a way to "enable our small retailers to do well against companies that have huge marketing resources."
I think you (Score:4, Funny)
a word there.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:I think you (Score:4)
I think you need to learn English. The phrasing is odd but legitimate.
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I think you need to learn English. The phrasing is odd but legitimate.
Yes, but it basically says to go to local retailers, which isn’t the thing to do right now, instead of to shop online there.
Spread it thin (Score:1, Insightful)
Yes, great idea - enter your information on dozens of disparate websites with various poorly defined privacy and return policies, then watch weird charges, inconsistent returns and spam, lots of spam.
Amazon/ebay exist primarily as gatekeepers, providing relative safety of transaction and uniform experience. Local retailers would do better if they sell through one of the big online platforms.
That's not to say Amazon is perfect - we really could use some limits on its own competition with its vendors, as well
Re:Spread it thin (Score:4, Interesting)
The amount of shilling around here for giant, globalist companies that treat people like crap is getting pretty appalling. The contrived excuses are getting more and more pathetic, and the shills more and more obvious.
Re:Spread it thin (Score:4, Informative)
Mom and pop shops are usually the worst at treating people well. They usually have bad hours that coincide with hours I need to be at work, they stock what they stock, the prices are high and they have very shady refund policies. Many refuse to tell you if a particular thing you want is in stock, trying to suck you in to their store for disappointment. Their strengths are usually clean stores, a different selection of goods, and not being overcrowded checkout factories.
I'm all for competition with Amazon, but local brick and mortars need to up their game or get out. The one positive change that *could* happen is now that many (at least here) are forced to do digital sales and pickup only, Maybe they figure out how to do it to stay in business? We'll see.
Re: Spread it thin (Score:5, Insightful)
In my opinion the danger is more than immediate convenience and healthy competition. Its about the eventual complete loss of both.
If we shift to one big provider of goods, local businesses lose the ability to operate. That causes a lot of problems, such as local jobs and economies, and also an actor who may not have your best interests at heart become one of tye only viable options for essential things. And with less competition or options, come an increased risk of abuse to us consumers.
Just my two cents.
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It isn't my job as a consumer to prop up local middlemen so that there is artificial competition. And according to the current political parties in power, it isn't their job to make sure the market is fair.
So what exactly do you propose? This isn't like telecoms and media companies swallowing up one another, strangling any sense of competition. It is a matter of giving the consumers what t
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Well, I get where you're coming from. And I'm not proposing anything, I'm simply stating the situation is more complex than short order needs. Right now we need to be physically distanced and not leave the house, and right now Amazon is best suited to fill that roll (or so it seems). My point is that there are potentially inherent long term side effects from that.
So while it might not be your job to prop up local businesses, it might be in your best interest to shop there when able, or else risk not bein
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This isn't like telecoms and media companies swallowing up one another, strangling any sense of competition.
The method may be different (taking advantage of massive volume to undercut everyone else) but the result, when unchecked, will be the same: a monopoly.
And it will be a monopoly by Amazon, who aren't exactly known for their upstanding business practices. Inventory comingling which mixes counterfeit with original product, scraping data from merchants who use their marketplace to undercut those merchants, useless search function, labor abuses, etc.
That's not a world I want to live in, so I've voted with my wa
Re:Spread it thin (Score:4, Interesting)
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You probably don't walk in, look around disdainfully at the pitiful selection, and comment on the inconvenience of the hours. GP might get different treatment than you do.
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It's a local thing. The ones were I am aren't that friendly or accommodating most of the times. The local bookstore (that Indigo put out of business) was horrible and wasn't a huge surprise that Indigo put them out of business. They would have an ok selection of book, but it would be mostly limited to top sellers. This would be ok if they could order in other, less popular books. But their answer was they would only order books that they've had in the past. Didn't matter you were willing to pay for it here
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I've always advocated to go shop in person and a real store, don't do online shopping if you can help it. All these people in love with amazon really are damaging local economies. Monopolies are bad for the economy.
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How many of those in-person real stores are locally owned these days anyway? If you shop at Walmart instead of Amazon, you're still sending your money off to an out-of-town, out-of-state corporation; doing jack-all for your local economy unless you happen to live in in Bentonville, Arkansas. And every vile thing you can think of to say about Amazon or Jeff Bezos? Well, it applies to Walmart and the Waltons a hundredfold; and they've bee a pack of rapacious scum and villainy since decades before Amazon wa
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If I shop at a local Walgreens (never a Walmart!) then money goes to the employees who work there. That's what matters, I don't care about the CEOs. And they'll buy local products often, dairy at least since you don't ship that online easily. The pharmacist is kept in work also. Even if someone is rich, do they really want to live in a community where there's a high unemployment rate because no one ever goes to the stores? Every politician talks about creating jobs, so I assume most people think jobs are
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I agree that the 15% helps them build the monopoly, of course.
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One of the top things that turn people off from ordering on these smaller websites is high shipping costs. Some of these small sites will tack on $10+ for shipping and handling. The Quebec government could organize a large postal discount for shipments originating in Quebec and being delivered in Quebec. Maybe they can make this cost low enough that the local websites could raise prices a few percent and then offer "free shipping". If the government gets enough volume in deliveries it might even be cost eff
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There's not much we can do about it. I ship orders via Canada Post, as most small businesses do, the business discount over retail is very small, and eating shipping costs would wipe out most or all of my profit margin... even making me sell at a loss on smaller orders. The only way I could do it is to offer free shipping on orders over maybe $200 (which aren't that common), and then all it takes is for somebody who lives in a remote region to place an order and I'm back to losing money on the order.
The rea
Re:Spread it thin (Score:4, Interesting)
Get the Quebec legislature to pass a special postal rate for shipments from Quebec businesses to Quebec residents. If that doesn't work, get the Quebec government to refund part of the shipping costs using Canada Post. If they start refunding part of the shipping fees it won't take long for them to work out a real deal with Canada Post. This is an easy thing for a political body to support. Everyone being helped by it is a constituent.
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Get the Quebec legislature to pass a special postal rate for shipments from Quebec businesses to Quebec residents.
I don't believe a provincial government of Canada can dictate the rates for a Crown corporation (federal). You'd have to get the Canadian Parliament to do it.
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You're right, they can't. They could setup an intra-province shipping service however, but that would likely fall afoul of Canada Post's legally protected monopoly. Since CP also own's Purolator, and billing rates by law must be higher then the government's own monopolies. Though Quebec, being Quebec, they could probably set it up thumb their noses at the feds and get a pat on the head, while every other province and territory would already be in federal court.
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DHL, FedEx, etc already operate in Canada. The legal monopoly is usually only for first class letters, not parcels.
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Yes they do operate here. The law also applies to carriers because purolator is owned by a crown corporation(Canada Post). The difference however is minimal but enough, but outside of major cities and dense urban areas DHL, UPS, FedEx all use the purolator for the 'last mile' to offset costs that would otherwise be incurred contractually.
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I wonder if the Quebec government could hire Canada Post to deliver the intra-province parcels for them? That is a loophole that side steps the Crown and would let the Quebec government negotiate special rates. A similar arrangement exists in the US -- Amazon has a deal with USPS to do last mile delivery of their parcels. Then if the Quebec government really wants to be nice, give each Quebec based small business 1,000 free deliveries in this system. All of this only works inside Quebec so there is no subs
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Sure. They could use purolator do to it, that's Canada Post's parcel business and already has a massive distribution and delivery network. Would they? Possibly. Quebec is...weird. There's no other way to put it in terms of how things work. In general there's a very antagonistic approach that Quebec has with the rest of the country, they also rake in money massively from equalization. Many provinces see this as "keep them on confederation" payments. The animosity is much bigger between western canada
Re: Spread it thin (Score:3)
It's my understanding that in Canadian politics, Quebec gets whatever the hell it wants, including forcing people to learn to speak a language that nobody actually uses in their day-to-day life.
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A lot of them don't advertise the shipping costs up front, probably because they are so high. If it doesn't say up front I'm probably not going to register and go through all the checkout pages just to find out how much it is.
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You forgot "no free shipping" which is also a major point.
I went on their website. Holy crap, can you say "government website"? There's quotes and feel-good-look-we-are-helping crap all over the place. And the search? By business or city.
What is that clusterfuck supposed to be? Because it sure as hell doesn't help me , the online buyer.
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Shipping is never free, you always pay for it somehow.
It's more accurate to say low bulk shipping prices that only big retailers with massive volume can get. It's the same old, age old problem that economies of scale make it harder for the little guys to compete.
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When I go on Amazon, it's a single place to search, a single package to receive (usually), a single shipping cost if any, because of those bulk shipping prices.
What's needed here is not a centralized search engine, which is badly designed from the start since we're talking about online shopping, but a centralized warehouse and shipping system. All those 13K businesses should be sending part of their inventory to that warehouse and that new company should be in charge of taking the orders, processing payment
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Yes, but the spam will be in French, so it's okay.
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Yes, great idea - enter your information on dozens of disparate websites with various poorly defined privacy and return policies
Wait? You let companies define return policies? I thought Canada was a some what sensible western nation with consumer protection laws, not a 3rd world country like the USA.
I'd say... (Score:1)
Non, Merci.
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Non, Merci.
If you're gonna write in French, do it properly! Non merci!
Re: I'd say... (Score:1)
Ah Quebec, right to protect their business. (Score:1)
Got it. (Score:2)
BTW JL joke (Score:3, Funny)
A Corona-patient in the hospital with a face-mask on asks a young pretty nurse:
"Can you check if my testicles are black?"
The nurse is embarrassed an refuses: "I'm not fully trained yet!"
Patient mumbles again: "I don't care, can you check if my testicles are black?"
The nurse is annoyed but she still kneels down, lifts the hospital gown, checks and feels the guys' testicles and says: "They look OK to me."
Patient removes his mask and says: "Can you check if my test-results are back?"
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Sigh.
That is very tasteless, but also very funny.
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Of course it was tasteless, the joke was about a handie, not a blowjob.
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"That is very tasteless, but also very funny. "
I was a fan and regular reader of alt.tasteless.jokes in the day.
https://groups.google.com/foru... [google.com]
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JL is insufficient credit for Jay Leno.
On the other hand, I've never thought he was particularly funny. My sense of humor is apparently somewhat out of sync with the main trends of American humor, but I can think of at least a dozen comics who seem much funnier than Leno ever was.
WTH? (Score:3)
America's bookshops have an Amazon-competing site (Score:5, Informative)
Local bookstores can refer customers to their "storefront" on Bookshop.org -- but shoppers can also just buy the book they want, and the profits go into a pool that's distributed among all the participating bookstores, helping them all survive...
What's missing isn't technology. It's just the will and awareness among people to actually do this instead of giving Amazon all their money.
Amazon was once small too (Score:1)
Amazon was once small too — and their business doesn't have a high barrier-to-entry at all.
They've done so well by doing a good job — in (almost) everything. 20 years ago I was looking to buy a DVD as a gift to friends in Ukraine — where video-standard is different. Amazon.com didn't have it, but their Australian site [amazon.com.au] did — and I was able to use the same account to place an order, which arrived
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Holy shit you're dumb as a rock.
Amazon LOST MONEY for 14 years in order to be what it is now. https://qz.com/1196256/it-took... [qz.com]
If that's not a high barrier to entry then my advise is to just go, start your own amazon, and be richer than Jeff Bezos.
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It's because for 14 years, Bezos used "we lose money on every sale, but make it up in volume" as a real business strategy.
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Behave, moron...
Lots of startups burn cash for years and years — indeed, the average is 2-3 years [chron.com]. Amazon's 14 years is long, but Uber is already at 11 too. That's not an insurmountable problem — as long your investors understand and agree with you.
Unlike, say, government regulations, intended to keep a monopoly a monopoly...
I'm afraid, I don't have
When you ignore (Score:1)
40% of the population because of a racist policy you will not supplant one that is more interested in service. Amazon is successful because it gives people what they are looking for.
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What the fuck are you rambling about. Québec's official language is french and this is for businesses.
If I moved to Ontario, I wouldn't ask nor expect anyone to talk to me in french, except governmental services.
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You're not entitled to government services in Quebec in English, though. They're usually available, but not always.
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"Health services must be provided in English if you ask for them, though, but practically speaking, you still need to be able to at least read French. If I go to the CHUM hospital, all the signage and terminals are in French."
So you can't even find the hospital because it's called hôpital?
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In the faq it says they are working on English version of the site too.
Quebec should ask retailers to push local (Score:2)
If buyers INSIST on it, then it can help all.
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So I'll give you a bit of background here in Canada on the state of local manufacturing. Starting at the turn of the 00's, various leftwing governments were elected in provinces like Ontario, Quebec, maritimes(NB/NS/PEI), which started imposing heavy environmental taxes, manufacturing taxes, higher provincially mandated electricity rates, higher specific industry mill rates, and so-on. This effectively meant that manufacturing said NOPE, packed up, and left the province. Usually right across the border t
Re: Quebec should ask retailers to push local (Score:1)
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Leftwing governments in Ontario? You're out of your mind. The closest thing Ontario has had to a leftwing govt was Bob Rae's NDP in 1990. Even they chickened out of ideas like provincial auto insurance.
The one "leftwing" action they took was temporary paycuts for govt employess, rather than slashing services like our current premier was attempting. It may be horrible to say this, but COVID-19 is teaching people just how much they need gov't services. Don't know how long we'll all remember this though.
Amazon is overloaded (Score:2)
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I won't buy locally made crap.
My problem with the local policy, is simply that someone "local" making a product, even if it is pure crap, will stand more chance getting on store shelves than an imported product with a better value.
The quickest example that springs on my mind: I wish we could get other Water heaters than the local "Giant" brand (Rheem, Heatpump water heaters ?).
The stupid arguments of the language laws needs to disappear: You want local crap with a French Manual, buy it and leave us, people
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There's a few things I tried to buy on... was it NewEgg or BestBuy? I couldn't because I'm in Québec.
Anyway, long story short, some items don't have bilingual packaging and/or bilingual manuals/instructions and so those products cannot be shipped to Québec. What the fuck do I care, I don't even read the english instructions either.
Fucking OLF, calm the fuck down already. Not everyone is an uneducated french-only moron. Sum of use aktualee no how too sp34k eengleysh.
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That news story is over a month old, and describes a policy which was in effect for a couple of weeks and then ended [cnbc.com] once Amazon got their capacity back up again by hiring/expansion.
I ordered some pizza screens two days ago from Amazon. Estimated delivery was Monday night, but they arrived this morning instead. My recent experience has been that they are showing later delivery dates than they can actually handle in order to be sure they can meet their promises, but pushing things forward as much as they can
Easy solution (Score:1)
Raise the road use tax. Amazon is exploiting this weakness and making taxpayers foot the bill for their expenses.
It will make buying local far more attractive, as it should be.
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What "road use tax"? You mean license plates and driving permits? Then we'll all be paying for Amazon, wether we use them or not.
I would be happy to (Score:2)
I would love to purchase everything I need locally from non Big-Box stores . . . . .
. . . . if only the non Big-Box stores carried the things I needed to purchase.
( or, if local retailers exist at all in some cases )
Groceries and the like, no problem.
Everything else, and I mean damn near everything else, has either become a Big Box chain or has gone bankrupt because
they can't compete with the likes of Walmart, Amazon, etc.
If you want small stores to survive, they're going to need some help to compete agains
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Nobody's going to browse 10 websites and make 10 payments for what can be done in a single step at Amazon. The small stores need to join forces and become a single online giant co-operative themselves. The initiative is already there, but they're going about it the wrong way.
Stay small at the local physical level, join forces as a big entity online. Have a big warehouse in Montreal, split warehouse costs, get bulk shipping rates, etc. Asking 13K businesses to handle online orders, have an inventory of boxes
Give to Amazon, they need it. (Score:2, Insightful)
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They are more efficient at tax avoidance than I am, therefore it is good to give them more of my money.
Competition is good! (Score:2)
Typical Quebec (Score:1)
The website is only available in French.
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Faq says English is coming..
Re:Typical Québec (Score:3)
Well of course, that's a given. It's the official language of the province and that's what most people speak over here.
Your comment is as pointless as me saying "Typical Ontario, with their english-only websites".
Sure, except: (Score:3, Informative)
1) Le Panier Bleu is only available in French, not serving the ~20% of the population who don't speak French as their first language. Just like when we got those "covid-19 self-help guide" pamphlets in the mail that were only in French, and included instructions on how to get an English copy... written in French. The government claimed it was illegal to send them in English or make them bilingual. And then later decided to send them in English anyway. This is not the time to play language politics. The virus doesn't care what language you speak.
2) The site has about as much value as the yellow pages. If I want to buy some specific product, I should spend an hour or two scouring the Panier Bleu directory for stores that match the category close enough, that sell online (the directory has physical-only stores too), has cheap enough shipping, and have the item I want? If you want me to buy local, help me find products locally.
To be honest, I'm more interested right now in things like "Who can I get to deliver food to me when all the grocery delivery services are overwhelmed" and "who has toilet paper in stock" than things like "buy local".
Thank goodness my online store is not my primary source of income, because neither the Quebec nor the Canadian government has made any programs available to help cover my business being shut down for several months. Because if it was my primary source of income, small businesses don't qualify for any aid if you're self-employed without defined payroll.
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Just like when we got those "covid-19 self-help guide" pamphlets in the mail that were only in French, and included instructions on how to get an English copy... written in French.
I think that's the most Quebec thing I've ever heard.
No thanks (Score:2)
It's better and more ethical to use amazon, and give those retailers compensation in the form of welfare checks and donations. If you use a service because you want to help that service provider, it's called charity. More dignified, but charity nonetheless.
if you like to buy local, sure that's fine, but do (Score:1)
and the local retailer buys from amazon? (Score:2)
but the local retailer buys from amazon?
I mean. what's the point. sure it spreads the money _around_ the local area, but it's not like it brings any more or less money into the local area.
what they should do is somehow seek out the local producers that are still able to produce and advertise those, help their online sales and possibly help them sell their wares on even amazon.
there's a few reasons why local retail shops have been hurting for some wares for two decades now. let me tell you a story about finn
Sometimes i do buy local (Score:2)
And sometimes i don't.
Amazon is no lines, no masks, don't have to risk going out and interacting with people.
I went to rona today, a quebec hardware chain store. Items I wanted were not in stock (lots sold out right now), and their computer was broken, so they couldn't get me the answers i needed.
I left with half the stuff i had planned to buy. And then came home and ordered the items that i dont need today from amazon for in some cases 30% less. The rest i can get from home depot. Another huge store. Face
Canadian Amazon is a shadow of the US version (Score:2)
French only? (Score:1)
If Quebec is making no concession to it's English speaking citizens, there is no reason for us to support it's crappy initiative. I'm continuing to buy local though, but my mail order supplies will come from whoever speaks my language, even Amazon.
Amazon and FedEx are the only delivery in Canada (Score:2)
no one will notice (Score:2)