e-Commerce Frustrations

Retail Technology

Shopping has become, sadly, a Thanksgiving tradition.  I used to ask at every Thanksgiving gathering, “Who wants to eat quickly and go to the Walmart Doorbuster Sale with me.”  Thankfully know one ever took me up on it.  I believe everyone knew I wasn’t at all serious.

This year Target made an announcement that they would not be open on Thanksgiving Day.  It might have been an altruistic move on their part.  My guess it was that less and less people have been showing up preferring to stay home and shop online.  Perhaps it was this along with a combination of giving their employees a day off in this tight labor market.

We had a Thanksgiving Day with a lot more free time than usual this year.  After a beautiful and bountiful Thanksgiving feast in the early afternoon, some football, and a short nap, we got online to make a few purchases for the holidays.  I went to the American Airlines site, AA.com,  to book some flights and my wife went to Talbots.com shop and buy some gifts.  My time on AA.com was moderately efficient and I was done with what I had to do in short order. 

My wife did not nearly fare as well.  She made several selections of sales items.  Upon proceeding to the checkout, she was informed that one or more of the items she selected were no longer available.  The website, however, spectacularly did not tell her which items.  Also, making matters all the more frustrating, the website noted under each of the four items that she had selected:  “In Stock.”  Refreshing the page did not help matters at all.  So, she started all over again and got… exactly the same result.  It was most frustrating.

She asked for my assistance.  As I came to understand the issue, I was a dumbfounded but only a bit. Many smaller e-commerce websites have similar issues in my experience.  I deleted one of the items and button to continue lit up again as active.  I clicked it and it brought me back to the same page with the same annoying message and everything showing “In Stock.”  What a horrible website.

Any e-commerce website that makes it hard or impossible for people to buy goods or services is by definition horrible in my book. 

Over the past few years, I have come to compare every other retail or e-commerce website to Amazon.   My conclusion?  Amazon is better than everyone else by a long shot.  Amazon is so intuitive and easy to use, it is incredibly easy and very reliable when it comes to e-shopping.  They rarely make an error which in my case is twice over the past 25 years. 

Even when I was on the American Airlines site, I tried to use a travel voucher.  The voucher was stored on their site mind you, but I could not apply it to my reservation.  I had to call the 800 number and have an agent help me, which she did quite effectively.

I buy Cross pens to pass out as gifts.  Up until this past year, I could never get an order to go through.  I would get to the checkout and then, kind of like my wife’s experience with Talbot’s, I would get into an endless loop of me entering my credit card, the site asking for it again, and me wondering if I was accumulating hundreds of dollars of duplicate charges.  I would call their 800 number, often the next day during business hours, and always get the same nice lady.  She could see me order just sitting there in limbo.  I would give her my credit card and the goods were headed my way.  I asked her if other people experience this same frustrating issue.  She said, “Now and then.”  I suspected most simply quit and shopped elsewhere. 

I had a very similar experience with Jos A Banks as well.  Their website was so obtuse that I rarely use it anymore.  Every time I used them, I would have to call the 800 number and finish my order with the help of a customer service agent.

Recently, I went to buy some oud strings from a well-known string manufacturer.  I had the same endless loop frustration at check-out.  I called their number and got one of the owners of the company.  He took my feedback to heart and was unaware of this problem.  They sent me the strings gratis which I appreciated.

I have never had to call Amazon for any reason.

I believe every executive team of companies with e-commerce websites should try to buy goods on their websites.  They should use a private email account and experience what the general public experiences.  I imagine these problems would get fixed very quickly.  Who would want customers, at the point of payment, not be able to complete the transaction?  I am guessing the executives at these smaller retailers are not taking e-commerce seriously enough.  I wonder if they would be shocked by the number and dollar amount of missed sales.

There is a reason Amazon is #1.

Michigan Beats Ohio State

Anyone who reads this blog knows I am a huge Michigan fan.  I haven’t written about football all season.  In fact, the last time I wrote about football was on January 11^th, Watching the Natty, when I reveled in seeing Alabama trounce Ohio State.

Today, I am on top of the world.  We beat Ohio State.  We beat them 42 – 27.  We led almost the whole game and physically beat them on both sides of the ball.  We were ran it down their throats and looked like the more dominant team.  Wow.  Awesome.

After Ohio State slapped Michigan State silly last week beating them 56 – 7, I was worried that Ohio State was peaking.  They had 655 yards of offense of which 449 were passing and 206 rushing.  While I was hopeful and thought this was a grittier Michigan team then we have seen for years, I harbored an inner fear programmed by eight years of losses that Ohio State might come in humiliate us again like they did in 2018 (62 – 39) and 2019 (56 – 27).  It wasn’t just me.  All the Michigan fans I talked to were cautiously optimistic.

We came out took the kick-off and scored in a nine-play drive.  We looked good.  It looked like we could run on them.  We held Ohio State to a three and out.  We were on our way to a second touchdown when Cade McNamara threw a rare interception.  Ohio State started to move the ball but we held them to a field goal in a thirteen-play drive.  It was 7 – 3.

Our next possession resulted in a punt.  Ohio State returned the favor on their next drive.  Our fourth drive was three and out.  Had their defense made adjustments?  Ohio State started on their own 46 and in six plays scored a touchdown to take a 10 – 7 lead.  Garret Wilson made a spectacular catch on the touchdown throw from the freshman phenom C. J. Stroud.  I was thinking, “Oh man, here we go again.” 

But no, on our next drive we scored a touchdown on an 82 yard thirteen play drive.  Cade McNamara connected on a 39 yard pass play to Cornelius Johnson.  Hassan Haskins scored with a leaping dive over the Ohio State line.  It was 14 – 10.  I was starting to think, “Hmmm… we are pushing these guys around.”  Ohio State came back but, again, we held them to a field goal and the half ended with Michigan in the lead 14 – 13.

After their 10 – 7 lead, Ohio State never took the lead again.

Ohio State took the second half kick-off and went three and out.  I was afraid they would make adjustments during half-time.  Our defense would have none of it.  We took the ball on our own 19 yard line.  We scored in three running plays!  Corum for 13 and 55 yards.  Haskins scored on a 13 yard run.  Just like that we were up 21 – 13.

We held them to another three and out.  We got the ball on the 22 yard line.  J.J. McCarthy threw a 31 yard pass to Roman Wilson for 31 yards.  McNamara came back in the drilled one to Mike Sanistril for 34.  Haskins scored on a run and voila it 28 – 13.  Did I dare think it was a comfortable lead?  Was our offense looking more potent than the vaunted Buckeyes?

It was not that comfortable.  Ohio State took the ball on their own 18 yard like and put together a seventeen-play drive.  The scored at the beginning of the Fourth Quarter making the score 28 – 20.  They were moving the ball but nothing like the big plays the throttled Michigan State with a week earlier.  We were able to put pressure on Stroud.  The talented receivers certainly made catches but not for big game breaking plays.

They punted to us and A.J. Henning returned the punt 22 yards.  We drove again with Haskins punching it in for another touchdown. The score was 35 – 20.  We were up two touchdowns again.  Ohio State came back on a 13 play 75 yard drive that involved two fourth down conversions include the play they scored on to make it 35 – 27. 

You have to know but this point in the game.  I was no longer sitting.  I have been pacing to and fro in front of the TV.  I was texting my son and a few friends any combination of ugh, awesome, OMG, stop them, they can’t stop our running game, etc.  We expressed that we were all nervous wrecks… optimistic nervous wrecks because we were not letting Ohio State dominate us on either side of the ball.  In fact, it looked like we wanted it more than them.  No, it didn’t look like that, we did want it more than them.

There was 4:45 left in the game.  We needed to get some first downs and win this game.  A.J. Henning took the kick-off  and returned it 26 yards to our 37.  Then, Hassan Haskins and the offensive line took over.  They ran the ball five consecutive times for gains of 15, 6, 11, 27 and 4 yards to score another touchdown making the score 42 – 27.

Now it was the defenses turn to show Ohio State how much we wanted the win.  Ohio State started from their own 25.  Stroud connect on a 16 yard pass to Wilson.  Another pass to Wilson got the ball their 46.  It was third down and five and David Ojabo sacked Stroud for a 13 yard loss.  On fourth down, Stroud’s pass to Chris Olave was incomplete.  Michigan took over with :54 left on the clock.  McNamara took a knee twice in the victory formation and the game was over:  Michigan 42 – Ohio State 27.

The fans were loud the entire game.  The number of offside penalties on their offense was due to that crowd noise.  Ohio State were rarely in a position to hear such.  When we took over on downs at the end of the game, the crazy loud stadium became frenzied with cheering and celebration.  At the end of the game, I have never seen so many jubilant fans stream onto the field.  It was a magical moment at Michigan Stadium.  The entire Michigan fan base exhaled and realized that we had just beat a pretty darn good Buckeye team.

It was a cold, sleety and snowy, the whole game.  It was Big 10 kind of November Football weather.  It was Michigan – Ohio State kind of football weather.  Did that slow down the Ohio State?  Maybe.  One of the Fox talking heads thought the weather played to Michigan to Michigan’s favor.  When Ohio State coach Ryan Day was asked that same question in his post-game press conference he said “Both teams had to play in the same conditions” to his credit.

This was a great win for Michigan.  After years of dominance by Ohio State, it really felt like a 1969 kind of win and hopefully a turning point for our program.  I love the grit and desire of this team.

This was a great game.  I have give credit to Ohio State.  They did not give up.  From about halfway through the Third Quarter, there were touchdowns scored on five possessions in a row.  Michigan scored three of them.

This is the first time Michigan has won the Big Ten East Championship and it is the first time they will be playing in the Big Ten Championship Game next week.  They will be playing Iowa.  If they win that… Well, one game at a time.

It has been a great day.  Go Blue!

 

Here is the Box score of the game.  The statistics are relatively close with Michigan having many more rushing yards than Ohio State and vice-versa when it comes to passing.  

 

 

Here are some interesting facts about this game.

 

 

An Armenian Thanksgiving Prayer

 Written for The Armenian Weekly.

     They say everyone in retirement needs a hobby or a vocation. Some fellows play a lot of golf. Others travel, garden or volunteer. Me? I took another job as associate professor of Operations Management at North Park University. Being a full-time faculty member at a university was always a dream. In this case, it is a dream come true. It is the best job I have ever had. In the spirit of the holiday in which I am writing this, I am very thankful for this.

     North Park University is a small liberal arts university in the North Park neighborhood on the north side of Chicago. The school was founded by the Swedish Covenant Church (now the Evangelical Covenant Church) in 1891. For most of the twentieth century, the North Park neighborhood was basically a Swedish Watertown. Most of the residents were immigrants or of Swedish heritage. There were shops and restaurants catering to the community. The community grew and thrived around North Park University and the North Park Covenant Church.

     Because of the Christian nature of the University, we begin meetings and meals with a reflection and a prayer. We call them devotions, and every school and department prepares schedules at the beginning of the academic year of who will be presenting the devotions for each meeting. In the November meeting of the School of Business and Nonprofit Management, I was up for devotions.

     I was looking forward to it because as it was November, the ideal and most appropriate theme was Thanksgiving. I immediately knew what the reflection part of my devotion was going to be, but I always struggle with the prayer part. I sought the Armenian church, and I would have loved to find an appropriate prayer from, say, Gregory of Narek.

     So, I did what many of us would do. I googled “Armenian Thanksgiving Prayer.” First up on the list was “An Armenian Thanksgiving Prayer” from the Armenian Weekly published on November 19, 2010. I thought, “how cool is this.” I clicked on it and was delighted and surprised to see it was written by none other than Tom Vartabedian. I shouldn’t have been surprised. It was exactly the kind of thing Tom would have written.

Tom Vartabedian

     I did not recall seeing this article before. Maybe I read it and forgot. Most likely, I had not read it. It didn’t matter because I read it that day and was so impressed and touched by the sentiments so beautifully expressed by Tom. His first paragraph was all I needed to get me started on writing my prayer.

     I am writing this article because I would like everyone to read Tom’s Thanksgiving prayer again or for the first time. Eleven years later, it still resonates, perhaps even more so now as we still struggle to deal with the reality of losing Armenian land after last year’s horrible war. Tom’s prayer is what we need to read, to take to heart, and act to revitalize and reaffirm being Armenian however we can.

     Reading his exquisitely written prayer made me think about what a wonderful man Tom was. He was a good Armenian. He loved his people and encouraged everyone from athlete to politician, writer to photographer, and cleric to volunteer to be the best they could be and… the best Armenian they could be. This Armenian Thanksgiving prayer is pure Tom.

     I hope during this Thanksgiving holiday that you take some time to read and reflect on Tom’s prayer. Wishing you and yours a happy Thanksgiving.