My first On-Line Purchase (outside of Flights)

Leper

Registered User
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Up to today, the only on-line purchases I have ever made were flights. I book my Opera House tickets at the Opera House, my cinema tickets are bought in the cinema etc. But, the Walking Poles I bought in a Cork Sports shop months ago now show worn rubber tips and they need to be replaced. I used more fuel than the NASA moon-shot driving to every sports outlet known to man in Cork. None of the shops stocked the rubber tips. Mrs Lep said “Try On-Line” which reluctantly I did and to my surprise I can get 15 rubber tips @ €4.87 total with free postage and to allow 14 days for delivery. Immediately after my purchase, I was advised my order is being prepared and being sent through An Post and also enclosed would be a €5.00 voucher towards my next purchase.

The writing is on the wall if you own or work in Retail, your job is as near Gone as makes no difference, I’m sorry to say. No retail outlet could compete. I will advise of the quality of the rubber tips after I’ve used them.
 
If it's Teemu, you may be better off with condoms on the end of your walking poles....Now that I think of it, that's what you may get.
 
The writing is on the wall if you own or work in Retail, your job is as near Gone as makes no difference, I’m sorry to say
The vast majority of my purchases are all online now, I check the price in stores and then online and whoever is cheaper gets the biz
This was especially true when it came to my cycling needs, I could pick up stuff online for about 50% off retail here
and sometimes it could be a third of the price retailers were charging here, you'd be mad not to avail of it
It's sad to see but online will be/is the future of retailing and a lot of manufactures have made the switch or are doing so
 
Look closely at any thriving high street shop here or anywhere and you'll usually find they're doing very well from selling online.

This Christmas it will be 28 years since I first purchased a Christmas present on Amazon to send to a relative who was them living in the US.
 
If it is Ali Express expect a bit longer than 14 days
I have bought lots of items from Ali Express lately.
Their delivery times have greatly improved.
If your total purchases total $10 or over you get free postage.
All items which come from ditterent suppliers are packaged into one parcel and this is sent by air mail to the Netherlands and then air mailed to Ireland. All orders came in about 2 weeks fully customs cleared.
 
The writing is on the wall if you own or work in Retail, your job is as near Gone as makes no difference, I’m sorry to say.
The retail staff of the country will be devastated to learn of this development in online shopping that makes it available for things other than flights.
 
Those rubber tips are a litter blight on the mountain landscapes here. They have a tendency to come off on our (largely) peaty mountain terrain. Pretty sure I have a handfull of them somewhere from picking them up on my travels. They're probably designed with the mass low level//track/Nordic walking community in mind.
 
I walk mainly in Wicklow and see much more non-rubber tips litter than rubber tips. And I would have thought that I fall into your "mass low level//track/Nordic walking community" .
Same here. Having walked c. 400KM in various locations since the start of the year I've picked up precisely one hiking pole tip accessory (which is great because I needed one) but bags and bags of general litter, coffee cups/lids, bagged but discarded dog excrement , deposit return plastic bottles, etc.
 
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bagged but discarded dog excrement
That's the one I don't understand,
without fail on every walk I'll see a neatly tied little green bag of dog doo-doo beside a lamp post or at the entrance of the parks I walk in
If you go to the trouble of picking up and bagging your dogs doo-doo, do the decent thing and bin it properly
and don't be expecting somebody else to do it for you, shameful carry on
 
You're not going to see the tips as often as lazily (and knowingly) discared litter. They tend to get embedded in the peat and are there forever. They come off unkowingly/by accident, but maybe if folk knew this before bringing them out on the open mountain they might leave them at home. They serve no purpose on open mountain. Any mountain range that's in close proximity to a large urban area or where folk can easily drive to is going to attract more walking taffic and litter. Moutaineering Scotland's anti-litter campaign is called TakItHame for the exact same reason as lazy dog owners can't take their dogs poo home. There seems to be this idiotioc notion that there should be a public bin right beside where someone wants to throw something away.
 
Think of asking at physiotherapy department of a hospital. Ferrules as they are called might work for your walking pole but maybe too bulky. They would be used on walking frames and walking sticks. Maybe salvage one from a discarded crutch as these items do not seem to be reused? There are shops that specialise in health aids (eg Phelan's in Dublin).