r/Reverse_Logistics

I bought a nice Breville coffee maker from HG a few days ago and ended up needing to return it the next day (unpacked and used once as a test).

The employee I chatted with told me that they don’t resell it but instead throw it away in a bin that is locked away. Employees can’t take them home, it’s not refurbished…just wasted. The reason: legal liability if someone get sick from using it. This rule apparently applies to any item sold and returned at HG.

Can anyone validate this? This can’t be true…if it is…good lord.

The normal price for this coffee maker is ~300, hg was selling it for ~220.

I work in retail, and my store takes Amazon returns. I’m not even exaggerating when I say we process over 100 returns a day. It is so painful. Every return has to go in a plastic bag (except for extremely large items), then those bags go in giant boxes, and those giant boxes get shipped back to Amazon. We fill 20-30 of those boxes every day, even on non-weekends. There are also plenty of other stores in the area that take Amazon returns, so it’s not like all of these people are coming from far and wide. My store isn’t even in a big city.

People return SO much. We even have several repeat customers who make a load of returns on a weekly basis. It’s just so so so wasteful. The most common things I see returned are clothes, shoes, and decor. A lot of people order multiple clothing or shoe sizes to try and return the ones that don’t fit. Here’s an idea: try stuff on in a store! Or just stop buying so many clothes! I promise the world won’t end if you wear the same shirt twice!!

I wasn’t sure which flair to pick, because I think this is both a corporation and societal issue. On one side, Amazon allows free, unquestioned returns and requires us to use so much plastic. On the other, people keep ordering junk they don’t need and returning it without considering how wasteful it is.

It’s honestly just so disheartening. Adding on to that the fact that my store sells a ton of useless crap that of course comes wrapped in a bajillion tons of plastic, it just makes all of my own efforts to consume less and be less wasteful feel useless.

Edit: guys, I get it that you can’t always try things on in store. If you need a certain clothing item and Amazon is your only option, I get it! I’m complaining about the people who browse Amazon for fun, frequently order a bunch of clothes they don’t need, and then return 75% of them.

But for everyone saying you have no stores near you to go shop in person, consider why. Online shopping has taken over and physical stores are disappearing. Shopping online just keeps feeding that cycle. It’s your only choice now because it was the cheaper, easier choice in the past. Now we’re all stuck with it, and essentially no one is free from blame (except for people who have managed to quite literally never order something online)

I really didn’t expect so many people in this sub to be defending the use of Amazon. There are more sustainable ways to order clothes online, like from secondhand selling websites or more sustainable companies that have online shops. Amazon’s stuff usually isn’t good quality anyway. If Amazon is your only option, alright. But this is r/anticonsumption and Amazon is a prime (haha pun unintended) example of consumption.

Edit 2: I work at Michaels, for those curious. We started taking Amazon returns pretty recently

Here are 5 facts about reverse logistics and sustainability that might surprise you:

• The Multi-Billion Dollar Blind Spot: In the US alone, consumers return over $800 billion worth of merchandise annually. If the returns industry were its own country, its GDP would rival some of the world's major economies.
• The Landfill Reality: Due to fragmented supply chains and high processing costs, an estimated 5 billion pounds of returned goods end up in landfills each year. Returns aren't just an operational headache; they are an environmental crisis.
• The Hidden Carbon Footprint: The transportation and processing required to handle returns emit millions of metric tons of $CO_2$ annually—often doubling the carbon footprint of the product's original forward journey.
• The Resale Renaissance: Keeping a product in use for just an extra 9 months can reduce its carbon, waste, and water footprints by roughly 20% to 30%. The circular economy isn't just about recycling; it’s about extension.
• An Untapped Profit Center: Companies with highly optimized reverse logistics processes can see a 10% to 12% increase in profitability by recovering asset value that is typically written off.