Last summer we moved into our new house. The first project I took on was cleaning and sealing the deck on the east side of the house. For that work I needed (not needed, strictly speaking, but found useful) a power washer. It's a pretty low pressure, cheaply made electric unit, which meets my needs. Until, that is, this Spring, when I pulled the trigger halfway through cleaning windows and the outlet hose blew clean off the front of the washer. The outlet T fitting, looking like it was made of cast iron, had blown completely in two pieces right across one of the threaded sections. A quick call to the Lowe's Task Force power washer hotline arranged for a replacement part to be shipped to me (being within the warranty period) free of charge. Excellent. Six weeks later, a second phone call to follow up and ask why I had not received the part resulted in the realization on the vendor's part that the replacement fitting had never been shipped. Four days after that...
...the box in the picture above had arrived. That box contained a replacement fitting, shown at the top of the box, and a bunch of crumpled brown paper. The picture also includes a can of Campbell's soup, which I included to provide scale. That's right, the vendor shipped the part in a box that could have held several hundred of those fittings. What could they possibly have been thinking at whatever warehouse they shipped that thing from? Consumer Reports often publishes pictures of gross waste in packaging, maybe I'll send this one in as a candidate.
3 comments:
That kind of stuff is just nuts! I buy a lot of computer stuff, and one place in particular always sends my order in what seems like as many boxes as possible which are 90% filled with bagged air and brown paper. Who approves these packaging techniques?!
After posting, I measured the box: 22" x 13" x 7.5", all for a 3 cubic inch part. My guess is places only want to stock a single style of box to simplify their inventory, and that they have an arrangement to only be charged for shipping by poundage, not volume.
I would mail somebody a Christmas card this year in that box. I noticed it shipped as a 1 pound item, that must be a dense fitting.
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