An item I bought a few of online recently which I could have got locally. A lot of bits that I buy are not readily available locally (or sometimes in Australia), if they are they are not manufactured here.

I like Jaycar, shop there when it's viable and appreciate the staff so am including them to illustrate the price differential that is often the case with small bits and pieces rather than as a dig at a good store.

Jaycar's version http://www.jaycar.com.au/Kits,-Science-%26-Learning/Electronic-Project-Kits/Computer-%26-Programming/3-Axis-Accelerometer-Module/p/XC4226

$22.95 (plus assuming I don't buy online another $5 or so to drive to to the store or if I buy online from Jaycar add for $7 delivery)

A similar (but I think higher spec) item from ebay http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/MPU-6050-Module-3-Axis-Gyroscope-Accelerometer-Module-for-Arduino-MPU-6050-SN-/151666979825?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_15&hash=item23500e73f1

$2.70 (delivered to my mailbox if I'm not in a hurry)

By my take on the costs the buy local version is around 10 times the price of an similar item online.

Online shopping hurts retail businesses locally, I'm assuming that some of the cost differences are not readily controllable but a 10 times price difference is difficult to believe. It's also providing advantage to buyers.

R0bert

I just bought a solar controller from China 103 $ the exact item here was 325 $, It makes it hard to pass up.
An imported item surely doesn't warrant that sort of differential. Stores here are going to create their own death.

I must be buying from the wrong places, or the wrong stuff.

Last night I was placing an order, online, for some very light, but bulky items, with a NSW supplier. Packed it would be about the size of a half height shoe box.

The price was $17 & some cents, but the invoice total, including packing & freight, was $56 & a few cents. I did not proceed with the purchase.

It is strange how these prices go. I could buy something similar from Hong Kong freight free, but from the US freight would be double the NSW supplier.

Of course you are taking quite a chance with overseas suppliers. Warranty claims, or not to descripting or damaged goods are hard to have corrected.

Hasbeen, a lot on online stores have free shipping if you purchase a certain dollar amount or over (e.g. $80).

With online DVD stores they also have quite frequent discount offers (e.g. 20% off).
So I save up and buy $80 worth on 20% off day!

Sign up for the mailing list of any store you're interested in, and they'll email you when special deals are on.

O sung, you have inadvertidly identified the major problem with retail V online shopping, as all too many these days seek the advice of the shop attendant , hence taking upnthier paid time only to purchase online once they have done their research. This was always going to be the nail in the retailers coffin.

So let's look at the next five to ten years as we are likely to have lost manufacturing of any significance.

Retail is well and truely on the decline and should we strive to meet the emissions reductions being dpsuggested, this will almost certainly put a huge dent in mining, if nit kill it off completely, and aguculture is almost at a point whereby costs have outgrown profits, simly because people don't have to pay $8 fir a cabbage as they have many options with cheap imports.

So essentially there is little hope of reversing the current deline in jobs producing industries and, given we may have stopped the boats, we are still shelling out billions every year to keep the ones who are in detention and there is no end in site fir that problem either.

So we now find ourselves heading for unchartered waters as we have more mouths to feed than ever before, non productive ones at that, a fast declining tax revenue base, a workforce with a very dismal outlook and an aging population who have worked and paid taxes all their lives, yet have little prospect of retiring with any real form of dignity or sence of finical security, and this will lead to less inheritance being left fir following generations.

Wow, what a frightening outlook!