Golly, I do tend to go on and on.

I’ve been buying quite a lot of things lately from internet stores. Some of them are located in Canada, some in the U.S. The things I’ve been buying are things that I could most probably buy here at home, supporting local businesses.

But I don’t.

I’ve been feeling a niggling guilt about this, in a vague sort of “I should be supporting my local business owners more, or we’ll soon be overrun by giant, boxy WalTargetBuy stores.” All goods manufactured for my purchasing convenience by children in some Third-World factory.

I know perfectly well that changing my purchasing habits to support local businesses will have zero effect on the inexorable tide of giant boxy multi-shoppy places. I don’t have the kind of purchasing influence of say, one of the Hiltons, plus I usually wear underwear. So that puts me out of the running.

The internet shops have what I want. That’s why I buy from them.

Using the power of the interwebs, and my stellar sleuthing skills, I can dig up some site, somewhere, that offers what I’m looking for. Quite often they offer free shipping as well. Whee! Yeah, I’ll spend $100 to get free shipping. Shipping is expensive! Plus, I get more stuff. It’s pretty much win-win for me.

By shopping on the web, my choices are expanded to an astronomical degree. I don’t have to settle for “what’s hot” or “best-selling” at my local store.

Prices are quite often lower than they would be in a local store, and that makes sense, when you consider that many of these stores only have an online presence, not a bricks and mortar store with all those pesky things like rent, heat, light, snacks, employees, and so on. They can afford to offer a lower price for their goodies, and pass the savings on to me!

But the convincing factor, what will make me return, again and again, in a guilty pleasure sort of way, is the customer service I have received from these faceless internet shopowners.

For example: I walk into a store here in the city and get the attention of the helpful staff. Sometimes I have to walk into a rack of things and knock it over to have any human intervention arrive on the scene. Once we’ve (well, me, mostly) picked up all of the stock from the floor, the conversation may turn to my particular reason for coming into their store in the first place. I’m looking to purchase something. Trade cold hard cash for something they are selling. The money is burning a hole in my pocket, and I know just what I want to buy.

“Hi,” I say, “I’m looking for X, and it’s made by Y. Do you have any of that?”

I start to feel a bit of trepidation when they stop making faces at all of the stock they now have to neaten. I know perfectly well that they are not there to work, but to text their friends and play with their iPod and check which Pokemon they need to collect next, or whatever those crazy kids are into these days.

They sigh deeply, tell the person on one of their cell phones to hold on (they quite often have several going at once) and say “No, we don’t have that.”

Awkward silence follows, as I can see from their appliance-like stare that they have just exhausted their entire repertoire of customer service.

Back to checking their investments or the moon phases or whatever on their hand-held communication device(s). Maybe they are really the mission commander for the latest shuttle launch, and are just moonlighting in their auntie's store to help her out while she has her bunions adjusted.

Anyhoo, long story short, and call me crazy (go ahead, nothing new here) at this point I am foolishly expecting that a sales clerk, a sales person, someone who is in sales, in a store, where they are selling stuff, stupidly I assume...

That they will sell me something.

They could perhaps say “No, we don’t have any of that X made by Y, but we do have this B, which is very nice also. Let’s go have a look at that, and see if that’s something you’d be interested in.”

But noooooo, ***SPOILER ALERT*** they don't.

In comparison, I have received excellent selling, and customer service, from faceless internet shopowners. They provide prompt customer service responses. They apologize sincerely if it turns out they actually do not have in stock what I want, and suggest alternatives. They offer to sell the alternative to me at the same price, and to throw in an extra item to make up for my “inconvenience”. Wow.

They package their wares nicely, sometimes with ribbon and tissue, and often include swag, Easter candies, recipes and handwritten notecards.

Amazing.

So I think I will continue to drop obscene amounts of my disposable income on internet shops. If it is a Canadian site, all the better. At least I’m supporting the Canadian economy. In my own non-Hilton way. Any economist worth their over-priced degree could shoot my justifications down in a heartbeat. I'm not gonna share any of my internet loot with those party-poopers.