Restocking the AA and AAA alkaline cell supply delivered this example of underprotection from Amazon:
I think that scrap of plastic was once an air pillow, but it sure didn’t last long and definitely didn’t fill the entire space around the boxes.
Allowing that much mass to thrash around inside the box can’t possibly be a Good Thing, even if the cells weren’t damaged. One would hope they’d do a better job with lithium cells.
The Smell of Molten Projects in the Morning 
I’ve recently ordered a set of brake rotors for my wife’s car from Amazon. Each has shipped separately. They came packed two ways. Loose in a large thing that used to be a box but by the time it hit my door was shredded cardboard or simply in their shelf-quality packaging which, while entirely insufficient, held up better due to being a snug fit.
I bought some water jugs, and once, a single jug and a DVD drive. The pairs of jugs were packed tightly in the box and had no issues. The single jug was in a box, with the bubble wrapped drive placed on top. By some miracle, the drive made it OK. (Note to self: don’t mix items in a single order too drastically.)
I don’t understand the money flow, but Prime shipping means never having to bulk up an order. I used to conscientiously order lots of stuff to save on shipping… nowadays, ordering one thing at a time means less hassle when it gets wrecked.
Given amazon’s bad attitude toward their employees, customers, publishers, and authors, I no longer care to do business with them.
Alas, they’re kind of like Walmart (*): we can either drive all over the area on multiple scavenger hunts or just get everything in one trip every few months. With Amazon, I can get exactly the thing I need in two days and it costs less (sometimes dramatically less) than the local hunt.
I’d like to support my local merchants, but it’s the same stuff. I can’t control Amazon’s attitude, other than by pissing & moaning about their packaging, which is about the same level of control I have over any other merchant… and the local ones rarely make the news, so I have no idea what happens behind the smiling faces.
(*) At least before Walmart took their eye off the ball. What with cluttered aisles, unstocked shelves, poor selection, and higher prices, they’re not so much of a compelling value proposition nowadays.
I can’t believe you don’t head over to harbor freight for the free packs of batteries….well, maybe I can. :)
I have my limits!
I learned a long time ago to NOT buy primary (non-rechargeable) batteries at either the local 99 cent store, the local drug store or at Harbor Freight.
The 99 cent store, while the cheapest purchase price has old outdated stock that dies early or leaks. Yes, they sell name brands like Panasonic, Everady, Duracell, etc but they die early.
HF is cheap bottom-of-the-barrel house-labled Chinese crap that dies earlier or leaks sooner.
Costco has enough purchase volume passing through the store that they are relatively fresh. And multiple technical evaluations have shown that they are the same as a Duracell Quantum, just the ones that just barely didn’t make the QC. So the folks at Duracell just changes the artwork and brands then as Kirkland.
See this: http://www.paulallenengineering.com/blog/kirkland-signature-alkaline-batteries
and: http://www.clarkhoward.com/kirkland-signature-battery-rules-new-aa-tally
Those boxes contain Amazon Basics batteries, for the specific purpose of seeing how they behave around here: perhaps Amazon has enough clout to get decent second-rate batteries from a reputable supplier.
One thing I’ve observed that doesn’t come up in the reviews: Amazon (et al) can switch suppliers on the fly or have multiple suppliers at the same time. In either case, the batteries in today’s order need not be the same as those from last week or next month. That’s true of the OEM manufacturers, too, but at least you know which brand to avoid for a while…