What are your thoughts on woot these days?

R

rei1574

Gawd
Joined
Nov 17, 2006
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517
I just wanted to get a general opinion on woot from some forumers. Do you think they're slipping, are they still the same old woot?

Here's my thoughts - I sent this to their customer service department just now.

I have to say, I'm really pretty disappointed with Woot as of late and I probably won't order from you guys again.
I feel like your products are declining and your shipping is completely atrocious. For me, wooting is a total impulses buy. None of the stuff you guys sell is really a necessity and it falls under the luxury category.

When I purchase something from woot, it's generally some cool toy that I purchase on a whim because I want to play with it. In the past, this worked out great because if I wooted on Friday, I would get the item in my handssometime the next week.

I haven’t been buying from you guys lately, but I placed an order the other week ago for the Reebok Heart Rate monitor on Friday May 2nd . I received the item on the 14th, just two days ago. I’ve heard horror stories about your new shipping, but I didn’t really understand it until experiencing it firsthand.

I really don’t think there’s any excuse for this kind of crap shipping. You guys sell an impulse product that takes half a month to arrive. It kind of takes away the impulse aspect of it – if you know what I mean?

I purchased items from you in the past, but I won’t be buying from you again. I can satisfy all of my impulse purchases from stores like Newegg, Amazon, and eBay and it takes half the time for them to arrive here. These retailers actually value their customer and won’t use some crappy shipping method to save a few bucks.

-Rob
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Their shirts take SO MUCH LONGER. Its ridiculous... i think its partitally why i stopped ordering them. Not to mention that some of them are REALLY WEIRD.
 
I've always been satisfied with them, though I haven't bought tons of things. Still, sometimes it's nice to get something for a fraction of the price, even if the wait is a little long. They still have way better items, prices, and delivery times than thingfling.

Wasn't the reebok heart rate thing from the wootoff? Generally, those do take a little longer because they have a lot more orders and items to process than the normal one item with a group of people.
 
So far so good with Woot! I buy from shirt.woot mainly and have always recieved my item within 3 business days. I actually bought that same heart rate monitor and recieved it in a very timely manner. I am sure it helps that I live about 15 minutes from Woot! and is less than a mile from work.

Although, I will admit there product line has slipped to crap you would buy at the dollar store it seems.
 
I guess maybe I should thank Woot. I could easily spend beyond my means if they put up more interesting products! :p
 
Woot? You mean iRobot Nation?

Even the Woot-Offs suck. They've sucked for at least a year.
 
Their shipping is pathetically slow and their products are bargain bin trash no one wants (as of late). Seriously, Smarpost shipping has to be the worse way to ship something ever! I would almost say it is worse than USPS parcel post which is saying a lot.

Whatever happened to $80 Zunes? Most of the deals anymore aren't that much less than what you can find on Amazon or other places and when you figure it'll take 3 times as long to receive the item, I certainly looses its value IMO.
 
Their shipping is pathetically slow and their products are bargain bin trash no one wants (as of late). Seriously, Smarpost shipping has to be the worse way to ship something ever! I would almost say it is worse than USPS parcel post which is saying a lot.
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Agreed. Don't ever buy a woot when you see the little snail. Their community forums are still good. I don't understand the obsession with cats but it does make me laugh.

And I never ever want to see another Leakfrog.
 
I think who ever does the writeup should stop, the write up's are not funny. Just give me the freaking product info.
 
They were funny at first. Now you can tell they're trying really hard. Or they've started smoking marijuana.
 
i bought a 32" tv for like $440 shipped not to long ago, it a no name brand but it works and looks fairly good
 
The woot-offs are complete shit lately. And the shipping is chaos at best.

I ordered the deathadder during the woot-off, never received a shipping notice, and just got it. Any questioning on the forums and the posts "disappear".

The text replacement crap they have going on the forums just breeds confusion.

And lastly, NEVER BUY a memory product from them.
 
I remember the days when flashing lights meant, "oh crap, I'm gonna max the credit card again!!"

Today, woot-offs are only good for maybe catching an item that I missed during the previous weeks... but even that is usually a stretch. They used to sell the woot-off items cheaper than the original offering, but not anymore from what I've seen.

And when was the last time anyone heard of someone landing the "big score" in their bag-of-crap?
 
Last BoC I got was exactly that. Only item I used was the 5 dollar back pack they threw in there.
 
At first I read this thread and thought it was a troll job, then I actually thought about the current situation with woot and realized.. this TS may be on to something.

The last purchase from them was the 80 dollar Zune, which was a killer deal. Nothing of the sort since then.
 
Shipping is terrible, but the deal I got on my refurb Tivo3 was awesome. So mixed feelings over all.....
 
i sent in a 2gb zen V touch that died on me for rma. they received it on march 25th (mailed march 21st). i asked them if they got it april 10th and they said no. i found the shipping # a week or 2 ago and told them and they promptly got my refund back to my checking account. i dunno why they said they didn't have it if they obviously did. thats pretty shoddy if you ask me. only $35 but still thats not insignifcant. the last nice thing i got from woot was the 1:10 rc car. that was cool :)
 
I have been hearing this mumbling and grumbling on the woot forums (usually by the folks with a clear box next to their name), and now I am seeing it here.

The two arguments I hear that are pertinent are the shipping and the items. Regarding the shipping - oh boo-hoo. So they slap it on the slow boat and it takes a week for a wootoff item. Everyone knows woot employees a communist style of shipping - one flat rate for everything and anything. Your 99¢ paper today? Yeah that's five bucks for one, two, or three. That 66" tv? Yup, five bucks there too. Shipping is shipping - you'll get your item so sit back and refresh the fedex site with your tracking number. Patience is a virtue.

Now the more irritating of the arguments is the quality of items. What? Can someone articulate exactly HOW the items are crappy or worse than usual? I looked at the items from this week or so. M-kay. Then I went back into their community archives to about a year ago (page 40ish). Same sort of items there, more or less. Then I went back a year from there (that’s two years for the counting inclined) around page 78 or so. Yup, same style of stuff there as well. Clearly this is not a full blown statistical analysis of all their items but skipping through their archives yields a fairly stable pattern of items. So if someone can tell me HOW these items recently have sucked I would like to know. Is it a personal gripe that the item they offer doesn’t directly apply to you (but might to the rest of their fan base), or is not technological enough, or not a launch item? HOW are they crappy, and then follow that up with what you would recommend they should sell. I would be largely amused if anyone can get past the claim, to provide the warrant (the ‘how’), and then proffer a solution that works well for everyone.

Now my bitter rant is over I shall return to cleaning out my “irrational user claims” email bin.

KTHNXBYE!
 
Woot never did give me a response to my email ...

They'll no longer get any of my business
 
I've been seeing less things that i'd actually want to get on there, which generally doesn't say much.. but their elusive BoC seems to be getting less hype as the time goes on.
 
modi123 said:
I have been hearing this mumbling and grumbling on the woot forums (usually by the folks with a clear box next to their name), and now I am seeing it here.

The two arguments I hear that are pertinent are the shipping and the items. Regarding the shipping - oh boo-hoo. So they slap it on the slow boat and it takes a week for a wootoff item. Everyone knows woot employees a communist style of shipping - one flat rate for everything and anything. Your 99¢ paper today? Yeah that's five bucks for one, two, or three. That 66" tv? Yup, five bucks there too. Shipping is shipping - you'll get your item so sit back and refresh the fedex site with your tracking number. Patience is a virtue.

Now the more irritating of the arguments is the quality of items. What? Can someone articulate exactly HOW the items are crappy or worse than usual? I looked at the items from this week or so. M-kay. Then I went back into their community archives to about a year ago (page 40ish). Same sort of items there, more or less. Then I went back a year from there (that’s two years for the counting inclined) around page 78 or so. Yup, same style of stuff there as well. Clearly this is not a full blown statistical analysis of all their items but skipping through their archives yields a fairly stable pattern of items. So if someone can tell me HOW these items recently have sucked I would like to know. Is it a personal gripe that the item they offer doesn’t directly apply to you (but might to the rest of their fan base), or is not technological enough, or not a launch item? HOW are they crappy, and then follow that up with what you would recommend they should sell. I would be largely amused if anyone can get past the claim, to provide the warrant (the ‘how’), and then proffer a solution that works well for everyone.

Now my bitter rant is over I shall return to cleaning out my “irrational user claims” email bin.

KTHNXBYE!
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in response to the same things being sold on woot throughout its life.. looking at just 3 pages isnt enough.

i have visited woot.com everyday, for the past few years, almost religiously at 1 AM (est FTW!)

now i can practically predict what will be next..

since we have had a dyson and an irobot recently, and the current woot is a TV. its going to be some lame 8 dollar bluetooth headset, refurbed of course.

back in the day, Woot.com had good prices and different things everyday. now i know exactly what to expect.

Another Example

Tuesday = 2 things (of course), 80% of the time they are related to audio, such as speakers, headphones, etc.
 
Purchased the 12mp Kodak camera from Woot a few weeks back.

It arrived within a week. Very satisfied.

I already have the TV that is on there right now.
 
I don't visit Woot anymore. I used to visit daily, but the lack of good stuff has dwindled IMO, now it's just cheap stuff or stuff that you would find at clearance stores (the stuff that no one wanted after a sale for a store closing).

I wish they would have a little higher end items that most of us can find it as value rather than small items. From time to time they have a few good deals, but IMO thats few and far in between.


My two cents.
 
SippieCup said:
in response to the same things being sold on woot throughout its life.. looking at just 3 pages isnt enough. i have visited woot.com everyday, for the past few years, almost religiously at 1 AM (est FTW!) now i can practically predict what will be next..
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So they have maintained consistant items across the years.. so you are arguing for... radically different items? Curious - what items would you like to see that they are not providing?

Apallohadas said:
I have 32 woots. (Correction 41)

How many do you have?

Yeah. KTHXBYE :rolleyes:
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I am at about seven or eight woots over the years. Ten items or so total.

I am glad you have quite a few woots.. that would mean you are satisfied with their items and accept their communist style of shipping! good job! :p
 
modi123 said:
So they have maintained consistant items across the years.. so you are arguing for... radically different items? Curious - what items would you like to see that they are not providing?
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INcorrect. They have become a iRobot factory and Dyson peddler. Check out any Woot-off for reference to how many times a vacuum pops up.

Items like today are actually pretty good, however for a refurb that isn't such an impressive price (they run around $450 new and that's with a real warrrantee.)

I am at about seven or eight woots over the years. Ten items or so total.

I am glad you have quite a few woots.. that would mean you are satisfied with their items and accept their communist style of shipping! good job! :p
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Quite the leap in logic. And flawed.

42 woots for someone that's been visiting Woot since it's first days isn't much at all. If you had asked about the frequency of my purchases, I'd tell you that it's dropped off a great deal because of low quality tech items and the complete crap they put in the last BoC I got from them.

2 Charm Blowpop collector replicas. FAKE LOLLIPOPS.
 
LMAO @ Fake lollipops!!

I marvel at the striking similarity between the weekly MCM Electronics sale flyer and the Woot offerings. Same crap, exactly.

So, does Woot buy from MCM? Vice-versa? Or do they BOTH buy from the same crap supplier?
 
elektronisch said:
The last purchase from them was the 80 dollar Zune, which was a killer deal. Nothing of the sort since then.
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Ditto. To sum it up for me:
Same, repetitive stuff. I understand between the bigger interest items you've gotta have some lower end stuff, but it at least used to be more random than this.

No higher end stuff at all much anymore. Stuff like the Zune, nice projectors, etc, etc...
 
The first time I saw woot. It was a pretty awesome thing. They had great deals on thing that people actually want. Now! they have nothing but roombas and crappy computers. Woot-offs are even worst. Webcams should be banned from wootoffs. I am so sick and tired of seeing crap on sale.
 
modi123 said:
So they have maintained consistant items across the years.. so you are arguing for... radically different items? Curious - what items would you like to see that they are not providing?
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bah lemme rephrase that. a couple years ago, woot.com seemed random, and there would always be some interesting item at least once a week.

now, it has come down to being the same stuff every day of the week. one day it is a roomba, one day it is a vaccum, then a 26 inch refurb TV, then headphones. etc

they dont have anything really different. i miss the querky gadgets such as binary clocks and the such. not so much vaccums..
 
I think someone at Woot has seen this thread. The items are SLIGHTLY better lately.

At least until Next Week's iRobot.
 
i've noticed a decline in stuff from woot.

i think Ockie said it best.

The only things i have ever actually been interested in on woot was the zune (which i got) and the barracuda sound card (also which i snagged) aside from that i used to check all the time... now i only check if hardforum posts something in hot deals.

It's mostly leftover junk from store closeouts ><...stuff that may make an fun impulse buy if i was at the store closeout...but definitely not worth shipping then waiting for delivery
 
Apallohadas said:
I think someone at Woot has seen this thread. The items are SLIGHTLY better lately.

At least until Next Week's iRobot.
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I forwarded them the thread in an email I sent - so it's possible.

It's pretty disappointing that I have still yet to hear back from Woot after contacting their customer service more than 10 days ago.

Companies like Newegg have always responded to any issues I had in an extremely timely manner, but this episode with Woot is an example why they're slipping.
 
I would have bought the camcorder on Memorial Day.
Decent price and NEW... not refurbished. ( not very often we seen that on Woot! )

But, I missed the sale. :( Oh well.

I do like Woot for refurbished Sandisk MP3 players. I have 4 kids that habitually break and lose them. :p
 
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