Not too long ago, shopping for an item could take considerable time. Assuming that you knew what you were looking for, several phone calls still might be required to locate where it was for sale. Then you might spend an hour or two to travel there, make the purchase, and return home. Or perhaps no one had what you were looking for, and someone had to order it, if they could. Multiply this sequence by several dozen products, and you might spend weeks or months finding everything you needed.
Recently I purchased some shampoo; it took me three minutes on Amazon. I don’t think any stores nearby carried it.
Products and services provide many benefits, of course. But one of their greatest values is to save us time. After all, time may be our most precious resource. More time for doing what you love and tending to what matters most, or even living longer, is about as valuable as it gets. Yet this is something products and services contribute every day.
Buses, trains, planes, and automobiles reduce the time getting from here to there. Technology reduces the time required to communicate. Home appliances reduce the time spent preparing food and cleaning clothes. Medicines extend life.
And online retailers reduce the time spent buying and selling. Which I guess makes Amazon a kind of time machine. As is every other product or service that frees a single minute to be spent another way.
Instead of the metaphor “time machine,” then, perhaps we just think of them as life savers.
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