Tech Reality Check: eCommerce and Microchips

A colleague recently complained that furniture company Room & Board has a great website but the buying process stops halfway and must be completed by phone. By coincidence we recently bought a bed from them and I have to admit the order was completed much quicker using the phone compared to a typical online shopping cart process. Even better, the bed was just delivered and I assembled it in 3 minutes. Literally. With no tools. And since the pieces were delivered by their own service and wrapped in the truck, it required almost no wasteful packaging. Overall a great customer experience, sans eCommerce.

Meanwhile, my new (deep breath) Gillette Fusion Phantom Power Razor cost $11, has 6 blades, and runs on a battery and a microchip, bringing us closer to Kevin Kelly’s prediction that chips will be in everything everywhere. Shaves nicely too.

Update: the next day Room & Board sent me an email (from a person, not just botmail) making sure the delivery went alright. Very nice.