I was recently shopping online for a specific type of lotion (my skin seems to hate all other types). I am somewhat predisposed to avoid Amazon.com because its size and increasing dominance of online shopping concerns me as it moves closer and closer to "shopping" (in the sense that "searching" means Google to most people). However, my biggest reason for avoiding Amazon.com is simpler: it has become incredibly confusing to shop there. Searching for just about anything will yield thousands of results and it takes (me) a lot of effort to determine which one is appropriate. This can be a great thing in a lot of cases, but more often than not it feels more like navigating a minefield of deceitful listings than comparing competing products.

This lengthy post evaluates one example - Aveeno "Daily Moisturizing" lotion. As with most personal care products, when searching online I pull up a couple of websites to compare prices. In this case I pulled up Amazon.com last, searched for "Aveeno" and was impressed to see just what I was looking to compare (the 18 oz., non-SPF version) as the first result. I clicked through and, curious to figure out the price …

Continue reading