Amazon Prime Day Is An Abomination

42% off is a great deal, but not if it's 42% off...BEARD-GROWING CREAM. You do not need or want beard-growing cream. I understand that patchy beards are an unsightly problem for many men, but let's be real: If this smegma actually worked, you'd have heard about it already and it wouldn't look like some dollar-store leftover inventory.

I saw this deal for one of those face wash machine thingies, and thought, "You know, HEY, I've heard from my colleague Doree that these things are pretty decent." So I figured, why not.

Here's what happened. I added it to my cart at the Prime Day sale price ($17), and then went back to browsing. All the deals are limited in quantity, so it's possible a deal could be sold out — although during a decent shopping experience this shouldn't happen once you have already put the item in your cart. When I checked back, the price in my cart had jumped back to the $29.99 full price.

When I went back to the item page, I could still SEE the deal price, but this time, when I tried to "check" for the availability of the deal, it just spun with a waiting sign saying "Checking Deal Status" indefinitely.

I ~think~ what happened here is that the deal sold out or timed out while the item was in my cart. Which is annoying, but I suppose understandable (ideally, adding an item to your cart means you've reserved it). However, the other issue is that Amazon has no way of properly alerting or warning customers when that's what happens. The fact that you can get stuck in an endless spinning loop of "check deal status" means there's something very wrong happening on the site.

This is like the WORST possible customer experience: offering people a sale price that they can't get. People freak the eff out when that happens.

If you're saving at least $80 on your beard cream, then I guess it's worth it. But remember, Amazon Prime is you paying a yearly fee for the pleasure and privilege of getting deals and two-day shipping, so make sure you're getting your $80 worth. That's probably a lot of beard cream, even at full price.