I am an Amazon Prime member and have been for rather a while now....until this past year, I used the service occasionally, when I couldn't find something locally after having been in local shops looking for it. Well, with COVID-19, my shopping habits changed drastically, and I am no longer going over to the local mall for an afternoon of casual browsing, some shopping finished off by a meal before heading home. These days, for the most part when I realize I need (or more likely, just want) something, I check Amazon, see if it is available, which is usually the case, and with the click of a button place my order and the item arrives on my doorstep a day or two later. Now THAT's convenience!
No need to get in the car and go driving from store to store in hopes of finding the desired item.....no risk of being in those stores with those who are careless about wearing masks (or who flat-out refuse to wear one and cause huge scenes)..... I get the item right on my own doorstep, open the box or envelope and there we are.....
That said, though, I am concerned that, yes, this is definitely making inroads on the stores which provide the kinds of items that consumers really want and often need to see in person, touch, test out, before purchasing.... It doesn't matter to me too much one way or another what the sensor-viewing loupe I recently purchased from Amazon looks like, and how it feels in my hands, as long as it does what reviewers on Amazon and in other places described, in the way they described. However, if I am plunking down a few thousand USD for a camera body and/or lens(es), by gum, I want to have a hands-on, touchy-feely experience with those items before making the final decision and purchase. Last November I headed right to a local camera shop to see, handle, decide on the A7R IV and the three lenses I purchased with it; no way I'd order any of that through Amazon! B&H? Yes -- they're a well-established, very reputable camera store with both a physical presence in NYC and a significant online presence. They're a sort of Photographers' Mecca! There have been a few times over the years when I've bought something from B&H that simply was unavailable in local shops for whatever reasons.
Right now there's a lens I've been wanting to buy but have been putting off for this reason, that reason....and the other day when I looked again, I saw that the local camera shop doesn't have it in stock right now, which is disappointing. Fortunately there is no urgency about getting the lens, so I'll wait a couple of months, see if it reappears in the local shop. If not, then I'll order it through B&H and it'll be delivered promptly and safely.... I would never, ever consider ordering that lens through Amazon (I don't even know if they have it available, actually), because sometimes Amazon is casual and careless about how they package and ship their goods. A paperback book? No problem if it's delivered in a bubblewrap envelope or even a non-bubblewrap envelope. Any sort of electronic gear, though? it better be packaged appropriately in a way which will actually protect the contents!
Also with Amazon, one has to be a bit careful about the possibility of counterfeit goods, such as memory cards for cameras. Again, ordering an expensive memory card through Amazon may work out just fine -- or the card may turn out to be a dud because it is counterfeit. This is a situation where I go to the local camera shop and if they don't have what I want, good old B&H will....
So basically my current process is, when I'm interested in something, to check online, read reviews of the item, look at Amazon, see if it is available there and the pricing, and then look online at local stores' websites, see if they've got the same thing in inventory. If it's something like an external SSD, and Microcenter, which is only a few miles down the road from me, has it, I'll get in the car and head down there preferably at a less-busy time during the work day to grab one. If no one has it except Amazon, well, it's Amazon to the rescue....