Earthling

In web retail years, it's pretty ancient. I couldn't find an official press release on Amazon.com about it, but this article dates it as being born in June of 2002. Skip past the big ad to see the article.

I did a quick Technorati search on it, and found plenty of evidence that Gold Box Watching is a popular past-time among bloggers. When a strange product like a over-the-counter defibrillator appears in people's offers, it gets noticed. And because it's supposedly highly personalized, it gets the same kinds of sideways, confused dog stares TiVo gets when it suggests an offer that's totally not right for you. Then there's the speculation about strange item combinations, like a Prada pocketbook with a tape measure.

(Steal this idea:) Someone should start a Gold Box Watch blog if one doesn't already exist.

Sometimes it does pick things off of your wish list or what you've saved in your shopping cart, and other times you get completely random items, like the massage mat I was just offered.

So what's the draw for me? If I rarely if ever buy stuff from it, why do I keep clicking it? My first thought is that it's like looking in the refrigerator when you're not hungry. Sometimes you just want to stare dumbly at a bunch of options. I spent more of my teen years doing this than I care to admit. I'm not sure what it does for you, but it's some form of entertainment. My second thought is that there's some good psychology here.

You can only look at your gold box offers for one hour in total each day. As I remember, if you pass up an offer, you can't go back and get it again. And once you buy one of the items, you can't see the rest of the offers that would have come after it. It's kind of like a tiny little personalized game show.

In some strange way, I think we also get some comfort from being reminded of the 'land of plenty' that is the American retail landscape. Seeing a store stocked with stuff is comforting. Somewhere in the back of your head, it makes you feel like everything is ok. And the same goes for variety. Knowing that Amazon can surprise me with strange, wonderful, and occasionally useless products makes me feel like things must be good in the retail world. Obviously, the presence of the gold box offers is not a good economic indicator for the thinking man, but I think that's probably the effect it has on me emotionally.

Even if I'm not buying the featured offers, I think it works out well for Amazon because it's part of what brings me back to that page when I'm looking to buy something. On some items, I'll search for the absolute lowest price, but if it's something that I know is in Amazon's wheelhouse, like a book, CD, or DVD, I usually end up at Amazon. And the gold box is part of the reason why.