There are many reasons to enjoy the expat lifestyle. We want to talk in today’s article about one of the things that expats and expat families most enjoy about living abroad, that is, in most of the rest of the world, you can get things delivered much easier than you can back home, at least, assuming back home is somewhere in the USA or Canada.
Quality Of Delivery:
Just to start with an an example of something that you would get delivered to someone anywhere in the world: flowers. In many parts of North America, you can get flowers delivered, but the process is complicated and expensive. I have seen cases where they can’t even get the day guaranteed for the delivery. What’s more common, however, is that they can guarantee the day but not the time, so the flowers could come at any time, say, during business hours. Obviously, this is far from ideal. Compare and contrast with flower delivery Singapore, for example, which is a great place to be an expat. You can get the time within an hour or so, even in the city’s sometimes heavy traffic. This is much more professional; we can call it better quality of delivery.
Things You Didn’t Think Could Be Delivered:
There are lots of cases and instances where people in other countries wouldn’t think twice about ordering things for delivery whereas in Canada or the USA we are always going out of our homes to pick them up. The first thing that comes to mind is your local corner store, whatever you want to call it in your particular locality. This is your convenience store, superette, bodega, tuck shop, it has tons of names depending on where you are in the world.
In other parts of the world where you may be living as an expat, these places deliver. Always. All of them. So you can be sitting up in your house and apartment and realize that you are, for example, out of butter or cooking oil to cook up your lunch or dinner. You just get on the phone, give them your address and tell them what you want, and they appear within minutes with your exact order. In some places in the world there is a delivery charge for such a convenience, but it is usually minimal, and well worth it. For example, in the above case, you can start preparing your meal while they are bringing you the missing ingredients. Going out of the house just to get something like a stick of butter would slow you down considerably.
Keep The Party Going:
This one will be big for you younger expats, but people of all ages could potentially take advantage of this:
Many places abroad have night-time delivery services. These services vary a lot in their nature depending on exactly where you are in the world. But the general idea of them is to keep that house party going at full swing when supplies start to run out.
One such service that has come to our attention in Latin America is open from 6pm to 6am, and offers delivery of such essential party supplies as various types of alcoholic beverages, tobacco products such as cigarettes etc., and party snacks such as potato chips, as well as things like breath mints, soft drinks, ibuprofen, etc,
This may seem like such a waste of money to use these services, but the fact is that they can be a godsend, because there is a special factor involved, one that seems to defy the laws of physics. No matter how well you prepare for a house party, something always runs out too early. This happens no matter how much you even try to over-buy everything.
And this is not just to keep a fun little party going sometimes. Savvy expats will often tell you these type of events, unlike in North American culture, are where business deals get struck, so these services could make a difference in your professional life as well as your social life.
Pharmacies:
The pharmacy experience is completely different in other parts of the world than it is in North America. Not only are things generally more available over the counter and cheaper, you can also get them delivered to your door. And, more importantly with this type of business, it’s not hard to find a 24-hour pharmacy relatively close to you, and yes, they all deliver! We have to wonder why, in the USA which is the land of 24-hour everything, can you do your grocery shopping at 3am if you want to, but if you are leaving the emergency room at 3am, it can be hard to find a place open to fill that much-needed prescription. Not to mention, wait times are high and paperwork is sometimes intense, with all the different authorizations that are needed. This is one area in which your quality of life actually goes up tremendously living as an expat.
Looking To The Future:
We think that things in North America are going to start changing and improving. Pharmacies are starting to offer more 24 hour service, and in a few select markets people have started up party delivery services, although sometimes they are illegal due to local blue laws.
In the end, changing demographics are going to make every country more and more like every other country, especially in terms of good ideas that could work everywhere. And to add to that, today’s under-30 crowd have quite different values than the ones that came before them, for example, they are not as big on their cars as older people are. This is going to insanely drive things like delivery services in the very near future.
In the end, delivery culture generates employment, saves people time, and is good for the environment, so we can hope that North America catches up to the rest of the world in this area, because it really is a win/win for just about everybody, and makes a lot of sense in so many ways.
