35 Products That Are So Bad, It’s Hard To Believe Someone Came Up With Them
Interview With Author
If you hate wasting time walking around the mall, online shopping might be right up your alley. It’s fast, it’s efficient, and it has become almost like a lifeline during quarantine. When you have something specific in mind, you often turn to the retail giant Amazon, a go-to site for virtually everything. Yet, once you scroll past the items you need, things take a bizarre turn.
The Worst Things For Sale (TWTFS) is a Twitter account dedicated to the most horrible objects on the web. After all, there’s plenty to choose from. The creator, Drew Fairweather, combs the site and handpicks "one terrible item every day" to make his followers a little baffled and a lot amused.
So if you’re looking for a terrible gift guide, you’ve come to the right place because we have selected some of the weirdest things the account had to offer. Continue scrolling, upvote the ones you enjoyed most, and tell us what you think about them in the comments!
This post may include affiliate links.
When people say that all things should have a function and a purpose, they've probably never stumbled upon an enormous USB-compatible Enter Key or a fried chicken phone case. The internet is chock full of items so extreme that they seem unreal. Yet, all it takes is one look at Amazon to recognize that it’s a true treasure trove of weird, strange, and peculiar objects.
We reached out to Drew Fairweather, the founder of the account, to learn more about his project and the inspiration behind it. The artist not only writes The Worst Things For Sale blog but is also the author of the daily comics Toothpaste For Dinner and Married To The Sea.
Fairweather started TWTFS about ten years ago when he was simply looking through Amazon. He noticed that there were many weird and hilarious items "always peeking out from under what I was actually trying to find," he told Bored Panda. Ever since then, the author has faithfully documented the oddest and most pointless objects found online. "Once you realize the breadth of bizarre things available there, you can't un-see them!"
I have seen it, its actualy amazing becase it hugely desexualite woman wearing it, so they arent fpcus of some random boner
When it comes to the Twitter account, it now has more than 11.6K followers. This shows just how many people are drawn in by a desire to discuss and figure out why on earth such things exist in the first place. Also, why some people actually buy them. Well, as they say, one person’s trash is another’s treasure.
"Since buying items is the main creative outlet of most people—most Americans, at least—people enjoy seeing unusual items for sale," he said. Statista reports that Amazon was responsible for 50 percent of US e-commerce spending in 2021. One of the company’s key tools to increase that spending is Amazon Prime, a membership that gives you free and fast shipping, plus extra privileges like streaming music and video.
In 2018, as many as 62 percent of their customers in the US were Prime members. According to Statista, they are highly engaged shoppers who spend a lot of money—more than double the amount of non-Prime members per year—and are relevant to Amazon’s success.
Fairweather also writes about items "that seem normal—branded waffle irons, pink screwdrivers—that have a strange or sinister subtext hidden beneath the sales pitch." When it comes to some of the most bizarre things he has ever come across, it has to be the "BabySaver, a box where you store your child's baby teeth after they fall out."
"The box has holes for each tooth, so you can reassemble your child's teeth into a jaw-shaped curio," he explained. "If that's not enough, it has a slot in the middle for your child's umbilical cord."
When it comes to finding such items floating around Amazon, he revealed that most of them he has dug up on his own, though his followers also help with suggestions. "I tend to stay away from novelty items, which are those intentionally created to be 'wacky,' since there's nothing unusual or sinister about these."
"I'd rather write about something like Extylus, which is a stylus for your smartphone that you strap to your finger, so you can use your finger to control your smartphone."
"As with any items manufactured and sold, these were all created with the purpose of making money! A lot of these companies, I'd imagine, start with someone having an idea they hope will be popular, a niche product that will become the next Beanie Baby or Scrub Daddy," he told us. "They're then put through the wringer of marketing to become one of the abominations I write about, like Bumper Dumper, the toilet you attach to the trailer hitch of your truck."
My family destroyed capitalism and the only thing they brought back was this tee shirt.
The artist revealed that his ultimate goal is to make people think about what they’re buying and why. "These products are mostly made of plastic, manufactured by underpaid factory workers, sold at a premium to people who don't need them," he explained.
"They're a colossal waste of energy and material resources, and it engenders suffering from the human cost of manual labor, the occupational health hazards experienced by the workers, and the ecological damage done by extracting these limited resources from the Earth."
Ok but I NEED this! I have autism and HATE when food touches, and I would buy this is an INSTANT!
Fairweather continued: "The very richest people accumulate wealth and use their power to strip the rest of us of health and happiness, then sell it back to us, one plastic piece at a time. We don't need any of these things! It's all a symptom of a society which has prioritized the accumulation of the wealthy over all other aspects."
Was going to ask if they do a matching magnifying glass...
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Couldn't you have named it something a little more conservative like: Find My Bone, or Flesh Finder?
I bought one of these. It hurt, and my fiancée could not stop laughing
I can hear the conversation now. "And we will call it Easyboner and people will give us money for it and we will die laughing every time we ship one..."
TL; DR: i tried to put HUUUGE paragraph breaks in here, but no dice sorry, people: you're stuck with the ol' wall of text When I was in hair school, all the estheticians got a callous file in their equipment kits, for pedicures. They were big wooden paddles with a different grade of sandpaper on either side of the business end of said tool. Branded into the wooden handle, on both sides, was either the name of the company, or perhaps it was a simple how-to? It said "PedoFile," in giant capital letters. Lost in translation gone horribly, darkly hilariously wrong. It was awful, yet transgressively rad. If you can't laugh at your childhood traumas, you'd never get out of bed; trust me. I tried like crazy to buy one off the esthetics students that year, but no dice. Not even when I offered to buy them a new, better, more sterilizable metal callous remover, *and* throw 20 bux into the mix. It was either, "No way, dude, this is going up on my wall!!" or "Ewwww, you're creepy! No!!" One extremely creative student brought hers home during the weekend, and using a soldering iron, created a cool design to hide the unintentionally offending words. She sealed it all up with varnish after, and voilà: no more sick jokes. I think a few others paid her to do the same to theirs, or just sanded off the words. I cried in frustration at the waste of a perfectly good horrifying mistake. I wanted one BAD!! Those types of files are far from ideal for professional use, anyway! The sandpaper isn't replaceable on the cheap ones my school bought by the gross from China, and after one too many dips in the barbicide bath, they totally come apart. Or grow mold in any cracks in the varnish from being wet constantly. Better to use the metal cheese grater ones, or a Dremel set on low, with a new sandpaper disc for every client. Even the supposedly sterilizable "pumice" stones fashioned from glass get all kinds of gnarly bacteria growth inside all the little bubbles and crevasses. They eventually get all discoloured and disgusting. The school ended up being shut down about 5 years after I graduated. It was sad, because for years, it was considered to be one of the best beauty schools in town. My class was the last class to experience the high quality they were known for; things swiftly went seriously downhill from there. They didn't pay their staff enough, so the instructor turnover rate was astounding. One teacher would disappear into the bathroom for 20 minutes 5 times a day, and smoked crack with students out in the side alley that housed staff parking, dumpsters, and the cigarette smoking area. She only lasted about two months from what I heard. The estheticians' kits only had one set of pedicure tools, but they were booked mani/pedi clients back-to-back. Hence, their tools weren't given the requisite time to soap and water scrub, rinse, spend 15 minutes in a serilizing soak, washed and rinsed again, and dried on a clean towel. My then-SO and I both got toenail fungus from our first ever pedicures, as models for an ingrown toenail class. A class where they used the ONE, SAME INGROWN FILE ON EVERY SINGLE MODEL, WITH NO STERILIZATION BETWEEN USES!! I still have gnarly toenails almost 20 years later, despite numerous treatments, tinctures, etcetera. I'm so *pissed*. Even when I was 18, and in perfect health, my doctor wouldn't prescribe me the oral treatment, and every topical treatment I've used has failed, despite my extreme diligence. Eventually, a spa client ended up with Hep C. They sued, and the owner pulled a flight by night back to Columbia. I hope that client got at least *something*, even just from the liquidation sale that went on afterwards. That's a long-ass story that evolved from hilariously mis-named products. Hopefully your time, that you'll never get back, was at least rewarded by a smirk, or a few nose-exhalation-half-laughs.
(Remembers high school's locker rooms) Hmmm... I don't need to buy that.
Ok this is gold 🤣🤣🤣😂😂😂😂😂😩😩😩😩😩😩😩😩😩😩😩😩😩😩😩😩🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 I'm wheezing 😂😂😩😩😩😩😩
It's only a matter of time before these come out with updated instruction that include a warning. Kind of like not using a blow dryer in the shower. Some knucklehead will hurt himself because there was no warning. Which hell never read anyway. A woman will and she'll pass it on.
Kinds like how when my two lesbian friends started a marijuana trimming service and I suggested they call their business "The Scissor Sisters"
What i say when imout and a stunner waljs past . . ."Whoaaa there . .easy boner, easy . . . just stay low and don't make a scene"
So while these awful objects catch our attention and allow us to let out some genuine laughs, they also show a much deeper problem. Remember that each time we consume a product, we support certain businesses and their values. So next time you want to buy a funny-looking thing online, think long and hard whether it's actually worth it.
You can even store the umbilical cord and the lanugo in it. Every proud parent should have one.
Amazing how much american flag apparel there is. I'm sure that there's something written that the flag is not supposed to be worn
Because you can't just use your hands to shape hamburger into any shape you want.
Note: this post originally had 120 images. It’s been shortened to the top 35 images based on user votes.
So... People wasted time, money, resources and energy to make... that?
Capitalism is gross. “Does anyone need this? No. But some people will still pay us for it, so let’s make it.”
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A review on the Shock bracelet site complaining that it started shocking them at random intervals. They didn't figure out that they were being punished for being stupid enough to buy it in the first place.
"35 Products That Are So GOOD, It’s Hard To Believe Someone Came Up With Them"
Curious. Question to all of you. If you were to choose one of these products for yourself. Which one would you buy?
It seems to me that this list offended itself. I'd consider quite a few of these. If uncommongoods.com was a little less uptight, they'd sell some of these things.
Which ones? Seems many like the divider thing for plates.
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Several of these would actually be really useful for ND people or those with motor issues :/
"Fight capitalism, buy my merch! Only 10 uyghers died in the factory, on the day this shirt was made" I'm convinced most gen z'ers are going to cause a new type of willfull dark ages, where the information is there but they care more about their own statement backed by feelings rather than facts.
It's kinda sad that some of the ones being mocked are products made for disabled people.
Advanced techniques in design and mass production supporting an explosion of creativity. There's a book called Post-Scarcity Anarchism that explains how these forces have the potential to create an great utopian anarchy. But looking at products like these, it seems we've got a ways to go yet. We're not yet done wasting time, energy, and resources on drivel like this.
I want to read that book, and I think at least half of these items are not drivel.
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Some of these are dumb, sure. But a lot of these are just fun stuff, or actually helpful for people with mobility issues. Made me laugh a couple times at least.
Cats (as well as dogs) are special because they can usually sense when their owner is pregnant. That product may seem dumb at first, but cats do have very sensitive hearing, so it could be good to get them used to baby noises before the baby truly arrives as they can be very loud, as well as other noises that may result from caring for a baby. So that when the cat meets the actual baby, it won’t be as surprised by the noises it makes or become afraid. Just make sure baby doesn’t play too rough with your cat! Kitties are only animals so if your child pulls their tail, the kitty may give you baby a little swat, so be sure to condition your baby to your cat as well and make sure they know how to properly treat cats and to not harm them!
Wow. I think I upvoted every single one except that product to keep food from touching (which seems legit). I'm impressed with the ability of humans to be complete ridiculous.
*that's* the one you thought seemed the most useful?
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So... People wasted time, money, resources and energy to make... that?
Capitalism is gross. “Does anyone need this? No. But some people will still pay us for it, so let’s make it.”
Load More Replies... A review on the Shock bracelet site complaining that it started shocking them at random intervals. They didn't figure out that they were being punished for being stupid enough to buy it in the first place.
"35 Products That Are So GOOD, It’s Hard To Believe Someone Came Up With Them"
Curious. Question to all of you. If you were to choose one of these products for yourself. Which one would you buy?
It seems to me that this list offended itself. I'd consider quite a few of these. If uncommongoods.com was a little less uptight, they'd sell some of these things.
Which ones? Seems many like the divider thing for plates.
Load More Replies... Several of these would actually be really useful for ND people or those with motor issues :/
"Fight capitalism, buy my merch! Only 10 uyghers died in the factory, on the day this shirt was made" I'm convinced most gen z'ers are going to cause a new type of willfull dark ages, where the information is there but they care more about their own statement backed by feelings rather than facts.
It's kinda sad that some of the ones being mocked are products made for disabled people.
Advanced techniques in design and mass production supporting an explosion of creativity. There's a book called Post-Scarcity Anarchism that explains how these forces have the potential to create an great utopian anarchy. But looking at products like these, it seems we've got a ways to go yet. We're not yet done wasting time, energy, and resources on drivel like this.
I want to read that book, and I think at least half of these items are not drivel.
Load More Replies... Some of these are dumb, sure. But a lot of these are just fun stuff, or actually helpful for people with mobility issues. Made me laugh a couple times at least.
Cats (as well as dogs) are special because they can usually sense when their owner is pregnant. That product may seem dumb at first, but cats do have very sensitive hearing, so it could be good to get them used to baby noises before the baby truly arrives as they can be very loud, as well as other noises that may result from caring for a baby. So that when the cat meets the actual baby, it won’t be as surprised by the noises it makes or become afraid. Just make sure baby doesn’t play too rough with your cat! Kitties are only animals so if your child pulls their tail, the kitty may give you baby a little swat, so be sure to condition your baby to your cat as well and make sure they know how to properly treat cats and to not harm them!
Wow. I think I upvoted every single one except that product to keep food from touching (which seems legit). I'm impressed with the ability of humans to be complete ridiculous.
*that's* the one you thought seemed the most useful?
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