Shopping with Claude: How to find quality brands, automate returns, and buy things that last 100 years | Nicole Ruiz

Writer and parent Nicole Ruiz has developed an AI-powered shopping system using Claude to help families find high-quality, long-lasting brands while avoiding drop-shipping and poorly made products. The system automates returns by scanning email receipts and drafting refund requests, and helps users vet brands based on heritage, craftsmanship, and return policies. Ruiz's approach aims to help small artisans and century-old manufacturers compete against Amazon's infrastructure.

Nicole Ruiz is a writer and parent who has built a comprehensive AI-powered shopping system to help her family buy high-quality, long-lasting items while avoiding the noise of drop-shipping brands, paid ads, and poorly made products. She writes an interview series on Substack about how technology is changing the household. Listen or watch on YouTube, Spotify, or Apple Podcasts What you’ll learn: How to build a Claude Project with custom instructions for vetting brands based on heritage, craftsmanship, and return policies The shopping criteria that help surface century-old manufacturers over trendy direct-to-consumer brands How to use Claude to search through trusted vendor websites that have terrible UX Why AI actually helps small artisans and heritage brands compete against Amazon’s infrastructure How to use Claude Cowork to automate returns by finding receipts in your email and drafting refund requests The technique for getting Claude to analyze whether a brand is legitimate or just a drop-shipping operation How to shop within a specific budget or with gift cards using AI assistance Brought to you by: Orkes —The enterprise platform for reliable applications and agentic workflows Metaview —The agentic recruiting platform for winning teams In this episode, we cover: 00:00 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOPganyUinE Introduction to Nicole and AI-powered shopping 02:29 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOPganyUinE&t=149s The problem 04:55 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOPganyUinE&t=295s Building a Claude Project for household purchasing 07:44 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOPganyUinE&t=464s The “anti-to-do list” concept for reducing mental overhead 10:30 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOPganyUinE&t=630s Shopping for a can opener: the system in action 15:53 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOPganyUinE&t=953s How AI helps century-old brands with terrible websites 18:45 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOPganyUinE&t=1125s Processing returns with Claude Cowork 25:06 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOPganyUinE&t=1506s Using gift cards strategically 26:33 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOPganyUinE&t=1593s Vetting brands 29:40 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOPganyUinE&t=1780s Recap, lightning round, and final thoughts Tools referenced: • Claude: https://claude.ai/ https://claude.ai/ • Claude Cowork: https://www.anthropic.com/product/claude-cowork https://www.anthropic.com/product/claude-cowork Other references: • Boston General Store: https://bostongeneralstore.com/ https://bostongeneralstore.com/ • L.L.Bean: https://www.llbean.com/ https://www.llbean.com/ • Manufactum: https://www.manufactum.com/ https://www.manufactum.com/ • 5 OpenClaw agents run my home, finances, and code | Jesse Genet: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/5-openclaw-agents-run-my-home-finances https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/5-openclaw-agents-run-my-home-finances • From a $6.90 newsletter to $3M API: How a non-coder built Memelord | Jason Levin: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/from-a-690-newsletter-to-3m-api-how https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/from-a-690-newsletter-to-3m-api-how Where to find Nicole Ruiz: Substack The Third Oikos : https://www.thirdoikos.com/ https://www.thirdoikos.com/ Where to find Claire Vo: ChatPRD: https://www.chatprd.ai/ https://www.chatprd.ai/ Website: https://clairevo.com/ https://clairevo.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/clairevo/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/clairevo/ Production and marketing by https://penname.co/ https://penname.co/ . For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email email protected /cdn-cgi/l/email-protection .