Needing to match the stain on wood flooring in a house built in 1999, a Hacker News user uploaded a clear photo taken in bright sunlight. ChatGPT searched online, found a matching stain colour and showed ordering options, and a quart was delivered.
Here's a photo of my [WOOD TYPE IF KNOWN] floor, taken in daylight. It was laid around [YEAR]. Suggest stain colours from brands available in [COUNTRY] that are the closest match, explain why, and tell me where I can buy small tester sizes. Also tell me how to test the stain on a hidden spot before doing the whole job.
Replace the [PLACEHOLDERS] with your own details before you send it.
How to try it
- Photograph the floor in natural daylight, with no flash, close up and from a little further away.
- Upload it to ChatGPT with the prompt and ask for a shortlist of colours.
- Buy the smallest tins and test them on an offcut or hidden corner first.
More shopping use cases
Find savings in a year of grocery receipts with ChatGPT
One shopper had ChatGPT analyse a year of online grocery orders. It worked out the household could save hundreds a year by switching to equivalent own-brand products and buying specific items from specific shops.
Here is my online grocery order history for the last [PERIOD]: [PASTE OR UPLOAD]. Analyse it and tell me: 1) my top 20 items by total spend, 2) where a cheaper own-brand equivalent exists, 3) which items are cheaper at [OTHER SHOPS], and 4) a realistic estimate of yearly savings. Present it as a short table.
Find an item in stock at your local shop with a Grok agent
In October 2026 we asked Grok Bot, a desktop AI agent with its own browser, to find a 10 m Cat6 network cable at Anhoch, an electronics shop in Skopje. It searched the shop's website, found an SBOX Cat6 UTP 10 m patch cable for 250 MKD, compared two Lanberg options at 290 and 450 MKD (both warehouse-only) and used the per-branch stock list to find the mall branch that had it. We popped in and bought it in one trip; the agent didn't buy anything itself.
Find a [ITEM AND SPEC, E.G. 10 M CAT6 NETWORK CABLE] at [SHOP NAME OR WEBSITE] in [TOWN OR CITY]. Search the shop's own website and compare 2-3 suitable options in a short table with the product name, key specs and current price. Use the shop's branch or stock information to tell me which branch has each one in stock right now, and flag anything that's warehouse-only or online-only. Give me a direct link to each product page. Don't buy or reserve anything; I'll go in and buy it myself.
Choose school supplies your child will actually like with ChatGPT
One mum gave ChatGPT the school's supply list for her daughter, and because it already knew her daughter's tastes from earlier chats it suggested items picked for her, with shop links. Her daughter, who usually rejects what her mum chooses, kept every item and only changed a few colours.
Here is my child's school supply list: [PASTE LIST]. My child is [AGE] and likes [COLOURS, CHARACTERS, STYLES] and dislikes [DISLIKES]. Suggest a specific product for each item that fits their taste, stays within a total budget of about [BUDGET], and is available from [SHOP OR COUNTRY]. Include a cheaper alternative for anything pricey.
Reference: Hacker News