Take it all in stride. The great problem is the dearth of music stores selling ukes of good quality. Plenty of music stores will stock a cheap uke or perhaps two. But the good stuff? Gotta trust a long-distance store, and you can only hope it works. . . or you'll lump the cost of the shipment back.
I'm old school, like to inspect merchandise like ukes that I intend to keep 20 years or more. I'm not a gear spinner.
I dislike the current situation where there are only a few decent retailers since I'm not keen on having only one or two options.
I agree wth you in part but not fully - yes I always suggest to my readers that buying in person is preferable - but for many that is simply not possible to do in what I call a 'specialist' ukulele store - whether through sheer distance, disablity, cost of travel options etc. It may also surprise you that when it comes to my own personal ukuleles - I have NEVER bought one in person - all have been online purchases one way or the other.
Yes, i'd like to see more GOOD retailers too though - but bear in mind, those that do exist have to work REALLY hard to make them work. I don't think there is is enough demand out there for there to be large numbers of uke specialists. I think there's probably diminishing demand for large numbers of musical instrument stores full stop. Very sad...