Amazon not leaving space for it's own selling partners
Hi all,
We been working with Amazon since 2010, so it’s quite a long time.
There were very good times, (and frankly i could not imagine my life without working with Amazon, which is the Company that i admire the most since i was in my 20s).
But it now seem that Amazon itself is slowly but surely killing it’s own third party sellers by selling directly pretty much ANYTHING that is decently requested, at a much lower market price, in pretty much most cases.
We believe this is a topic that should not be underestimated.
Of course Amazon is free to do that, but even being us very experienced sellers that works directly with a large variety of suppliers and products, we have HUGE & INCREASING difficulties in finding products that are not alredy offered (and KILLED), by Amazon directly, as their direct competition against us sellers too, is hugely increasing lately.
So, please tell me if is Amazon the only selling platform that directly compete like that with it’s own ‘partners’? We guess so… and how many of you are encountering this same problem?..
And also please tell us, how is this model sustainable for third party sellers on the long run of it keep getting worse for us?
And let’s not forget that Amazon has built much of it’s strength upon it’s third party Sellers.
So, could not Amazon implement some T&C to protect us selling partners that are investing on them, by for example at least trying to sell at a more reasonable price in most cases, without having to cut the rest of us out on an entire listing?
(They make money any way, if they sell directly as well as if we do).
Sadly, its a jungle for third part sellers that are not private labelled, and, we hope we are wrong, but it seem that the huge dear beloved selling partner Amazon, is more and more thinking about 1 thing only lately: THEMSELVES.
0 replies
Seller_esvgLzKXw2YAl
I’m not sure what it is that you think has changed?
Amazon has always competed with sellers. It’s not a new thing at all.
You just have to find products that will work.
And you can compete with Amazon directly, as long as you are sensible about it.
I haven’t been on here quite as long as you, but I have been around now for about 7 years or so.
But has always been about finding the products and moving on to something else, if it’s not worth it any more.
Amazon is a business. Who else are they going to think about?
Seller_NoMNQDGnEW5Bx
I don’t mind competing with amazon but they shouldn’t be allowed to have the buy box when their items are out of stock, that’s the bit that really frustrates me
Seller_DTufFoxJuMU0M
No offense, but you remind me of an old neighbour.
I used to live beside a milk dairy. It made me feel safe because there was always men on site, they were friendly often dropping off nearly expired items to neighbours etc, kept an eye on our houses while we slept and they worked. They weren’t really that noisy, yes there was vans being loaded and coming and going, glass clinking, the odd smash etc, but all in all they were fine, besides we all had double glazing…
A few years later (the dairy at this stage had been in operation for over 10 years) a woman moved in next door to me, but she didn’t like the dairy being there, she thought they were too noisy and shouldn’t be allowed to operate during unsociable hours, she called round to my house to try to get me to sign a petition to get the dairy closed down! I’m not sure how many signatures (if any!) she did get, but she probably got the same response from the other neighbours as she did from me… if you didn’t want the noise why did you move beside a dairy? If you don’t like it, then sell your house and move, the dairy was here first…
So the same thing applies here… if you did not want to sell on a site where the owner competes with you then why did you start selling here? And if you don’t like it, you can make the choice to not sell here.
Don’t expect Amazon to stop being Amazon because you aren’t happy…
(however I do agree that they should share the buy box fairly and threat themselves as any other seller on who wins it (ie have stock!))
Seller_WseB32EBb785w
I wouldnt sell anything on here that wasn’t our own brand, other than in exceptional circumstances. If you do, either your profitability, rates of sale, or both, are going to be controlled to an extent, by your competition, and the last business I’d want to compete with is Amazon.
Seller_rGtEcZnu0JTRD
We have been on Amazon for 12 years, they have always sold a large portion of the stock that we sell, but we have always had good sales figures, and it is possible to compete with them, not that you always have to as there are customers that will not buy directly from Amazon, even if it means spending more.
I certainly do not see any increase in the amount of products we sell against Amazon, it has been consistent throughout our time on here, infact there are a lot of products that Amazon used to sell, and no longer do so our share has actually increased in these area’s.
I signed up to Amazon knowing they were a competitor, and was pleasantly surprised at just how powerful the platform is, I initially said that if I were to sell 10% of what we sold on eBay on here I would be happy. The reality os that we sell over 10 times the volume on here than we do on eBay.
We dont have any problem with Amazon selling on their own platform, why would we ? Every single seller knows this when they sign up, the trick is to evolve with the platform, constantly introduce new products, and be prepared to drop them if Amazon becomes too agressive, although for us this does not happen very often.
Totally agree with @NEil in what has been said above, at the end of the day this is Amazon, and they have every right to sell on here. I also though do agree that they should filter the buybox to be fairer, including losing it themselves when they are our of stock.
Seller_77IcbQKVGdZo0
To be fair I have Amazon selling on a large number of my listings. It has increased in the last 12 months however it hasn’t really impacted sales.
I find Amazon sometimes sell at a much higher price than me so I can compete. They sometimes require the customer to buy multiple units so I can compete. They also run out of stock frequently so again it is easy to pick up sales then.
The only point I agree with is that Amazon should not be allowed to hold the buy box when they are out of stock or delivery is several weeks in the future. Especially if there are other sellers who can fulfil the items quicker.
Seller_yt1tc1VEjHw2P
Point To be noted we are also facing same problems!
Seller_tyyUEfNLKeHg1
I think you find more and more manufacturers are going direct cutting us out which lowers the price for customers and is less hassle for them dealing with one large customer
Seller_P9WE9DmQhKbaT
Eventually, (but it will take a long time starting from here) there will be monopolies regulation in the EU and the USA that will force Amazon to split the business in two (marketplace and their own fulfillment operation)
Seller_Uu1wdCFnoCleR
I have been working in e-commerce for 25 years and it was always going to happen with Amazon. Use the third party sellers, as guinea pigs, to find the best selling items and then just sell the product themselves. It shouldnt really come as a surprise as basic economics. Amazon is just becoming a massive monopoly and the consumer will pay in the end.
