In this somewhat related (rather lengthy) article, the NYT summarized the changes at AZ over the past few years that have made it nearly impossible to have your business there, while at the same time an online seller can’t afford not to: Prime Power: How Amazon Squeezes the Businesses Behind Its Store
“Last year, Americans bought more books, T-shirts and other products on Amazon than eBay, Walmart and its next seven largest online competitors combined, according to eMarketer, a research company.”
I can see them going halfway with the pricing thing. They’ll probably remove the policy, but retain the right to derank listings that are priced poorly compared to off-site prices. Which is fair, because they don’t really have the right to tell anyone how they can price things off-site, but they do have the right to suppress search ranks of listings that they feel aren’t giving customers a good deal.
Do they even enforce the off-site pricing rules? I haven’t heard of any suspensions purely on the basis that someone ran a sale on theirbrand.com but not on Amazon.
When we run deals on Amazon, we don’t match them on Walmart and we lose a spot or 2 in rank during the period. Matching the deal on Walmart didn’t increase revenue / profit so we stopped.
I’ve been afraid to test Amazon on this. We do it creatively on Shopify with multi-buy discounts that aren’t connected to the GTIN. They have no way to track that…
It’s all a game. You just need to know how to play it.
They don’t suspend but they absolutely do suppress…
We had a walmart seller jump on our top seller a few weeks ago with a really low price and Amazon took our Overall Pick away for the listing.
We threatened legal action instantly and that seller claimed it was a mistake and pulled off the listing. Within hours, the badge was back.
I do, because they are defrauding the consumer by letting them believe the inventory is genuinely new. They steal from the hard honest work of legitimate product dealers who purchase inventory with full providence of possession and pass that along to consumers. I would have no problem RA if Amazon rightfully listed their inventory as “Grey Market”.
This identifies who I am referring to as drop shippers. People who cannot complete this process because they never physically have control or possession of the inventory, or practices in place to make it legit.
" * You must identify yourself as the seller on invoices, packing slips, external packaging, and other items included with the product."
And…
“Next, make sure the supply chain is in order. Ask the dropshipping supplier where they receive products from and whether they have letters of authorization from the respective brands or manufacturers. Check the authorization to ensure it comes directly from the product source.”
I have several listings where my offer is hidden because of off-site pricing. However, in all situations its incorrect or improper reasoning. Different product, different brand, etc etc. Its just too much of a PITA to get them to fix.
Sorry, but a seller who uses the same supply chain validation as a stolen goods fence, should not be allowed to sell to the public IMO. As a consumer bilked by this type of behavior, I find it one of the worst things about online sales. This only exists here and swap meets because we all know other retailers would not tolerate it.
You don’t go to the grocery store and wonder if the apples (or anything for that matter) came from a vendor who bought them from Wal Mart at a deep deal for an unknown reason.
I understand my 25+ years of strict attention to following a checklist makes me a bit odd, but I believe that sentence needs a “shall not” followed by some kind of validation. That is the opposite of what currently happens. There are convicted felons for UPC theft and IP theft allowed to keep their account selling things to the public. I don’t believe Amazon vets anyone anymore outside of specific category sellers.
Long overdue. I may have a short snippet on Good Morning America tomorrow morning for those interested. Y’all probably know I’m pro-breakup. NPR has me on Morning Edition later in the week, maybe Thursday but not sure yet. We recorded this evening. I won’t reiterate my points, but I really hope we see some positive changes from this in our lifetimes.
