Selling Lego on Amazon.com

[calmdahn]

3 hours ago, thombockerman said:

I’m suspicious you got a phishing email and the login kept giving errors because they now have your info. Hopefully I’m wrong

no, that's not it.  

3 hours ago, Bold-Arrow said:

Why was your account closed ? That will help me answer your question 

"Seller Account Closed

We noticed that it's been a while since you’ve had any transactions on your Amazon seller account associated with this email address. Because of the inactivity, we have closed this seller account.

Your buyer account is not affected.

We appreciate that you chose Amazon as a selling channel, and we’d be delighted to see you return. When you’re ready, simply register a new account.

Thank you,

Amazon Seller Performance"

 

and then when i try to sign up via amazon services to sell online i get an error that says 

 

"You cannot sign up for this account because of your incompatible account status."

Edited April 6, 2018 by calmdahn

[teamhappyfrog]

Has anyone experienced this error when uploading completed packing list:

original-record-number    sku    error-code    error-type    error-message
100001    -    1    Error    Error: Empty cartons present Carton 2,Carton 3 (FBA_INBOUND_CARTON_052)

I resolved the other error that I had and now I only have this and I have to wait up to 48 hrs for a specialist to get back to me.

[33Lego]

I recall that last year I can generate a year end report on the total amount commission I paid to Amazon and the total amount of return, .etc.

But somehow I cannot remember how to generate it for 2017.

Can someone help me?

found out myself.

https://sellercentral.amazon.com/forums/t/want-a-date-range-summary-report-for-2017-but-now-limited-to-180-days/339981/14

put it here so other people can benefit.

Edited April 11, 2018 by 33Lego

[Bold-Arrow]

10 minutes ago, 33Lego said:

I recall that last year I can generate a year end report on the total amount commission I paid to Amazon and the total amount of return, .etc.

But somehow I cannot remember how to generate it for 2017.

Can someone help me?

found out myself.

https://sellercentral.amazon.com/forums/t/want-a-date-range-summary-report-for-2017-but-now-limited-to-180-days/339981/14

put it here so other people can benefit.

The new 180 day limit interval sucks . 

[NIevo]

So decided to try and see if selling on Amazon is worth it for me.  Got an account set up but when I go to list an item it is requiring that I submit a form with purchases from a distributor or the manufacturer of at least 10 units.  What has everyone sent in to satisfy this?  Obviously with LEGO's limits it is hard to get 10 of anything. 

Anyone who has sold on Amazon for a while have any regrets?

[legorunner]

Just a heads up, LEGO has been gated on Amazon for awhile now. Sellers were grandfathered in when the gate hit, but no new sellers without being linked to a distributor, which is pretty much impossible to do without running a legit toy store as far as I know.

[NIevo]

Kinda what I was wondering, if there was any way to get approved.  I wonder if submitting a receipt with say 10x polybags would work?

Edited April 14, 2018 by NIevo

[amrandazz]

What he is saying is that you basically have to be an authorized retailer to sell LEGO if you weren't grandfathered in a couple years ago. There's a whole thread on Amazon FBA that should catch you up.

[brickology101]

That’s why even with all the unpleasant experience like returns, cancelled listings, lost sets, etc. it is still worthwhile to be able to sell Lego’s on Amazon when one actually can.

[Emvisawthatswho]

I started doing FBA this year and can’t be happier. No problems; I’ve had the buy box many times, items selling quickly. I’m grandfathered in from years of being FBM. Only 1 return which in turn sold within days of being returned to my FBA inventory. 0 complaints so far.

[cladner]

gate came down 8/26/2016.  if you sold a certain amount of LEGO before this date you were grandfathered in.  if you had an account which had been dormant for  LEGO selling for years, you might have been gated out.   the gate thus far is impenetrable unless you are an authorized LEGO reseller with a letter from TLG + $1000 fee to Jeff.

 

18 hours ago, NIevo said:

Kinda what I was wondering, if there was any way to get approved.  I wonder if submitting a receipt with say 10x polybags would work?

no that won't work but it might get your ENTIRE amazon selling account banned.

only practical way to  sell lego on amazon now would be to try and buy someone's amazon store that is grandfathered in. 

i predict we will see such sales in the next few years as some sellers get out of the game.

it is extremely lucrative selling on amazon with strongest leveraging of your efforts with respect to number of sales and price per sale and almost no time packaging individual boxes or dealing with customer service (at least in my experience).

even a small time person like me can move 5 digits in weekly sales during the holiday insanity and ability to sell LEGO and other gated toys on amazon will be worth thousands of dollars to the next generation of reseller scum when I finally tire of the smell of post camping weekend sleeping bag fart that greets me every time i walk into walmart to go hunting.

 

you can read about it all starting here:

 

•  

Edited April 15, 2018 by cladner

[Mark Twain]

On behalf of those of us who weren't grandfathered in and can't sell Junior sets at x5 rrp at the holidays.

 

[brickology101]

1 hour ago, Emvisawthatswho said:

I started doing FBA this year and can’t be happier. No problems; I’ve had the buy box many times, items selling quickly. I’m grandfathered in from years of being FBM. Only 1 return which in turn sold within days of being returned to my FBA inventory. 0 complaints so far.

Good for you. Out of 200 k$ Of Lego sets I sold last year on AMZ I had about 6 k$ of refund so that’s about 2-3% of my sales. Out if these returns half of them were customer damaged and one was a return fraud. Finally, the entire last year I had only one negative feedback for a set that was supposedly not new which I am still convinced today was not a genuine feedback. This one feedback dropped my rating from 100% to 96% and still is 96% today. Could not get Amazon to remove the feedback. Buyer never responded and never returned the item. All in all I did great with a 5 digit profit but It is these little things that are really annoying and stressful when selling on AMZ.

[LegoBro]

1 hour ago, cladner said:

gate came down 8/26/2016.  if you sold a certain amount of LEGO before this date you were grandfathered in.  if you had an account which had been dormant for  LEGO selling for years, you might have been gated out.   the gate thus far is impenetrable unless you are an authorized LEGO reseller with a letter from TLG + $1000 fee to Jeff.

 

Impenetrable is a strong word.  More like if anyone knew of a way, it would behoove them to tighten that lip up or open the floodwaters to ebay 2.0. The $1k fee was removed a while back, unless it's made a comeback.

34 minutes ago, brickology101 said:

Good for you. Out of 200 k$ Of Lego sets I sold last year on AMZ I had about 6 k$ of refund so that’s about 2-3% of my sales. Out if these returns half of them were customer damaged and one was a return fraud. Finally, the entire last year I had only one negative feedback for a set that was supposedly not new which I am still convinced today was not a genuine feedback. This one feedback dropped my rating from 100% to 96% and still is 96% today. Could not get Amazon to remove the feedback. Buyer never responded and never returned the item. All in all I did great with a 5 digit profit but It is these little things that are really annoying and stressful when selling on AMZ.

Stressful is definitely a word I would use as too much negative feedback can get your account suspended.  At any time Amazon could also request invoices from any seller selling lego on Amazon.  Then what?  Yeah, probably overblown a bit as most sellers who get their account suspended just seem to be bad sellers (sending crap in, or really just not knowing what they are doing through FBM or FBA), but that that doesn't mean it can't happen for a variety of other reasons.  Knock on wood, say a few prayers tonight, tomorrow is not guaranteed on that platform.

Just my 2 cents for what it's worth, but there is money to be made on ebay as many do indeed make good money selling on that platform selling various items including lego.  You just have to be a lot more aware of the purchases your making, hold longer, go PowerSeller, buyin buyin buyin price,  etc...  Don't follow every picker posting their buys, as many of them sell on different platforms.  Newbies beware. 

Forum suggestion - I'd suggest an area for BP's to post under their avatar stating what platform they sell on.  May help the newbies out.  Then again, what do I know.

[Mark Twain]

I'm curious about something. Since the gate came down and the value of FBA access increased, has anyone partnered/ absorbed (Jeff's favorite word!) other resellers and given them access as secondary users?

https://sellercentral.amazon.com/gp/help/external/901?ref=efph_901_cont_200141510&language=en-US

Would it essentially be setting up a small business?

[asharerin]

1 hour ago, Mark Twain said:

I'm curious about something. Since the gate came down and the value of FBA access increased, has anyone partnered/ absorbed (Jeff's favorite word!) other resellers and given them access as secondary users?

https://sellercentral.amazon.com/gp/help/external/901?ref=efph_901_cont_200141510&language=en-US

Would it essentially be setting up a small business?

It is relatively easy to get ungated in the Lego brand on Amazon these days. I don't think being ungated in Lego gives your account any significant value.

It is still also very easy to get kicked off Amazon so I wouldn't advise giving anyone access to your account under any circumstance unless you have multiple unlinked back up accounts already operating so if one goes down it is not an issue.

[LegoEdison]

On 4/11/2018 at 6:01 PM, 33Lego said:

I recall that last year I can generate a year end report on the total amount commission I paid to Amazon and the total amount of return, .etc.

But somehow I cannot remember how to generate it for 2017.

Can someone help me?

found out myself.

https://sellercentral.amazon.com/forums/t/want-a-date-range-summary-report-for-2017-but-now-limited-to-180-days/339981/14

put it here so other people can benefit.

the 1099-K from Amazon include the fee / shipping? in other word. is it the net we get at the end?

[zaphoid]

1 hour ago, asharerin said:

It is relatively easy to get ungated in the Lego brand on Amazon these days. I don't think being ungated in Lego gives your account any significant value.

Willing to share?  I've looked around at what it takes and can't seem to come to a straight answer.

[33Lego]

It is the total charge /payment processed.
So it is not what you got. Try to generate a "summary" report for last year. It will tell you how much you actual got, how much you paid amazon for commission, how much was returned, .etc.

[33Lego]

It is Report -> Payments -> Date Range Report

Then for the radio button, select summary.

[asharerin]

1 hour ago, zaphoid said:

Willing to share?  I've looked around at what it takes and can't seem to come to a straight answer.

Order from a distributor (you won't be ordering Lego sets but rather other Lego branded merchandise). Submit invoices. Super easy.

[asharerin]

1 hour ago, LegoEdison said:

the 1099-K from Amazon include the fee / shipping? in other word. is it the net we get at the end?

1099-K is the gross payments Amazon's customers paid. To get your taxable income you need to add in reimbursements and any sales you had outside of Amazon, and then back out all of your expenses (such as amazon fees and all shipping, cost of goods sold, amazon pro subscription, advertising, office expenses, home office deduction, mileage, storage fees etc) and refunds.

[Bold-Arrow]

Supreme Court and online taxes http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-pol-court-online-sales-20180417-story.html

[NIevo]

Well having a selling account doesn't do me any good anyways if I have no options to sell LEGO so no worried about loosing anything.  I didn't realize there wasn't any way to sell certain items on there or I wouldn't have even signed up.  Bricklink and eBay are my only outlets right now so I was just trying to broaden my options.

[yannick29]

From this morning, it is not possible to sell toys on amaznEurope without the autorization from the Brand.

We have been selling for 5 years and received today this email from amazon:

Dear seller,

Please read this email carefully. The listing information described below may affect your ability to sell certain products.

As part of our ongoing efforts to provide the best possible customer experience, we are implementing approval requirements for Juguetes y juegos products.

What does this mean for me?
Effective on 2018-04-18, you will need approval to list the affected products. If you do not obtain approval to sell these products prior to 2018-04-18, your listings for these products will be removed.

Why am I receiving this message?
You are receiving this message because you have sold affected products in the past. There is no penalty associated with this action.

Yannick