Selling through Amazon FBA

[belljohn]

1 hour ago, jaylay said:

Fulfillment to the buyer meaning it includes shipping on top of their fees.

I ve always wanted to try Amazon but shipping my stock accross the pacific would just totally be unacceptable as all profits won't be realized as it will all go to shipping.

Have you priced it out?  I was completely floored by how cheap it is to ship using Amazon's negotiated price.  My last FBA shipment to California from Wisconsin was for two 24x16X16 boxes weighing 29 and 25 lbs.  The dimensional weight was way more and I had to pay extra for a large box.  Total for both boxes UPS was $22.59.  The sale value of the Lego sets was close to $3,000.  I know you are shipping from Hawaii and you can't choose the warehouse you want to ship to, but it might be worth it.

[Phil B]

7 hours ago, belljohn said:

Have you priced it out?  I was completely floored by how cheap it is to ship using Amazon's negotiated price.  My last FBA shipment to California from Wisconsin was for two 24x16X16 boxes weighing 29 and 25 lbs.  The dimensional weight was way more and I had to pay extra for a large box.  Total for both boxes UPS was $22.59.  The sale value of the Lego sets was close to $3,000.  I know you are shipping from Hawaii and you can't choose the warehouse you want to ship to, but it might be worth it.

I'd like to second this. I had always shied away from FBA but just sent in my first shipment. 2x 20x16x11 boxes, each 14lbs, shipped to Texas and New Jersey from the midwest. Each box was ~$6-$7 to ship, containing ~20 items, which made the shipping per item around $0.30. And any other shipping costs (for Amazon to send this to whomever buys the sets) are included in the FBA fee. Not a bad deal if you ask me.

So even if, with the great UPS rates Amazon gets, you need to pay $20 to get a box with 20 sets to a warehouse on the mainland, that's only $1 per set. I doubt you can send them across the ocean cheaper if sold individually, even when accounting for the fee increase between FBA and EBay (~8%).

[asharerin]

Shipping to FBA will run around $0.30 per lb using SPD. On a pallet will be around $0.10 per lb for LTL. For us the real benefit is the outsourcing of storage, picking, packing, advertising / promos and customer service. Because Bezos built his centers in the middle of nowhere those rates are insanely cheap. Instead of 10 employees and 2 warehouses it is just myself, my wife and my son receiving items from UPS and Fedex and they go back out to Amazon the same day. If you really want hands off you can even have everything shipped from your suppliers to a prep center and pay around $1 per item and do nothing but source. We just don't trust anyone else with our Amazon business and the future income stream. If Amazon messes up in their warehouse you get a free pass. If your prep center messes up it is suspension time.

[cobrakai]

I'm not positive, but I think the discounted inbound FBA shipping rates are much higher from Hawaii.

[legopocalypse]

20 hours ago, asharerin said:

jack off craigslist 

 

[Robb]

Love selling FBA and here are a few of my fave free tools:
*** Keepa extension for Chrome:
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/keepa-amazon-price-tracke/neebplgakaahbhdphmkckjjcegoiijjo?hl=en
Keepa will show you the sales history and historic price, as well as Amazon's history on a listing, right on the product page automatically. Read the chart and find out that average sales rank which is far more useful than the current sales rank.
*** How Many? extension for Chrome:
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/how-many/fifaampimdjablpkjapdjehjcfloecjp?hl=en
How Many? will display how much of each item your competitors have instock quickly and easily. 5 free uses per day. Want more? Purchase or simply re-install. Want to hide this info from your competitors using this app? Change the Max Order Quantity to the amount you want to show.
*** Jungle Scout Sales Estimator:
https://www.junglescout.com/estimator/
Very accurate and useful estimator to see how many units per month an item will sell for a given rank and category. Plug that average sales rank found from Keepa in and bingo. It is extremely accurate and they update it monthly to account for the changing traffic throughout the year.
These are free tools we use ALOT. Have any others that you find useful then please reply and add them!
 
 

Keepa has a setting that will do what [How many?] does. No limit. Keepa is awesome!

[asharerin]

2 hours ago, Robb said:

Keepa has a setting that will do what [How many?] does. No limit. Keepa is awesome!

It does but it does not show for every seller. Not sure what the criteria is. How Many? gets them all. If you figure out how to get Keepa to show stock levels for every seller pls post here.

[Robb]

7 hours ago, asharerin said:

It does but it does not show for every seller. Not sure what the criteria is. How Many? gets them all. If you figure out how to get Keepa to show stock levels for every seller pls post here.

I didn't use How many? long enough to notice the difference. In my experience the ones that keepa doesn't get are ignorable. But, I could be wrong. If How many? was free to use I would compare them.

[legolegolego2014]

For those that have sold polybags via FBA, do you just place the FBA label on the LEGO polybag? Or do you do something special/different. Any tips? 

[Bold-Arrow]

4 minutes ago, legolegolego2014 said:

For those that have sold polybags via FBA, do you just place the FBA label on the LEGO polybag? Or do you do something special/different. Any tips? 

on the bag for me 

[Loghamel]

29 minutes ago, Bold-Arrow said:

on the bag for me 

x2

[asharerin]

Here is a list of the newly gated sub-categories on Amazon. Went into effect sometime in the last 48 hrs (but was trialed by Amazon in December):

Baby Activity Gear
Baby Car Seats
Baby Diapering
Baby Feeding
Baby Food and Formula
Baby Stroller and Carrier
Baby Topicals
Batteries
Chargers
Childrens Costumes
Contraceptives
Cook Tools
Dietary Supplements
Feminine Hygiene
Helmets
Industrial Supplies
Infant toys
Kid and Baby Furniture
Learning Toys
Medical Supplies and Equipment
Outdoor and Sports Toys
Pet Care Products (formerly OTC Medication)
Professional Medical Devices
Radio Controlled Toys (formerly Toy Models and Kits)
Seasonal Lighting
Topicals
Toy Building Blocks

Lego is under Toy Building Blocks (unless listed incorrectly) that is why no more collectible for Lego conditions, just new. 

[exciter1]

Cool, I'm good for breast pumps, chargers, helmets and industrial supplies.

[Darth_Raichu]

I do not know why anyone would buy some of those stuffs in that list sight unseen from 3PS on Amazon

[asharerin]

42 minutes ago, Darth_Raichu said:

I do not know why anyone would buy some of those stuffs in that list sight unseen from 3PS on Amazon

If they are buying through the Buy Box with prime then they think they are buying directly from Amazon. Until I started selling on Amazon I was the same way. That is the whole dog and pony show.

[Jackson]

How many sellers here actually buy from wholesalers and distributors? In my experience, it's no good. What happens is I buy 10 cases of trinket Z from the distributor at $20 per unit. A week later, a retailer puts trinket Z on clearance for $10 each. So all the "non-authorized" sellers are now selling trinket Z $10 below my break-even point, and I'm stuck with 10 cases for eternity.

Am I doing it wrong? I must be doing it wrong.

[landphieran]

29 minutes ago, Jackson said:

Am I doing it wrong? I must be doing it wrong.

In my experience most distributors are not worth your time. I have gotten contracts with distributors only to scour there catalog and realize Amazon offers literally everything they have at a cheaper price.

That being said there are seasonal items, low production distribution items, as well as hot stock people aren't paying attention too. Am I great at this? No. I have a full time job. I do know a couple niches, which double as my hobbies, that treat me well.

A lot of the big players here spend a lot of time finding there places in the market and have many years of experience.

 

[landphieran]

On a semi related note I think it's important to understand the types of goods you are aiming to supply.

Type 1 : Exclusive brand access, unlimited stock - insanely valuable (rare)

Type 2 : Only source of a listing but not necessarily exclusive - insanely valuable (short term)

Type 3 : Distributor stock - hot items, clearance items, replenishables - offers consistent okay returns, time consuming, competitive

Type 4 : Rare hard to find items - great profit to time ratio, limited stock, high risk, exclusive access?

Type 5 : Flippers - low barrier to entry, highly volatile, short term gain, time consuming to track trends.

I personally view items I sell in these buckets. I currently use type 2/3/4 and very rarely 5. I spend most of my time working towards finding type 1/2 connections. I have a couple of type 2 sources setup and I can't stress how much easier life is. You place a huge order, label it, pack it, send it and forget. No deal hunting, no price wars, no store hunting. I'm not going to quit my day job anytime soon but with enough of those connections, or the right one, you have yourself a long term repeatable lucrative future.

 

 

 

 

Edited March 27, 2017 by landphieran

[redcell]

on the bag for me 

Same here

[Jackson]

1 hour ago, landphieran said:

Type 2 : Only source of a listing but not necessarily exclusive - insanely valuable (short term)

 

 

 

 

 

For type 2, do you mean you are the only seller on the listing just because other sellers haven't caught on yet?

I've also experienced browsing a "wholesaler" catalog only to find that Amazon has most of the items for about the same price or cheaper.

Also, I jumped through the hoops to get a wholesale account with a company once, but they canceled my account a few weeks later, saying that I couldn't have a wholesale account because I didn't have a brick-and-mortar store. So I continued to buy from their retail site during promos...at cheaper prices than I was getting through the wholesale account. It's dumb.

[asharerin]

7 hours ago, Jackson said:

How many sellers here actually buy from wholesalers and distributors? In my experience, it's no good. What happens is I buy 10 cases of trinket Z from the distributor at $20 per unit. A week later, a retailer puts trinket Z on clearance for $10 each. So all the "non-authorized" sellers are now selling trinket Z $10 below my break-even point, and I'm stuck with 10 cases for eternity.

Am I doing it wrong? I must be doing it wrong.

If you are going to do wholesale my advice is to contact a company who has a great product but is not on Amazon yet. Ask them to sign an agreement stating you will be the only authorized distributor allowed to sell on Amazon's platform. That way if any non-authorized sellers pop up on Amazon then you can open a case and have them kicked off. In our experience there is alot less risk and alot more money to be made doing RA and OA for products that are gated that you are ungated in with not many sellers and that Amazon does not have access to. If your game is strong you can get those products for well below wholesale price without having to commit to minimum quantities. Any new sellers that come along will be on the the other side of the gate and the few sellers on the listing are very likely to sit back and price match so everyone enjoys great sales without tanking margin. If you see a wholesale product that everyone has access to including new sellers and Amazon then move on unless you are going to create a bundle with other items that are a little harder to source.

[landphieran]

5 hours ago, Jackson said:

For type 2, do you mean you are the only seller on the listing just because other sellers haven't caught on yet?]

Yeah most of them are smaller distributors with niche products.  What @asharerin suggests is true and a great idea (try to get an agreement signed), however it's extremely difficult in practice. Business's aren't very willing to sign an agreement such as this. It often doesn't make sense for a small time seller to agree to not provide product to more willing sellers and or participate with Amazon themselves. Its worth a shot if you build a good rapport.

...Speaking off which ...I should try before anyone catches on ?

 

Edited March 27, 2017 by landphieran

[Kenxxx]

Noob question... so I'm preparing a shipment into FBA... haven't done this in a while... I'm going for easiest method possible: comingled inventory, use manufacturer UPC or Amazon labels (if needed), Amz Inventory placement service... I set up all the different SKUs I want to go FBA using the "Add a Product" function.  I'd search for say, "Lego Homing Spider Droid", and from the 3 or 4 identical / alternate product listings, I chose the one that comes up first in the search.  Now looking over my complete list I see that most of the products are not identified by an EAN or UPC that I recognize... in fact, very few of them start with the usual "673419xxxxxx".  If I ship my product in, will it scan correctly? For example, even though their system says that ISD 75055 is "EAN: 5054242212832" will it recognize the actual UPC on the box: 673419210577 ?

[exciter1]

39 minutes ago, Kenxxx said:

Noob question... so I'm preparing a shipment into FBA... haven't done this in a while... I'm going for easiest method possible: comingled inventory, use manufacturer UPC or Amazon labels (if needed), Amz Inventory placement service... I set up all the different SKUs I want to go FBA using the "Add a Product" function.  I'd search for say, "Lego Homing Spider Droid", and from the 3 or 4 identical / alternate product listings, I chose the one that comes up first in the search.  Now looking over my complete list I see that most of the products are not identified by an EAN or UPC that I recognize... in fact, very few of them start with the usual "673419xxxxxx".  If I ship my product in, will it scan correctly? For example, even though their system says that ISD 75055 is "EAN: 5054242212832" will it recognize the actual UPC on the box: 673419210577 ?

If you select from the one on the list, it should scan in correctly. I've never compared the UPCs.

[asharerin]

59 minutes ago, Kenxxx said:

Noob question... so I'm preparing a shipment into FBA... haven't done this in a while... I'm going for easiest method possible: comingled inventory, use manufacturer UPC or Amazon labels (if needed), Amz Inventory placement service... I set up all the different SKUs I want to go FBA using the "Add a Product" function.  I'd search for say, "Lego Homing Spider Droid", and from the 3 or 4 identical / alternate product listings, I chose the one that comes up first in the search.  Now looking over my complete list I see that most of the products are not identified by an EAN or UPC that I recognize... in fact, very few of them start with the usual "673419xxxxxx".  If I ship my product in, will it scan correctly? For example, even though their system says that ISD 75055 is "EAN: 5054242212832" will it recognize the actual UPC on the box: 673419210577 ?

First off never, ever do commingled for Lego.

Secondly if the seller who made the listing used the wrong upc or ean then you will want to print your own label otherwise you will create a huge mess for yourself. Each listing should have a unique upc or ean. If there are two or more listings with the same upc or ean then amazon will make you print an amazon barcode. If the person who created the listing used a fake UPC then the correct UPC on your boxes will not match and you are going to have big receiving issues ranging from unfulfillable inventory to lost inventory to having your FBA privileges revoked.

Thirdly when listing search on the amazon buyer platform, not the seller side. The listing with the best sales and most reviews will be the one you want in most cases. That should also have the correct UPC most of the time (but always do your due diligence). Copy that ASIN and list against it.

Easiest method is simply print your own FNSKU an don't do commingled.