We went ahead and summarized some of the highlights in this year’s shareholder letter: Bezos took the shareholder letter as an opportunity to remind legislators that while Amazon is the largest player in the growing ecommerce space, Amazon is still a small fraction of global retail sales: “Amazon today remains a small player in global …
Jeff Bezos releases his annual letter to shareholders Read More »
Shortly after Amazon’s first quarter earnings report CFO Brian Olsavsky announced the company’s intention to enhance the standard Prime free two-day shipping program to a one day standard. Amazon introduced the Prime membership program 14 years ago, with free two day shipping being the principle benefit of the program. And while over the years Amazon …
Amazon investing $800M to build out one-day shipping for Prime Members Read More »
In an article posted on Bloomberg, Wedbush Securities Inc. analyst Michael Pachter estimated that Amazon sales on Prime Day were around $4.2 billion. If you want to capitalize on this high-volume period, there are a few questions that you should ask yourself. Have you submitted your deals on-time? Is your detail page content optimized for …
The deadline for submitting Prime Day deals is rapidly approaching. Prime Day is an excellent time to pick up sales on Amazon, so it is important that your product detail pages are ready and your deals are submitted on time. If you haven’t already, it may be a good chance to ask yourself, are you …
According to a study by Marketplace Pulse, a New York based e-commerce research firms, Amazon’s private label brands are not a significant threat to established brands. According to Juozas Kaziukenas, founder of Marketplace Pulse: “This idea that Amazon can introduce a product and magically use data to dominate a category is just a conspiracy theory, …
In an announcement earlier this month, Amazon said it would no longer force 3rd party sellers to price their products lower on Amazon than any other retail site or marketplace platform. These “Price Parity Agreements” or “Most Favored Nations Clauses” (MFNs) were used in Amazon contracts with 3P sellers to ensure that these sellers did …
According to a recent report in the Wall Street Journal, Amazon is considering expanding its brick and mortar presence by launching a new chain of grocery stores. Amazon acquired Whole Foods in 2017 for $13.7B, its largest acquisition to date. Amazon reportedly seeks to differentiate the two by offering a wider assortment than Whole Foods …
Amazon considering launching a new grocery store Read More »
You may have heard recently that Amazon shut off thousands of vendors. Though it appears this decision has been reversed, we’d like to share the available facts and their potential future implications. Impact on Navazon clients: All dropship accounts were suspended the week of February 25th Most dropship accounts were reactivated by March 3rd, …
In a move to gain ground on Amazon’s marketplace, Target has rolled out an expanded 3rd party marketplace called “Target+”. This invite only platform features a carefully curated selection including products from sporting goods company Mizuno and toy maker Kaplan. Target plans to carefully expand the selection over time but does not expect to open …
In November of 2014, Amazon rolled out a long-term commitment to achieve 100% renewable energy for their AWS infrastructure around the world. Over the last 5 years, 6 solar farms in Virginia and 3 wind farms in North Carolina, Indiana and Ohio have been constructed. The energy produced by these facilities is enough to offset …
Amazon has announced a new tool for First Party (1P) sellers to help police counterfeit items. An invite only program called “Project Zero” gives brands the ability to remove suspected counterfeit items without Amazon’s intervention. There are robust training requirements, and Amazon says they will be closely monitoring usage of the tool for signs of …
In 2019, Amazon started tracking “New-to-brand” sales through their advertising console. The New-to-brand metrics determine whether an ad-attributed purchase was made by an existing customer or one buying a brand’s product on Amazon for the first time in the last 12 months. This metric is only available for sponsored brand campaigns. The goal of …
In a statement issued on February 26th, the Federal Trade Commission announced the “first legal challenge of a marketer’s use of paid fake reviews on an independent retail site”. The FTC alleges that Cure Encapsulations Inc, paid the website, amazonverifiedreviews.com to create and post reviews of their weight loss product, producing an artificially inflated score …
After years of prioritizing growth over profit, Amazon has shifted their priority in the U.S. from selection to profitability. “CRaP” is an internal acronym for “Can’t Realize a Profit” once the fully loaded cost of the item is considered, including shipping and warehousing costs. These are often items that are large, bulky, heavy, or have …
On December 26th, Amazon announced yet another record-breaking Holiday sales season. While this news itself is noteworthy, and we shared updates about this in last month’s newsletter, what is especially important is Amazon picked, packed, and shipped these record-breaking orders with 20,000 less seasonal workers. According to Citi Bank Analyst, Mark May, it is …
Amazon announced in late 2018 that packages over 18” by 14” by 8” would require either Tier 2: Ships in Own Container (SIOC) or Tier 1: Frustration Free Packaging (FFP) certification. While there is some concern and confusion about the change, we summarize the context and steps here. Tier 2 SIOC (Ships in Own Container): …
When progress on a proposed EU-wide tax on large tech corporations stalled in late 2018, and movement slowed on a Franco-German joint “Tech Ad-Tax”, French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire announced France would move forward unilaterally with a tax on major American tech companies, including Amazon. In a 2018 press conference in Paris, Le Maire …
Effective February 1, 2019, the Indian government will be banning e-commerce companies from selling products where they have an equity interest. This will be especially harsh on Amazon and Flipkart (owned by Wal-Mart). In a statement earlier, the commerce ministry said: “An entity having equity participation by e-commerce marketplace entity or its group companies, …
New E-commerce Restrictions Will Impede Amazon’s Growth in India Read More »
Early in 2019, Amazon will be rolling out fee changes in Seller Central: FBA Inventory Storage Fees: February 15th, 2019 FBA Fulfillment Fees: February 19th, 2019 Referral Fees: February 19th, 2019 FBA Inventory Storage Fee Changes Starting February 15, 2019, long-term storage fees (LTSF) will be eliminated for items that have been in a fulfillment …
Amazon Seller Central Referral Fee Changes for 2019 Read More »
The third-party (3P) marketplace on Amazon has been a competitive place for sellers since it opened. New strategies have emerged that make the competition on Amazon even more ruthless. These strategies combined with Amazon’s strict policy enforcement and difficult-to-navigate customer support create a high stakes atmosphere that can cost businesses their livelihood. Amazon has …