Amazon have opened up a shop front on a rival’s marketplace. Unable to make the inroads into China that they would wish, they’ve done the next best thing and opened up a store on Alibaba’s TMall marketplace.
That’s astonishing from two aspects. Firstly could you ever imagine Amazon opening a store on eBay in the UK or vice versa? Because that’s the equivalent of what just happened. It’s one way of getting your brand in front of China’s consumers and TMall is huge, it’s bigger than Amazon and eBay put together.
The other surprising thing is that TMall don’t appear to have objected. Again can you imagine the reaction if Amazon started to punt their wares on eBay or if Rakuten opened up a store on Amazon in the UK? Of course one aspect is that Amazon will now be paying fees to Alibaba.
I guess “If you can’t beat em, join em” is the new order of the day for Amazon.
