It has been announced this week that Amazon Spain will be launching Amazon Launchpad. If you can read Spanish, that news can be found here. And the new national addition to Launchpad is a good opportunity to explore what the programme is and how it can be useful to merchants.
What is Amazon Launchpad?
It’s a way of inventors and entrepreneurs to take a new product to market, generate interest, make early sales and even get investment.
As Amazon says of Launchpad:
We often hear from startups that bringing a new product to customers can be just as challenging as building it. At Amazon Launchpad, we’re collaborating with crowdfunding platforms, venture capitalists, and startup accelerators to solve the sales and distribution problems every startup faces. We support these young companies with Amazon’s global selling and expertise so they can stay focused on product innovation. The Amazon Launchpad programme will help startups bring new products to our customers.
– Amazon
To get involved you’ll need to make an application. All the goods will need to be sent out using Fulfilment by Amazon (FBA).
Who can use Amazon Launchpad?
Existing Amazon merchants are welcome to apply and get involved and you can register through Seller Central. More information can be found here.
Although the branding and rubric makes much of Amazon Launchpad being all about ground breaking innovations and fantastic new inventions, actually quite a lot of the items featured by the scheme are workaday. If you cast your eye over the dedicated marketplace of items then you’ll see things like laptop stands and papery notebooks of various types.
Any merchant who has developed their own product, perhaps for private label sales on Amazon should consider Launchpad as an interesting prospect. It’s not essential to be looking for investment but it won’t suit a merchant branding a generic product for resale.
Have you an experience with Amazon Launchpad? Tell us all about it.
