Amazon have now banned merchants from selling Apple and Beats products on their marketplace. From the 4th of January 2019, Apple and Beats products can only be offered by a small group of select Apple Authorised Resellers as part of Amazon’s new agreement with Apple.
Sellers are reporting that over the weekend Amazon started to remove offers of their Apple and Beats products listed on the site as announced in November. This effectively signals the end of their business unless they have built up sales on alternative marketplaces. Even then, most sellers on Amazon of Apple and Beats products will already be selling on eBay so their business will have been sliced in half this weekend.
This isn’t a particularly unusual arrangement and those familiar with Amazon’s brand registry will be only to familiar with the restrictions brands can impose. On the plus side, for consumers it means that they’ll be purchasing from an official channel but on the downside it means less choice of who to purchase from and very possibly higher prices, although for new Apple products margins have always been tight so discounts low. Authorised resellers will be happy as there will be less competition.
What to do if you have Apple and Beats products in Amazon FBA
If you have any remaining inventory of Apple or Beats products in Amazon fulfilment centres you will now need to create a Removal Order. Amazon said that they will reimburse you for the return or disposal fees until the 4th of February, 2019.
Where can you sell Apple and Beats products
Amazon has been a lucrative channel for sellers of Apple and Beats products but there are now only two options for these merchants. You’ll either need to become an authorised dealer to trade in what’s now become a gated category or find alternative marketplaces to sell on such as eBay, OnBuy and Flubit. Naturally competition on these sites will increase, so spreading your options is more important than ever as many of your competitors will probably focus purely on eBay.
10 Responses
1. this is price fixing.
2. this is a great reason not to put all your eggs in amazon’s basket.
3. amazon complying with this kind of thing, when they have aspirations to be all-pervasive, is a stupid move. this kind of monopolisation and protectionism will only hasten them being broken apart and punitively taxed by governments.
This was probably part of the deal they made with Apple…
Also, this should eliminate fakes, which is a huge problem on eBay for example where fake Apple & Beats products are sold in massive quantities.
So much for a free trade and independent marketplace. What they are doing is illegal and against anti competition laws.
What is the legal situation regards selling items if you are not an authorised supplier of a brand?
We have a supplier who has been trying to remove loads of idiots virtually giving away his products and that includes Amazon themselves. None are buying the items from his authorised distribution centre.
He has Brand registered with Amazon and trying to get people removed they just keep fobbing him off.
It seems the only people they will help are multi billion pound companies and the little man can go and whistle.
He does not want price rigging but when you have an item supplied out at an an RRP of £19.95 and then Amazon are offering it out at £14.64 delivered Prime. It makes a mockery of brick and mortar shops. it really means £10.64 with a risk of return.
If you live across the road from a shop selling it and it’s raining why cross the road you can order it from Amazon and not even go out.
The killer blow is knowing that the shipping others then try to match is around £4 next day so that means there is nothing left in the product as shops and businesses pay UK taxes and need profits unlike Amazon. Then if the item is returned any other Seller Fulfilled Prime seller is billed £2.99 return leaving the item as a minus item.
Then they wonder why people do not stock their items.
We could offer the item on eBay for £19.95 and pay eBay £2.19 fees leaving us £17.76.
When someone buys it purchase from Amazon Prime using our Prime account at £14.64 just changing the delivery address. That would leave us pocketing a little old £3.12 profit and no postage or packaging or handling.
Plus we do not need to place an order for the item in MOQ’s.
But as i say Amazon will only act for the really big boys with the threat of legal muscle behind them. If sellers remove Seller Fulfilled Prime and just offer free shipping watch Amazon take note.
Sadly the fakers and poor sellers have become a big issue that the big companies really don’t want the hassle of dealing with ( and that includes the market places. So this has driven this kind of thing. It’s a simple and effective solution to all but the small decent sellers who get caught up in the net.
While many will dash to ebay…. they have been slowly moving this direction too. Of course being ebay it has been at a painfully slow pace. The big market places are now looking for maximum profits for minimum work… and pushing out the little guys etc is one way to do it.
Hi Jake not sure what you understanding is but you talk as though Amazon are paying the same prices and then batting on a level playing field.
They are purchasing via a 3rd party maybe. But Jimmy Choo has stopped sellers even who are buying from their Distribution so its genuine. Calvin Klein have done the same and Amazon sucks up to them and removes the listings.
Amazon are not trading fairly when they ship for free. and will not let any of us use that free delivery company (fictional does not exist) and then pay all their billion pound tax bill to the UK government (oh sorry they don’t) they are destroying retailers everywhere. After all you tell me what person gets a dog and then says oh i need one of those special things that looks like that. They dont
They need to see it first in a shop window or tv advert then they shop online for it at the best price but when no-one stocks it the product fails. As for your understanding of milk sales to Tesco it is rather lacking.
Wisemans carry out all milk deliveries and orders in the UK controlling the whole market place for every supermarket not just Tesco and they dictate the prices. Of course the farmer can say get lost and milk his herd directly down the drain and stand a few pints at the farm gate hoping to sell a few litres unfortunately that will end with him bust.
No market place for a fresh product means they can do nothing about it. and people are not going to go to the farm gate to collect it.