I was going to go to walmart and a few other places tomorrow, and I was thinking about signing up for the Amazon FBA program. I've read a lot of good things about it, and it seems to be pretty much hassle free. (Besides all the label printing, and shipping). Do any of you use the Amazon FBA program? Please post in the comments or contact me directly if you do!
A few of my questions would be:
- Where do you source your items?
- What items do you seem to sell the most of?
- How are the items priced on Amazon?
- What do you need to get started?
- Do the fees make it worth it?
~Nandry
I've been using FBA for a month or so I **love** it. I have heard very little bad about it (which for the internet is amazing!)
ReplyDelete1. I source primarily from retail arbitrage and new stuff at yard sales/thrifting (to count as new for FBA there can be little to no shelf wear) FYI Toy/Babies R Us has 80-90% off colored stickered tags. We did great there
2. Baby has always sold well (amazon has a baby registry) I do well in health and beauty too but now that is gated and you have to be an actual authorized reseller to be approved. Toys do well also (i sold 4 furby booms in 2 days). Basically any "need" sells better in this economy than "want"
3. Amazon has a lot more competition. I match the lowest price or slightly higher based on the selling rank. If you have no feedback be prepared to be lower on price (I only have 7 feedback out of 200 transactions. Amazon buyers don't leave FB unless there is a problem typically)
4. You will possibly need polybags, shrinkwrap, suffocation labels, bubble wrap, ready to ship labels, and a heat gun for price tags. Be prepared for more supply overhead but then again I think its really worth it.
5. Yes depending on the price point. I don't sell anything under 9.99 they take out too much in fees. As the general rule buy for 3x less that what you will sell it for. Most blogs I read try to make 100% after fees. I try to make 50% after fees just because I'm still new.
Profit Bandit (i hear they monthly charge now but my plan is apparently grandfathered in as long as i dont upgrade) and Seller Mobile by Amazon apps are 2 good iOS apps to have (profit bandit is on Droid too but not the amazon one).
We were going to start with 10 items to send in but our first shipment ended up being 229 items to see if it was worth it. We really like it. Worst case senario if you don't like it you can pay 50 cents an items to get it back and sell it on eBay :D
Oh my goodness you have made my day!! Thank you so so much for commenting! I will definitely be trying this out. It seems like it could be a great source for extra income. I'm going to go shopping tomorrow and hopefully bring back a few things. Thanks again!!
Delete~Nandry
glad I could make your day LOL. I made a similar blog post 2 months ago and not a single reply. Look up the blog Online Selling Experiment. He is an absolute wealth of knowledge (but his posts are super unassuming which is kinda nice) Also Toys R Us and Babies R Us has 80-90% off the clearance only for a few more days. Hubby and I hit 3 or 4 different stores and they all seemed to have good-to-better FBA clearance still available.
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