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Amazon Discounts Other Sellers' Products as Retail Competition Stiffens (reuters.com)
Amazon is slashing prices of products from third-party sellers on its website, moving beyond its more typical method of discounts on items it sells directly. From a report: The "discount provided by Amazon" applies to products including board games and technological gadgets offered by other merchants as the holiday season approaches. The retailer has been trying to compete aggressively on some items to win sales and draw customers away from low-priced rivals like Wal-Mart Stores. The move allows Amazon to sell the products at lower prices while still giving full price to the sellers. "When Amazon provides a discount, customers get the products they want at a price they'll love, and small businesses receive increased sales at their listed asking price," an Amazon spokeswoman said in an emailed statement, noting that businesses can opt out at any time.
the old "drive all your competitors out of business" ploy. This time, powered by a global conglomerate.
This should be the final nail in Toys-R-Us. They need a good holiday shopping season to survive in their bankruptcy and it seems unlikely competitors will yield an inch.
Did anyone hear that Wal-Mart's tech incubator WalMart Labs is one of the worst places to work. Not surprisingly almost all the engineers feel they're underpaid
https://www.google.com/search?...
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They're going to lose this one and while I'm not wild about how Amazon has crushed the competition I won't shed a single tear for wally world.
So it's pretty ironic
Isn't this a perfect example of monopolistic behaviour? Use your large size to sell a service at zero or even below cost to drive anyone not using your service out of business?
Amazon sells nearly everything its third-party sellers do. I noticed after Amazon started collecting sales tax in my state they began to feature third-party sellers much more prominently in my browsing sessions, none of who collect sales tax because they're mostly virtual resellers with a physical presence in only one state. Amazon still makes money by charging transaction fees on the seller. The fact they're subsidizing discounts for these third-party sellers is more proof of Amazon's sales tax strategy.
I haven't bought from Amazon in 2 years because they aren't competitive with brick and mortar stores anymore. If I buy online it's through in store pickup at Walmart or best buy. Also, brick and mortar stores will price match Amazon; so.... No need to even buy from them. I don't want to wait days for something.... And, for fast service you want me to pay for prime? Lol nty
They are offering the discounts as a way to clear space in their buildings. Doing this is cheaper than offering sellers free removals or renting temporary buildings.
In the late 80s - early 90s time frame, Sam's and Pace (owned by KMart) were in competition. There were over a dozen Pace Membership Warehouses in the St. Louis metropolitan area by my recollection. I personally preferred Pace and thus watched what happened with interest.
Walmart decided they wanted the business. They proceeded to build a Sam's within sight of almost every Pace at great expense because they had to get whatever land was there instead of cherry-picking sites. It was so blatant that you knew what was going on from day one. After doing so, they opened the stores, set the prices below Pace (running them all at a loss), and fairly quickly put the Pace stores out of business. They then built some more new stores in the area with a different distribution so that they could cover the area with fewer stores and closed down almost everything they had built to put Pace out of business. When Pace started talking lawsuit, Walmart purchased the corpses to shut them up.
In a remarkably short time, we went from a competitive market to a monopoly market.
I sincerely hope that we're not seeing similar tactics happen here, but now to Walmart. Having Amazon in competition with Walmart helps us. Losing Walmart in that competition would put us right back in the monopoly situation with an even stronger predator.
Sure they could. Anyone with a concealed carry permit could have shot back.
On the other hand, some guy passing by did in fact return fire. Another guy also joined the pursuit and the perpetrator was quickly dealt with.
In Texas, little old ladies pack heat to deal with varmints.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
The move allows Amazon to sell the products at lower prices while still giving full price to the sellers.
What kind of sorcery is this?
Can't they give the products for free and give money to sellers?
Can't they buy all the sellers product and give them away?
I think Amazon is on its way to make a breakthrough in physics with a perpetual motion engine
I know they are trying to paint a happy face on this, but over the past year Amazon has instituted a number of seller hostile policies and we are getting pretty sick of it. Most recently - very recently - Amazon instituted an automatic return policy. It used to be that we would get a return request notification with a reason selected and an explanation from the buyer. This allowed me to save many sales or otherwise turn some frowns upside down. A return request was a great way to get a good seller review. Being able to offer customer service on returns also helped reveal scammers. Now if a buyer wants a refund, they just pick an option, usually "bought by mistake" or "did not need" with no written explanation. Still want to contact the buyer? Too late, they already printed out the prepaid return label and it's on its way. The seller pays for the prepaid return label. Have a policy that the cost of the label will be deducted from the return? The buyer can file a claim to dispute that and will usually win. Otherwise you get a nasty review out spite, and there is nothing to do about that either. Need a new guitar for a gig this weekend but you have to pay rent in two weeks? No problem! So we can opt out huh? Yeah, right. This week maybe.
I would rather not have posted this anon, but Amazon has become so big brother the paranoia is justified.
Ever since they switched to Amazon Delivery Service in my area I've switched to other online suppliers, even if they are more expensive and/or charge shipping.
The Amazon drivers, which are a local sub contractor, have driven over my lawn, lost packages and thrown packages onto my property (drive by delivery). Prior to this on the USPS had been guilty of these same infractions.
Seems UPS and FedEx have higher performance standards.
But what happens when Amazon stops discounting those items? They stop selling altogether because customers got used to the discounted prices.
Explain to me how exactly this business model makes a profit for Amazon? Are the discounts subsidized by the $100/year payment for Amazon Prime?
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
Time for an huge antitrust investigation of Amazon. Just like Microsoft at the turn of the century.
The amazon marketplace has watered down the amazon brand for me. Searching for something is a pain with all the 'sponsored item' placements and third party marketplace results. Even when I find something sold by amazon, you have to check reviews to see if their inventory has been tainted by marketplace knockoffs and factory seconds. I figured if they want to be like ebay, I will use the genuine ebay, at least I know that the questionable item will come direct from the seller, and not accidentally be from some other knockoff seller.
Yes I can filter results to 'shipped and sold by amazon,' but why bother when it's faster to just start somewhere else.
I just did a "bought by mistake" return to a 3rd-party seller on Friday and when I picked that class of reason for return Amazon made it quite clear that I would have to pay for return shipping because the seller was not at fault. The printed return label was also very clear that *I* would have to pay the postage.
You sound like someone who is just ticked off that you might have to ever accept a return.
There's crazies on both sides and we haven't heard the story of the shooter here...
I'm sure you were saying the same thing when that neo-nazi rammed people with his car. Right? Right?
No, this isn't the usual scheme. Put your stuff for sale on Amazon and buy it back at a discount. Then sell it again and again and again until Amazon stops giving you free money.
"Everybody's naked underneath" -- The Doctor
Everybody has his/her own reasons to do things. I'm not saying they're right or even justified.
#DeleteFacebook
It's all over the mainstream media. CNN, Washington Post, Fox, everyone is reporting it.
On the other hand... it doesn't belong on Slashdot. The shooter didn't do anything with technology, and his actions will have no foreseeable effect on the tech industry.
Go read about it on a general news site, and leave Slashdot for the nerdy stuff. I'm not interested on another fucking 2nd Amendment shitshow.
The situation might differ according to region, but where I live, Amazon almost never provides the cheapest offer on any product, and this didn't change as long as I know Amazon.
I do still visit Amazon's web page to lookup customer reviews and alike, which seem to be just more abundant there than elsewhere. Buy buying there? Rather not.
Just last week, I ordered two items: One printed image calendar and one piece of sport supplies. Both where signicantly cheaper at online shops other than Amazon, the calendar at -20% (including shipping and gift wrapping), the sports supply at about -30%.
The one category where I find Amazon to be price competitive is with tiny, seldom traded items that one can find to be sold only by either some "Amazon market" partner, or by very specialized shops that just don't sell anything cheaply, even if it's just some special-sized screw.
We had an article about the vegas shooting
To be fair, we thought the Vegas shooter was a double threat at first, both dark skinned and non Christian. Those shootings need to be covered. This is just another unrelated mental health issue. It is too soon to talk about it.
It will be too soon to talk about the next one too. Unless the guy is slightly tan and possibly related to her emails.
Its dumping. Its applying 3rd party money (Amazon's) to push a price down to allow a seller or subset of sellers to dominate a market (for an item). Its dumping. Same as solar, same as semiconductors.