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Amazon Is Kicking All Unauthorized Apple Refurbishers Off the Site (vice.com)
In a new agreement between tech giants Amazon and Apple, shoppers will soon see a selection of the latest Apple products on Amazon.com. This is not good news for everyone. Motherboard: John Bumstead is a computer refurbisher who, every year, saves thousands of laptops from the shredder. He buys MacBooks en masse from electronics recyclers, fixes them, then sells them on Amazon Marketplace or wholesales them to vendors who do the same. Friday morning, Bumstead got an email from Amazon informing him that he'd no longer be allowed to sell Apple computers on the platform, thanks to a new agreement between Apple and Amazon that will only allow "authorized resellers" to sell Apple products.
"As part of a new agreement with Apple, we are working with a select group of authorized resellers to offer an expanded selection of Apple and Beats products, including new releases, in Amazon's stores," the email says. "You are receiving this message because you are currently selling, or have previously sold, Apple or Beats products. Your existing offers for those products will soon be removed from Amazon's online store in the United States. Please contact Apple if you would like to apply to become an authorized reseller on Amazon." As the email notes, this is part of a new agreement between two of the largest companies in the world that will allow Amazon to sell new Apple products around the world; in exchange, Amazon agreed to let Apple pick-and-choose who is allowed to sell Apple products on the site.
"As part of a new agreement with Apple, we are working with a select group of authorized resellers to offer an expanded selection of Apple and Beats products, including new releases, in Amazon's stores," the email says. "You are receiving this message because you are currently selling, or have previously sold, Apple or Beats products. Your existing offers for those products will soon be removed from Amazon's online store in the United States. Please contact Apple if you would like to apply to become an authorized reseller on Amazon." As the email notes, this is part of a new agreement between two of the largest companies in the world that will allow Amazon to sell new Apple products around the world; in exchange, Amazon agreed to let Apple pick-and-choose who is allowed to sell Apple products on the site.
So, who amongst geeks or hardware hackers needs Amazon or official Apple Macbooks? Refurbished Macbooks are aplenty on ebay, as always. Similarly, macos Mojave works on cheap linux-using laptops in vmware with some tweaking.
I deny that I have not avoided attaining the opposite of that which I do not want.
monopoly
/mnäplE
noun
the exclusive possession or control of the supply or trade in a commodity or service.
Politics; n. : A religion whereby man is god.
Allowing others to sell used/refurbished hardware is certainly less profitable than being allowed to sell new stuff yourself.
These refurbished are free to set up their own storefront and sell their product. No one is owed the traffic that Amazon provides.
This is tantamount to a craft brewer complaining he can't put his beer in Walmart's aisle coolers.
Not quite. Amazon has been pushing their platform for years as a safer alternative to eBay.
To use your example, this is tantamount to a craft brewer complaining he suddenly can't put his beer in Walmart's aisle coolers after Walmart encouraged him to put them there for years.
Apple reigns in the renegades.
Time for some trust-busting, Sherman Act style. Where's Theodore Roosevelt when we need him?
Yes, a person can set up their own storefront, there will always be ways for dedicated customers to find a supplier. However, as a supplier who, I don't know, wants to make a living, this kind of power to cut you off 99% of the market is really devastating to people for whom it isn't a hobby.
Hell, my employer loses 10s of thousands of dollars a month in fraud from people reselling our stuff on Amazon and Amazon refuses to do anything about it, even after we've told them repeatedly that our products are not authorized for sale on their site.
Sounds like your employer's products are underpriced if resellers can make a profit reselling them on Amazon. Either that or you need to do better inventory control.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
You buy a computer, sell it, and now Apple and Amazon say you can't resell it?
No, you can still sell it. Apple & Amazon are saying you can't resell it on Amazon.
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
In the internet sales business, Amazon has effectively become a monopoly.
Oh, right, because there are NO other companies to buy from "in the internet sales business".
None that anyone buys from. The mere existence of another store does not meet the minimum requirements for competition. There must also be a reasonable possibility of actually selling goods there.
As a buyer, calling Amazon a monopoly is pretty accurate. Apart from a very small number of product-line-specific resellers that I buy from, the only other selling platform out there is eBay, which is basically only a last resort if I can't find what I want on Amazon. More to the point, not once have I bought anything on eBay merely because it was cheaper there. I don't even *start* looking at eBay unless Amazon has failed to provide the product. So at least for me, sellers that sell solely on eBay are not competing with Amazon in any meaningful way.
But even that is not what makes this disconcerting. With this policy, Amazon is restricting not just new product sales, but also used product sales. After all, that's what a refurbished product is. Never before in the history of mankind have two companies with as much market power as Apple and Amazon colluded to destroy the used market for their products. Anyone who owns an Apple product should be very, very concerned, both with the realization that Apple wants them to be unable to sell their products when they want to upgrade and with the horrible net impact on the environment resulting from such policies.
Shame on you, Apple. And shame on you, Amazon, for going along with it. I have never been more disappointed in Apple in all my life.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
there is no problem here, plenty of other places that guy can sell his things to those who like that stuff.
Except there's not. Show me another online platform where a seller can ship a bulk load of good to a huge warehouse and have that platform take care of shipment and delivery. Amazon has a massive logistics infrastructure that sellers can take advantage of.
This is tantamount to a craft brewer complaining he can't put his beer in Walmart's aisle coolers.
No.... this is tantamount to officials from your local flea market coming up to your permanent booth that you've been selling from for years informing you "We're going to have to close you down, because you've been selling reconditioned brand X products, and we've signed an exclusivity deal with brand X that only businesses authorized by brand X officials can sell brand X products at this market.".
This SEEMS like Antitrust, because Amazon != Apple, and Amazon is in the business of allowing 3rd party sellers to sell pretty much any kind of product on their website, which only a few general exceptions.... this is Not normal like Walmart refusing to allow a 3rd party to stock goods in their store. The Amazon marketplace is more like eBay..... it would be like Apple signing a deal with eBay requiring eBay to remove/block listings for all Apple-branded products unless the seller is pre-approved with Apple as "permitted to sell".
There goes.... not only all the legitimate used/refurbished equipment, But generic replacements for things like Macbook power adapters, non-Apple-OEM adapters, lightning cables, thunderbolt cables, etc.
Strange..
Both Apple and Amazon started in garages..
More to the point, not once have I bought anything on eBay merely because it was cheaper there. I don't even *start* looking at eBay unless Amazon has failed to provide the product.
So, what you are saying is, that you have SELF-SELECTED Amazon, and then have the temerity to call it a "Monopoly"?
Right. Gotcha.
Frankly, I have bought several used Apple products over the years, and not ONE of them have I ever even LOOKED at Amazon. They have all come from eBay. In fact, in my mind:
1. Amazon = First place to check for New stuff.
2. eBay = First place to check for Used stuff.
And I would bet that 95% of all people feel exactly the same. In fact, I really didn't pay attention to the fact that there were whole businesses who sold Used stuff through Amazon.
I think the only Used thing I ever bought through Amazon was an out-of-print Sci-Fi book I wanted to re-read. And, IIRC, that wasn't even a wonderful experience; they sent me the wrong book the first time...