Hey. How much did everyone invest in their initial product orders? Currently only have pretty much $50-$100 per fortnight and I’m tossing up between either saving up until I can place a more substantial order, or placing smaller orders and rolling all of the profit straight into the next order in order to slowly upscale.
Is there any unseen positive or negatives to either option, or is this just personal preference?
I have several $M USD in a manufacturing facility that grew over the years to accommodate online marketplace sales. Started out 24+ years ago and the marketplaces were desperate for sellers and treated my company very well. Things have changed, I was either way too stupid or just blinded by the success to see how they would change about 10 years later.
You must test everything because many things will fail, however, you will learn from those mistakes and make decisions based upon that. Only thing that is for certain is someone, either the marketplace, an activist buyer or competitor will stick a dagger in your back at some point in time. So just be aware of that and continue moving forward with your venture.
I can completely understand you. I am just starting and I am too worried not to waste my money on something that won’t sell.
I think it’s always better to wait and see how is the product performing before buying more.
Just to add to that, one thing that could never be posted on the amazon proper forum is the clear fact that returns and rip offs are significant. That is worse than not making money, you go negative very fast.
Hi @skeeter,
Just to add to that, one thing that could never be posted on the amazon proper forum is the clear fact that returns and rip offs are significant. That is worse than not making money, you go negative very fast.
I couldn’t agree with you more. It’s worse now than it’s ever been.
Both approaches have their pros and cons. Saving up for a more substantial order can give you the advantage of buying in bulk, which may result in lower unit costs and potentially higher profit margins. On the other hand, starting with smaller orders and reinvesting profits allows you to test the market and minimize risks, but it might take longer to upscale your business.
The unseen positives and negatives depend on your specific product, market, and business strategy. It’s essential to consider factors like product demand, competition, and the rate of return on your investment. Assessing your risk tolerance and long-term goals will help determine the best approach for you. Remember, it’s always a good idea to research and plan before making any decisions
If you are on a tight budget, you may want to consider placing smaller orders and rolling all of the profit straight into the next order. This will allow you to slowly grow your business without having to invest a large amount of money upfront. However, it will also take you longer to reach your goals.
If you have a larger budget and are willing to take on more risk, you may want to consider saving up until you can place a more substantial order. This will allow you to buy more products at once, which can lead to higher profits. However, it also means that you will have more money tied up in inventory, and you may not see a return on your investment as quickly.
Yes, remember how I was a huge supporter of the other online site. NOT any more, what they have been doing to my company over the last few months is awful. Our sales over there are down 70% on their site, now our dot com and amazon are only down single digits. Pretty obvious what is going on with a 63% spread.
Glad some of us are finding a URL where we can get back together, I miss all my friends from the amazon forum.
I did not transition to the new forum and have been looking for place to go where I will not have to wear a muzzle.
Hello Skeeter,
nice to see you there. I have been migrated to the New Forum on Amazon, so I had my suspension lifted. But I chose to setup this forum to ensure that we have a safe place where no one has to worry about being banned, suspended or otherwise targeted for their posting.
As you can see, here everyone is a “Member”, there are no “Leader” badges. There are no community flags and no one will be getting suspended.
Right now, I am not advertising this forum anywhere. I invited a few of my friends to join and also anyone who finds their way through Google or elsewhere.
At some point, maybe by the end of the year, I will post an advert into my FB group and do a Youtube video to help spread the word. Then I think crowds of other Amazon Sellers will come.
If you have any Amazon Seller Forum friends, feel free to invite them here.
Thank you for sponsoring this site, myself and my staff have always admired your drive and determination. It is wonderful to see young folks creating new paths.
Since I don’t use the new amazon forum that would be hard to do. Since this is a social media type site you should start to index fairly high. When you see the bots scraping your domain when looking at your server side analytics it means you are getting exposure.
Found this site just by chance while doing some research, glad our paths have crossed again.
You are welcome 
Since I discovered that the old forum was actually using open source software, it enabled me to recreate the whole thing.
While I am not familiar with domain scraping, I am hoping to see the whole seller community join soon. Google should bring us to the top.
You are not missing anything. Many discussions on Amazon’s forum are closed and only new users or Amazon staff can post. Everyone’s storefront names are publicly listed in their Seller profiles.
Welcome @skeeter !
Yes, remember how I was a huge supporter of the other online site. NOT any more, what they have been doing to my company over the last few months is awful.
The same is true with me. Everything started going downhill when they started messing around with the FBA platform sellers. What they are doing now is nothing short of reprehensible.
As the community “whistleblower” they finally silenced me by suspending my account on 70 “bogus” complaints by someone that didn’t exist. I used the time to start building my website. When the complaints vanished from my Account Health, I started selling again, but it hasn’t been the same. I hit on a hot seller every now and then, otherwise sales are virtually non-existent.
I am glad that you found your way here, and I expect many of our old friends will join this safe and friendly alternative once it goes public.
Amazon’s forum is a big mess. I am not planning to post there in the near future. I heard from some people that you can get your sellers account shut down for criticizing Amazon or the mods.
I agree. I would rather not risk my entire business knowing that Amazon uppers may be reading my comments and linking them to my selling account.
They attacked my company around 9 years or so ago. It was extremely bad for us since we just did a major capital investment for increasing production to meet the amazon demand. They finally crossed the line and that is when I started posting on their forum and exposing them for how they “really” are. Just off the top of my head I feel we have lost over 8 digits USD in amazon sales since the attack.
Back then they could not handle the fact that “an illiterate hillbilly from a fly over state” could manage to out maneuver amazon and kick their like kind product out of #1 in the category, a product that was stocked and sold my amazon…
Also, when I started to post on their forum it was at a point of no return with our relationship with amazon.
That is bad news for sellers. That is how ebay is and that is why we have never posted on that site. amazon made a left turn disclosing everyone, look at what just happened, this uncensored forum was born…
I started posting on their forum and exposing them for how they “really” are.
Stumbling on how they were ripping sellers off on their lost and damaged items, customer returns, and the items that were never returned netted me almost $6,000, and I have a small family business. Publishing how sellers could do this for themselves, really “pissed them off.”
They decided to put me out of business. The things they did were not to be believed. They went as far as doctoring images, and sourced 11-kids necklaces from my supplier, who was a retail chain, to prove their point.
I was working with other FBA sellers to put together a case against them. The documentation we had was irrefutable. We sent it to everyone. No one would touch it.
I don’t mind having my storefront name published. As you know, ever since I started participating on the Amazon Seller Forum, I posted under my actual storefront name. Since I wasn’t operating any shady business and had nothing to hide, I assumed that all will be well and this will bring me more trust from the community but I couldn’t be more wrong.
I had my whole life infiltrated by the malicious retired booksellers who were jealous of my success. All of my private label listings had their negative product reviews upvoted with hundreds of votes, while the positive ratings were downvoted. I was being stalked and since Amazon couldn’t handle the matter, they suspended me rather than deal with the problem.
Now, they forced everyone to post under their real storefront name, apparently to achieve that contributors weigh their words and actions not to get sued or pursued in any way and keep the discussions civil.
In fact, the seller identities were always accessible to Amazon staff. And this is the worst thing.
If you stood out from the crowd as a prominent forum contributor, Amazon executives in charge of the forum watched you (and your Amazon store closely) and took selective actions which may have been somehow justified by their policies, but wouldn’t have been taken if you hadn’t attracted the unnecessary attention. As you know, there are millions of policies on Amazon and any seller on the platform can get suspended anytime, and Amazon will always find a way how to justify it with their policies.
Sellers bragging on the forum about having secret hacks how to deal with specific matters or creating guide threads often meant that Amazon would take their time to put it to a quick end.
I had my famous A-Z claim guide thread which used to save sellers lots of money. Afterwards, Amazon strictened the system in such way, that no one can win the claims anymore.
I suspected that too, remember back when they were handing out the T shirts. One of them reached and requested the size and our address. The message came from amazon, however I ignored it.
It made me question why did they want that. It could have been a contractor working for amazon that had intentions of damaging our account. This would have given amazon “finger pointing” power if the possible threat actor would have damaged us and been caught.
The ones from eBay that attacked Ina Steiner of ecommercebytes and her husband were eventually caught and are serving time in Federal Prison. That story is not over yet, hopefully the mastermind behind that will get some time too.
I investigated this case very carefully and read the court documents, since it was a very similar situation to mine and even my lawyers used the complaint to draft my legal paperworks. It surprised me how far this went. I have been selling on eBay since 2012 and never heard of this couple or their blog. eBay is a household name and literally their entire board of leadership became obsessed with taking them down over some silly articles that attracted a handful of comments and views 
Those executives had everything - millions of dollars in yearly income, perfect careers and to throw away all for something as harmless and insignificant….
What were they thinking that if they harass someone anonymously, then repeatedly turn up (as eBay executives) in front of the bloggers house and offer them help and support with the harassment, it will put end to them writing negatively about eBay?
Personally, I find what the couple experienced to be far less than what was done to me and I am surprised how much responsibility eBay and the executives had for their part in the targeting.
But it also evidences how much out of touch from the reality are the corporate executives, that they consider something as innocent as a threat and come up with such an unthinkable childish strategy how to address it.