German cartel office investigates Amazon’s treatment of small sellers
handelsblatt.com
handelsblatt.com
In both of them, when sending something off to Amazon, we first of all got to rip off the bulk packaging, then individually packed each item in their oh-so-eco-friendly packaging (which I suppose still makes sense as they're individually sending those items out to customers), but then if it arrived at Amazon's warehouse and anything is wrong with that truck load, like a splinter from the pallet damaging one or two packages, then they would usually pack everything back onto the truck and send it back to us. Then we got to rip off their eco-friendly packaging to check each item, pack it again and send it off to Amazon again. The costs for sending the whole truck load back and forth, we as supplier got to pay.
To try to avoid this, we also specifically threw away pallets that would have even the slightest chance of splintering, or used them for other companies that we supplied to. So, in effect we got to put the Amazon deliveries in their eco-friendly packaging onto the shiniest dead trees that you'll ever see.
Tip, if you are selling something through Amazon, make sure it is branded. At least you may get Trademark protection.
That makes their business practices fall under increased scrutiny.
That's the ultimate point, though. The reason why anti-competitive laws exist. The reason we like free markets on a societal level is that competition - where it happens - keeps the prices down, and prevents a single entity from having too much control over people (via prices and availability). We benefit from entrepreneurs playing the game, not winning the game. A total success on the market is a disaster for society (imagine e.g. Walmart being the only grocery store, or fully vertically integrated Unilever controlling food production).
Do supermarket supplier contracts really work like this? I was under the impression that nowadays suppliers have to pay supermarkets for shelf space, take the risk themselves for low sales volumes (with agreements to buy back inventory), etc.
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-29629742
Relating back to the initial part of the question, it seems like if suppliers are fighting over the "good spots" (the ends of the aisle or section), then the supermarket's branded products can safely fill in the gaps at lower prices (but much better margins), and still be profitable as long as they don't lose too much to waste.
It's hard to get vendors to agree to the terms unless they're given control over in-store execution, and it's a lot of set up/hassle to integrate systems. The products that scan based trade tends to be most common with are DSD where someone from that company stops by on a fairly regular basis to deliver or merchandise the product.
Being in a category Amazon has tried to infiltrate, we’ve heard the “either join us or...” The head of the project does everything they can to attract leaders in the space to share their knowledge on how we’ve made it work for so long. Then if that seller doesn’t jump on board, it’s a well you’ll be sorry in the end. If their product doesn’t start to compete within the first few months, that is when you see desperation sink in from the lead of the project.
That’s when you’ll start seeing Amazon brands taking over the front page, when they haven’t done the ground work to get there. Then you’ll see more Amazon brands showing up on the front page, with the help of product pages and ads that break their own terms of service. Then sellers may start seeing more frequent issues with their product in that category. And then if you’re really unlucky, Amazon vendor will say either bring your product to vendor or don’t sell on the platform at all.
I get it’s their playground, and it’s their rules, but sometimes you just end up throwing up your hands and asking if it’s all really worth it
what does this mean?
VendorCentral is where you become a Vendor/Distributor to Amazon, i.e, Amazon should be allowed to purchase at wholesale price from you, and sell it themselves.
and MarketPlace/SellerCentral is where you can sell directly to customers.
"Not selling to walmart is to invite death...
Selling to walmart is to embrace death"
Supermarkets demanding that offers they make are funded by the supplier, charging a premium for prime shelf space,and so on.
This kind of thing has been going on for years and isn't that dissimilar to how amazon are behaving.
That's how you get your cheap stuff.
On a positive note the supplier can protest by folding or reducing the quality or fucking up so much that the supermarket gets a bad name because it's their brand on it.
This double-role of the cartel office makes sense, because the whole point of a cartel is for a group of companies to be able to interact with the market like when they would hold a dominant market position.
There's also the step in between, which are official fusions or buyouts of big companies, which's only difference compared to a cartel is that they're officially talking to one another, not inofficially, but which would lead to one single company holding the dominant market position, at which point you would normally not count that to "cartels" at all anymore.
[1] https://www.linguee.de/deutsch-englisch/uebersetzung/Kartell...