What's the deal with Amazon Vendor?
What is Amazon Vendor Central?
If you are currently selling on Amazon Seller Central, you may have heard of Amazon Vendor Central. Amazon Vendor is Amazon’s invite-only channel for high growth or revenue retailers. Qualified vendors enter into a new relationship with Amazon whereby Amazon place orders with you, and products become shipped and sold by Amazon.com themselves.
Amazon Vendor Central gives you access extensive marketing opportunities with customisable landing pages, enhanced product pages and opportunity to use Amazon's Subscribe&Save, Amazon Vine and Amazon Display Advertising. As with Fulfilled by Amazon (FBA) under Amazon Seller, Amazon Vendor products qualify for Prime Shipping.
Essentially, your products are deemed popular by Amazon and in turn, more trusted by consumer, leading to higher sales.
How do you become an Amazon Vendor?
If Amazon Vendor is so high-profile, how do you get your products onto this scheme? By nature of being invite-only, there are no guarantees that your products will be accepted by Amazon Vendor. Unlike Seller Central, you cannot just setup an account and start selling to Amazon...
There are however, two routes to starting to sell on Amazon Vendor:
1) You are invited
Stating the obvious however, you may actually be lucky enough to get that 'knock on the door' from Amazon themselves if your product or turnover has caught their attention. It is believed that Amazon monitor sales and look for relatively new products with higher-than-average inventory turnover in a refined set of product categories. Your product therefore has to 'fit their bill' and have notable product history. To learn more about Amazon Vendor's product requirements, read here.
2) You apply to Amazon Vendor Express
Amazon Vendor Express is intended to 'fast track' the process of joining Amazon Vendor. Amazon may require for you to send free samples of your merchandise (up to c£150 worth) so that they can determine demand for your product.
With Vendor Express, you cannot negotiate your prices with Amazon however, retailers have reported that Vendor Central does leave room for negotiation.
Can we help?
We know that navigating Amazon Vendor can be challenging so do not hesitate to get in touch if you'd like to discuss.