Amazon selling - FBA

immuno

Hi everyone,

Does anyone have experience in Amazon selling (FBA)? How time consuming is it? Obviously it depends on how much you sell, but do you think it can be worth it if only pursued for 6-8 hours a week?

I'm wondering whether to pursue Jim Cockrum's course..

soolin

I've moved this over to the 'eBay and other' board as there are Amazon sellers on here that use FBA and can better advise.

I think it does all depend on what sort of stock you have, do you generally sell well already online and are you already selling with Amazon and able to stay competitive?

Marcon

I guess much depends on what you do during those 6-8 hours - the old maxim of 'work smarter not harder' springs to mind. Whether it is 'worth it' depends on what else you could be doing with your time that would be more productive/lucrative.

immuno

Marcon wrote: »

I guess much depends on what you do during those 6-8 hours - the old maxim of 'work smarter not harder' springs to mind. Whether it is 'worth it' depends on what else you could be doing with your time that would be more productive/lucrative.

I guess I'm wondering whether to give Amazon selling a go, versus something like Kindle Publishing OR just a regular job with a company such as Leapforce/Lionbridge doing web search evaluation for a fixed salary..

Brynsam

6-8 hours a week isn't much - could you do both to see whether Amazon works out for you as a viable source of income?

immuno

Brynsam wrote: »

6-8 hours a week isn't much - could you do both to see whether Amazon works out for you as a viable source of income?

Well, I have a full-time job but just want to earn more on the side. Both probably isn't a good idea. I guess I could try to dedicate 10 hours a week to Amazon, and more at the beginning, but not more than that. Hence, I wasn't sure if it'd be worth it...I guess it's hard to say and it's a vague question.

RFW

immuno wrote: »

Well, I have a full-time job but just want to earn more on the side. Both probably isn't a good idea. I guess I could try to dedicate 10 hours a week to Amazon, and more at the beginning, but not more than that. Hence, I wasn't sure if it'd be worth it...I guess it's hard to say and it's a vague question.

I'm afraid it is. There's quite a lot of factors involved in whether it's worth it. I sell full time on Amazon and largely use FBA. We have several thousand items in Amazon warehouses.
Some items cost less for Amazon to send than they would for me to send by Royal Mail, others are more expensive. So size and weight is a factor.
There are also minimum charges, so selling price is a factor. There are also storage charges, these are minimal but if items end up being stored for several months then it could be costly that way, so how quick a product sells is a factor.

The actual process of FBA is relatively straight forward. Get your products, put in how many of each you are sending, label them, if necessary (it can be possible just to send with existing barcode), then find out which fulfillment centre they're each going to and pack them. You can opt to use your own courier to send or use UPS via Amazon, which is generally the cheapest. Label the boxes and arrange for UPS to collect. After that you have to wait for goods to be checked in by Amazon and then you're away.

RFW

I would just add that if you have products ready to sell then it really isn't that time consuming. It's how long it takes you to add items, label them, pack them and label a box. I can usually get 5-600 items labelled and packed in 6 hours.

immuno

RFW wrote: »

I would just add that if you have products ready to sell then it really isn't that time consuming. It's how long it takes you to add items, label them, pack them and label a box. I can usually get 5-600 items labelled and packed in 6 hours.

Sorry, but I'm a bit confused about this point. Are you selling your own products? I thought the main issue would be finding a decent manufacturer or supplier, finding a niche product, etc etc? I'm not sure what you mean about the packing, etc...as I thought it goes straight from the supplier to Amazon's warehouse?

Do you do private labelling?

RFW

immuno wrote: »

Sorry, but I'm a bit confused about this point. Are you selling your own products? I thought the main issue would be finding a decent manufacturer or supplier, finding a niche product, etc etc? I'm not sure what you mean about the packing, etc...as I thought it goes straight from the supplier to Amazon's warehouse?

Do you do private labelling?

You could do that but I can't see how you can make any money doing it. If it was a profitable item, either Amazon or the supplier would be selling it. In my opinion you'd need a lot of money behind you to be able to get stock sent into Amazon from a supplier and be able to earn anything on it. Amazon would mostly want products labelling with an ASIN, an Amazon barcode.

I sell about 60/40 my own designed and manufactured products and those sourced from wholesalers/manufacturers.

I'm now the confused one, you want to sell on Amazon but haven't any product in mind and don't know where it will be coming from?

I had a look at Jim Cockrum, whilst he may be somewhat helpful I often wonder why people who can earn millions on Amazon are selling their ideas rather than being too busy selling on Amazon. Although looking again he charges $1500/hour consulting so maybe I'm in the wrong business!

For some (free) advice, it seems like you're starting this all wrong. Follow something you know or like and see if you can source something to do with that. Maybe think of the last few things you bought and which were the hardest to source and you had the most trouble finding. Then see where the product came from and if you can source it.

soolin

RFW wrote: »

You could do that but I can't see how you can make any money doing it. If it was a profitable item, either Amazon or the supplier would be selling it. In my opinion you'd need a lot of money behind you to be able to get stock sent into Amazon from a supplier and be able to earn anything on it. Amazon would mostly want products labelling with an ASIN, an Amazon barcode.

I sell about 60/40 my own designed and manufactured products and those sourced from wholesalers/manufacturers.

I'm now the confused one, you want to sell on Amazon but haven't any product in mind and don't know where it will be coming from?

I had a look at Jim Cockrum, whilst he may be somewhat helpful I often wonder why people who can earn millions on Amazon are selling their ideas rather than being too busy selling on Amazon. Although looking again he charges $1500/hour consulting so maybe I'm in the wrong business!

For some (free) advice, it seems like you're starting this all wrong. Follow something you know or like and see if you can source something to do with that. Maybe think of the last few things you bought and which were the hardest to source and you had the most trouble finding. Then see where the product came from and if you can source it.

I'm pleased that you have posted on this thread as Amazon FBA is not something I know much about, and I am always interested to hear about other venues and options. My initial post, post 2 in this thread asked OP about her items as I had just assumed that she was already selling and was just looking to update it to be a little more 'hands off'.