One of Amazon’s strengths is its in depth catalog and its requirement that each retailer promoting an merchandise has to record its supply on the identical web page. This signifies that when a shopper needs to purchase that merchandise, each supply from each vendor is listed in a single place — the buyer can then select. Amazon helps this by sorting the provides within the order that Amazon thinks is greatest.
This works properly for branded merchandise, the place there isn’t any doubt that every retailer is promoting the identical merchandise. The drawback lies in generic merchandise, resembling cell phone covers, battery chargers, and ice dice trays.
In reality, I have simply bought a primary fridge-freezer equipment that doesn’t have an icemaker. So I wanted ice trays. On Amazon there have been many decisions. On choosing probably the most well-liked choices, I appeared on the evaluations simply earlier than my buy. Here I observed that though many had 5 stars, a lot of the newer evaluations have been two stars and one star. The reviewers complained of brittle trays, sharp edges, and the fallacious type of plastic.
Initially I thought that perhaps there was a nasty batch. But I then realized that a number of of the sellers have been undercutting the unique retailer with equivalent wanting trays made with cheaper supplies. No doubt the unique vendor had produced a superior product and it had earned its place as a well-liked merchandise.
Then the rivals took benefit by itemizing their inferior copies on this product web page. The drawback I had was that there was no means in figuring out who was promoting the great product and who was promoting the inferior one. With Amazon’s product critiques, there isn’t any approach of figuring out which retailer bought the product for that specific assessment.
Bad merchandise, good critiques
This is a rising drawback. It is a worrying drawback. Inferior merchandise being bought on the power of excellent product critiques could be harmful. Phone chargers can catch hearth. Ice dice trays can contaminate the ice. Toys can include lead paint.
So lengthy because the merchandise resembles the unique (high quality) product, then Amazon lets an unscrupulous retailer listing its supply on the identical web page. It’s worse if the vendor is utilizing Fulfillment By Amazon, as all of the merchandise are positioned collectively within the warehouse and the provider of the pretend product is misplaced within the warehouse shelf. A pretend may be despatched beneath the identify of a special retailer. Indeed even Amazon itself might not know who provided the pretend whether it is combined with actual gadgets.
There is little that an trustworthy retailer can do. On the Amazon boards there are posts of shops complaining about this and the shortage of response from Amazon. It appears that the primary line help from Amazon just isn’t useful. The solely posts on boards are from sellers who had issues getting the fakes eliminated. Unscrupulous retailers that succeeded presumably don’t complain.
One answer to this is able to be to order a budget product and check it towards the unique. This might be hit and miss if Amazon fulfills the merchandise as there isn’t any means of guaranteeing that you simply’ll obtain a pretend one. Once you’ve got a pretend, nevertheless, you possibly can check it to reveal why it’s considerably totally different from the unique. You can increase an A-Z declare towards the retailer and, if harmful, contact the related authorities. (In the D.N., it’s the Trading Standards workplace.) If you and others proceed to do that, the A-Z claims will accumulate and the retailer will doubtless be banned.
But there are two issues with this. First, the retailer you obtain from could also be harmless — because of the drawback of Fulfillment by Amazon, described above. Second, the precise offender might merely create a brand new account and proceed.
There is not any magic bullet for this drawback, though Practical Ecommerce just lately interviewed the founding father of an organization that’s making an attempt to unravel it.
Regardless, if the issue continues to develop, it should turn into an actual concern. It might drive Amazon to police its sellers rather more completely. Until then, real companies will endure, clients will endure, and, certainly, Amazon will endure.
