How to properly allow distributors to sell my brand on Amazon
For over seven years, I’ve been a seller on Amazon and have successfully registered my brand with both the Amazon Brand Registry and the Transparency program. I am contemplating extending my business operations to collaborate with distributors, who are also Amazon sellers, for the sale of our branded products on the platform. However, I have some uncertainties and hope to get some clarification on a few queries. Based on my past experiences with Amazon, I feel that the insights gathered from this forum would be more reliable than those obtained through Seller Support (which I haven’t reached out to yet).
- My principal worry is about the lack of control over a distributor’s Amazon account. If a distributor account is suspended, could this potentially risk my account or the accounts of other distributors dealing with my brand? I’ve seen numerous instances of “related accounts” suspensions over the years. Does Amazon view my account as being “related” to my distributor’s accounts and in case of any issues with a distributor’s account, could mine also be suspended?
- I aim to introduce new products under my brand and grant exclusive rights to some distributors for selling these new items on Amazon. In such a scenario, how should the new product listings be incorporated into the Amazon catalog? Should it be done through my account or through the distributor’s account who will handle the actual sales? If a distributor creates a listing using my brand name, would I be able to incorporate these listings into my existing Brand Store on Amazon?
Thanks,
Andrew
How to properly allow distributors to sell my brand on Amazon
For over seven years, I’ve been a seller on Amazon and have successfully registered my brand with both the Amazon Brand Registry and the Transparency program. I am contemplating extending my business operations to collaborate with distributors, who are also Amazon sellers, for the sale of our branded products on the platform. However, I have some uncertainties and hope to get some clarification on a few queries. Based on my past experiences with Amazon, I feel that the insights gathered from this forum would be more reliable than those obtained through Seller Support (which I haven’t reached out to yet).
- My principal worry is about the lack of control over a distributor’s Amazon account. If a distributor account is suspended, could this potentially risk my account or the accounts of other distributors dealing with my brand? I’ve seen numerous instances of “related accounts” suspensions over the years. Does Amazon view my account as being “related” to my distributor’s accounts and in case of any issues with a distributor’s account, could mine also be suspended?
- I aim to introduce new products under my brand and grant exclusive rights to some distributors for selling these new items on Amazon. In such a scenario, how should the new product listings be incorporated into the Amazon catalog? Should it be done through my account or through the distributor’s account who will handle the actual sales? If a distributor creates a listing using my brand name, would I be able to incorporate these listings into my existing Brand Store on Amazon?
Thanks,
Andrew
3 replies
Seller_D59sukg3PflcJ
@AndrewB
This is Aksh from Amazon and I’m here to assist you with your concerns.
From the above post we see that you have queries related to extending your business on the platform and we are glad to hear that. I’m here to provide you with the resources on the same.
As per Amazon’s business requirements we recommend our sellers to have a distinct selling account void of any policy violations on the platform. In order to achieve this, we request you to kindly ensure to keep your account devoid of any information that represent an other selling account.
Further, If you have more questions about our Multiple Account Policy, please go through our “[Selling Policies and Seller Code of Conduct], here
For a dedicated assistance on the same, we recommend you to contact our Account Health Support team via the “Call Me Now” button on your Account Health Page.
For further information on the listing procedures on Amazon, we request you to kindly to reach out to Seller Support through normal paths. While we want to be a resource for you Seller Support will always be your first line of support.
Please reach out to them using this link
Kindly post on the same thread for any further queries. The Forums community and I, are here to support you.
Regards,
Aksh.
Seller_iBrSIJDZKlsXi
Since the response above was as unhelpful as it could only possibly be… Ill try to advice you to my best knowledge.
There are few things, that you need to keep in mind:
1: Since your products are enrolled in Transparency program, you will have to make sure all your products sold to your new distributors will have that unique code on, otherwise Amazon will consider those units counterfeit and you could cause your distributors a lot of trouble.
2: There is nothing wrong with finding someone to sell your brand for you (ie distributor), but you will have to issue a letter of authorization for each and every one of them upfront, because Amazon is likely to ask them for that sooner or later.
3: As long as you do not share any connection with your distributors (internet access, address, phone number etc.) you should be ok. Those are not related accounts and their status has nothing to do with you (eg.: 70 different sellers are selling BOSH fridges, just because one of them are suspended to some violation it doesn’t mean all of them go down).
4: The moment you will start supplying other companies with your branded product, you are running risk of them selling a counterfeit of your product, you will have to think about some sort of control measure for that (remember Transparency code is only easily enforceable via FBA, if product is sold via FBM it becomes harder for Amazon to check that - as far as I know they asking some customers to scan the code for them through email, but if customer chooses to ignore that email, there isn’t much Amazon can do about it)
5: Final point is, that selling to distributors means your profit margins will take serious hit, while it doesn’t necessarily means you will sell more, since they will have to join your listings and share buybox with you.
Hope this helps
