By no means is what I’m about to tell you unknown information in the Amazon selling world. But, I’m sure there are some of you out there that are struggling or trying to figure out how to increase sales with your Amazon business. I want to share some successes and some failures I have experienced while sourcing products at Walmart. Keep in mind that these things probably apply to many other big-box stores as well.
Product sourcing is always a challenge. It doesn’t matter what product you purchase to resale, it is always a risk. In this industry, there are no guarantees. Just because a product looks good to sell right now, doesn’t necessarily mean that it still be tomorrow.
Ok, so we probably all shop at Walmart from time to time. For a lot of products, they really do have the best prices in town. Because they have such a large inventory of products, there are inevitably products that they cannot sell, or products that they need to get rid of in order to reclaim some shelf space for other products. What do they do?…. the clearance aisle!
I’m sure you’ve seen it. At our Walmart, it is in the back of the store between the toys and sporting goods. One aisle dedicated to the stuff they want to get rid of. It is a great place to source products to sell, specifically for FBA.
One day, I was browsing the clearance aisle, not really doing a through scan of items, but more just randomly grabbing products I thought might be good sellers. One item I picked up was a sponge mop head. I scanned the product which Walmart was selling for $5.76. On Amazon, it was close to $20. Great I though to myself… Let me buy all of them and I can ship them to Amazon tomorrow.
I got home, proud of my purchase, only to realize when I went to list them that I had been looking at the two-count pack on Amazon. With shipping and Amazon fees, it would be a wash… not a good buy! Luckily, it’s Walmart… I was able to take them back and get a refund… no harm, no foul.
Flash forward a week or so, and I find myself browsing the aisle again. This time, I find a fire-pit cover for $5. Amazon has them on FBA for $25. I checked to make sure I was looking at the same product and I certainly was. Now, they had 15 of these babies for sale so I purchased every one of them, roughly $75 + tax. I went home, packaged them up, and sent them on their way.
It took about 2 weeks to sell all of them and bad about $150-$200 after shipping costs, Amazon fees and my cost to buy the products. Not bad for 30 minutes worth of work.
This story is not uncommon, and I’m sure probably some of you have had even better success. But, this is just a reminder that there are products everywhere that can be profitable. Just keep your eyes open.
Comment below and share with me some of your Amazon success stories. I’d love to hear them.