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28-year-old makes millions buying from Walmart, selling on Amazon

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Re: 28-year-old makes millions buying from Walmart, selling on Amazon

#61

Back few years ago I was able to make extra $10,000 on Amazon by selling $200 packs of $2 for around $240 + shipping, because everyone thinks they are super-unique. Meanwhile a mere trip to a bank is required with request for a "$200 BRICK". I takes about 10 business days for BEP to ship it to your bank and you can order multiple times, no problem. My best month was December of course with I believe $18,000 in one mo…

That you Woz?

Re: 28-year-old makes millions buying from Walmart, selling on Amazon

#62
post #8

Good for him, but I really wish for a better class of business journalism. He's been doing this 4 years, and never made more than $150k/year. So he definitely isn't somebody who "makes millions".

I agree. The article is intentionally vague. Millions of dollars in revenue is relatively easy vs. millions in net profit. That said, presumably the value of the entity could be a multiple of the revenue. Either way the article fails to shed enough light on it.

And it is written also "...his business is making seven-figure profits..."

Re: 28-year-old makes millions buying from Walmart, selling on Amazon

#63

He shouldn't share this arbitrage strategy because if others do it, its profitability will decrease -- like all arbitrage strategies.

He shouldn't share it so long as it's more profitable than what he can get paid to share it by running seminars, selling e-books, minus expenses such as getting this article "published". There's not much in the article to suggest that is the case.

Re: 28-year-old makes millions buying from Walmart, selling on Amazon

#64
post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm. Seems unlikely given the manual nature of shopping at WalMart, shipping costs, returns, etc, on an $8M revenue base. Edit: He contradicts himself... "four years later, we're a team of 11 and we're doing well over $200,000 in sales per month" $200k/month isn't even close to $8M/year. And you aren't netting 7 figures with $200k/month and 11 employees. Now I'm thinking this is just a puff piece for his get-rich-qui…

This "company" may be doing something else, additionally to these flipping schemes. Seminars are mentioned. Consulting may be something else. Or some other form of ecommerce.

"Seminars are mentioned"

Ahh, yes, of course.

Re: 28-year-old makes millions buying from Walmart, selling on Amazon

#65

Very hard to believe, you'd have to be very naive to reveal your arbitrage like this.

Back in the 80's, it was practical to buy software packages in the US and resell them in Europe at a substantial markup. After a while, more and more businessmen started doing this until the price differential disappeared. Classic arbitrage.

My father did this. Also he imported stuff from Taiwan and crudely ported the software for European market for a 200% markup. Literally unpack, throw a floppy disk in it, pack, sell.

Re: 28-year-old makes millions buying from Walmart, selling on Amazon

#66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly both - this is a temporary sort of arbitrage but is great for both these entrepreneurs and the end consumer in the short term. I will be surprised if they survive in the long term, since most of their business model is designed around the lack of Walmart and Amazon talking to each other. I think it would take a relatively simple collaboration between the two (though that might never happen) to completely dest…

> relatively simple collaboration between the two Wouldn't this fall foul to some kind of anti-collusion laws?

Maybe, I’m guessing it depends on the flavor-of-the-year government they would deal with when attempting such.

Re: 28-year-old makes millions buying from Walmart, selling on Amazon

#67
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This "company" may be doing something else, additionally to these flipping schemes. Seminars are mentioned. Consulting may be something else. Or some other form of ecommerce.

"Seminars are mentioned" Ahh, yes, of course.

So, if you knew how to make money doing x and genuinely wanted to share that info, how would you do so effectively without being perceived as a scam artist?

Re: 28-year-old makes millions buying from Walmart, selling on Amazon

#68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly both - this is a temporary sort of arbitrage but is great for both these entrepreneurs and the end consumer in the short term. I will be surprised if they survive in the long term, since most of their business model is designed around the lack of Walmart and Amazon talking to each other. I think it would take a relatively simple collaboration between the two (though that might never happen) to completely dest…

Or Walmart could just dump the stuff back into their own fulfillment system. I doubt it amounts to enough merchandise for them to care about though, regardless of the margin. They make money on low costs and volume.

Indeed, which is why it has probably skated under the radar for this long. I imagine this company’s success will eventually be its downfall in that the second when Walmart and Amazon see how much money is being made over this kind of arbitrage and that kind of money becomes significant they will quash it like a fly on the wall.

Re: 28-year-old makes millions buying from Walmart, selling on Amazon

#69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly both - this is a temporary sort of arbitrage but is great for both these entrepreneurs and the end consumer in the short term. I will be surprised if they survive in the long term, since most of their business model is designed around the lack of Walmart and Amazon talking to each other. I think it would take a relatively simple collaboration between the two (though that might never happen) to completely dest…

I think pricing trends monitoring aka camelcamelcamel.com would be enough for Walmart to figure this out. They don't need to actually talk to each other IMO

Likely. They’ll probably stick some ML or data science person on it at Walmart Labs who ends up doing better at it than CamelCamelCamel because it’s his/her full time job and because they have a PhD in statistics or some similar field. Also because Walmart has near unlimited money to throw at these kinds of problems.

Re: 28-year-old makes millions buying from Walmart, selling on Amazon

#70

I am surprised that there is so much margin. Is this because: 1. Amazon product delivery is so convenient that users don't mind paying little extra or 2. Walmart discounts products valuing their warehouse space more. Thus not realizing there was demand for the product elsewhere or at a different time. Seems like it would be simple for Walmart to figure out this arbitrage and shelve products for longer time. Any thoug…

I’m part of group one. I have two kids. Putting them in the car to go bargain shopping sounds awful.

Being able to order online and have it magically show up later that day or the next is worth the markup.

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