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Amazon’s quest for more, cheaper products has resulted in a flea market of fakes

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Re: Amazon’s quest for more, cheaper products has resulted in a flea market of fakes

#31

Post by dwoozle »

privateSFacct wrote: post #22

All the ballyhoo about Amazon Transparency and UUID per item. This is a relatively well solved issue in other areas. Make become a seller a bit more difficult with some skin in the game ($2,500 deposit if you sell more than 15 items per year? In person identity verification?). Sellers used to meet with buyers agents (cost money and added identities). Caught selling garbage (product marked new actually used, totaly fa…

The market opportunity is already occupied by Target! Great products, shipped to you or delivered to your car in the parking lot. I’ve shifted at least 50% of my Amazon spend to Target. I won’t buy anything that I eat, that touches my children’s skin, that plugs in, or that has a Li-Ion battery from Amazon.

Re: Amazon’s quest for more, cheaper products has resulted in a flea market of fakes

#32

Post by osamagirl69 »

sp332 wrote: post #26
AlexandrB wrote: post #11

Amazon's fulfilment has also become shockingly bad. Most items are shipped in lightly-padded manila envelopes resulting in high percentage of damaged goods if you order books[1], CDs/DVDs/BluRays, video games, or anything else where the packaging is part of the product. eBay is a much better experience in this regard. [1] In an ironic twist, I absolutely refuse to buy books from Amazon anymore.

> eBay is a much better experience Wouldn't this be down to the individual seller?

Yes, but ebay sellers have a reputation to maintain so sellers that stoop to amazon levels of idiocy when packing their products don't last long.

Re: Amazon’s quest for more, cheaper products has resulted in a flea market of fakes

#33

Post by decebalus1 »

benologist wrote: post #16

Amazon's decision to employ lawyers and lobbyists instead of oversight resulted in a public black market they openly run but are not responsible for profiting from. I am excited to see which state will have the first Amazon fulfillment center crawling with feds. They have to raid one eventually to get to the bottom of the lead, the counterfeits etc. How is Amazon preventing the EPA or the FTC from doing their job and…

> I am excited to see which state will have the first Amazon fulfillment center crawling with feds.

I share your excitement but I'm not optimistic about this ever happening considering the increasing amount of cash Amazon is spending in DC.

Re: Amazon’s quest for more, cheaper products has resulted in a flea market of fakes

#34

Post by ikeboy »

privateSFacct wrote: post #22

All the ballyhoo about Amazon Transparency and UUID per item. This is a relatively well solved issue in other areas. Make become a seller a bit more difficult with some skin in the game ($2,500 deposit if you sell more than 15 items per year? In person identity verification?). Sellers used to meet with buyers agents (cost money and added identities). Caught selling garbage (product marked new actually used, totaly fa…

>Caught selling garbage (product marked new actually used, totaly fake junk) enough times -> gone from marketplace and hard to get back in.

This is what they have now. Many sellers get suspended over used sold as new and inauthentic complaints.

They also have velocity reviews; if your sales increase too quickly you may get suspended for a bit.

Re: Amazon’s quest for more, cheaper products has resulted in a flea market of fakes

#36

Post by soupfordummies2 »

sp332 wrote: post #26
AlexandrB wrote: post #11

Amazon's fulfilment has also become shockingly bad. Most items are shipped in lightly-padded manila envelopes resulting in high percentage of damaged goods if you order books[1], CDs/DVDs/BluRays, video games, or anything else where the packaging is part of the product. eBay is a much better experience in this regard. [1] In an ironic twist, I absolutely refuse to buy books from Amazon anymore.

> eBay is a much better experience Wouldn't this be down to the individual seller?

Yes, but eBay sort of self-selects for better sellers and you can also see the seller's profile, feedback etc.

Half the time on Amazon it's hard to even tell anything. As someone else said, books are REALLY bad. It's a gamble as to what you actually receive sometimes.

Re: Amazon’s quest for more, cheaper products has resulted in a flea market of fakes

#37

Post by thiagomgd »

AlexandrB wrote: post #19
izzydata wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've received many damaged books from Amazon. Whenever I report the items as being damaged I am prepared with photographs of the damaged goods as proof, but they always send me another one without caring. It just feels so wasteful to save money by mishandling everything to the point where it doesn't even matter if stuff breaks because it is cheaper to try a 2nd time.

It also flies in the face of Amazon's promise of convenience and "2-day delivery" guarantees when you have to have the same item shipped to you twice and make the trip to the post office to return the first one.

when I bough a TV on Amazon, the screen was broke. I asked for another, and the replacement... has a broken screen. Returned both, and bought for $50 more on Bestbuy, but it came intact

Re: Amazon’s quest for more, cheaper products has resulted in a flea market of fakes

#38

Post by rbritton »

AlexandrB wrote: post #11

Amazon's fulfilment has also become shockingly bad. Most items are shipped in lightly-padded manila envelopes resulting in high percentage of damaged goods if you order books[1], CDs/DVDs/BluRays, video games, or anything else where the packaging is part of the product. eBay is a much better experience in this regard. [1] In an ironic twist, I absolutely refuse to buy books from Amazon anymore.

eBay has become my first stop for many categories of goods. It's not always the best choice, but it is often enough that it's worth checking. For example, both of my carbon monoxide detectors expired at the same time, and Amazon and local box stores wanted something like $70 each for replacements. On eBay I found the same model new in box for half of that from what I think was a fire system installation company.

Re: Amazon’s quest for more, cheaper products has resulted in a flea market of fakes

#39

Post by viburnum »

AlexandrB wrote: post #11

Amazon's fulfilment has also become shockingly bad. Most items are shipped in lightly-padded manila envelopes resulting in high percentage of damaged goods if you order books[1], CDs/DVDs/BluRays, video games, or anything else where the packaging is part of the product. eBay is a much better experience in this regard. [1] In an ironic twist, I absolutely refuse to buy books from Amazon anymore.

Me too. I bought a rare $80 art book from amazon and the first two were badly damaged from shipping and the third was just a little damaged so I gave up and took it. I was worried they would deactivate my account for being a troublemaker or something.

Re: Amazon’s quest for more, cheaper products has resulted in a flea market of fakes

#40

Post by ilamont »

bloopernova wrote: post #12
praptak wrote: post #8

They seem to be aware of this. Amazon Transparency, if successful, will banish fakes. In its essence it's about provable origin of each item, back to the owner of the brand.

Amazon created the problem, and now they're selling a service to fix the problem. That they created. Heckuva business model.

And charging vendors for it. You have to buy the codes (5 cents per, no volume discounts) and then pay one of their preferred printers up to 15 cents per Transparency sticker.
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