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Washington state shuts down Amazon price-fixing program nationwide

atg.wa.gov

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Re: Washington state shuts down Amazon price-fixing program nationwide

#251

Post by granzymes »

YeBanKo wrote: post #211
granzymes wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there any evidence this happened? It seems like companies would simply leave the "sold by Amazon" program, and quickly.

Its actually right in the posted link: The “Sold by Amazon” program resulted in prices for some products increasing when Amazon programmed its pricing algorithm to match the prices that certain external retailers offer to online consumers. As a result, when prices increased, some sellers experienced a marked decline in the sales and resulting profits from products enrolled in the program. Faced with price increases,…

Yes, I read that. It doesn't address my point, which is that merchants would just leave the program if they faced declining sales.

Re: Washington state shuts down Amazon price-fixing program nationwide

#252

Post by throwawaylinux »

pstrateman wrote: post #84
ISL wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm extra confused, as I'd interpreted "Ships from and sold by Amazon" as "Amazon supplied the goods and will vouch for their validity", whereas "Sold by ISL" would have meant that ISL was on the ultimate hook should the goods prove to be counterfeit. Learn something new (and important) every day.

Sold by Amazon and Fulfilled by Amazon seem to come out of the same box at the warehouse. Unfortunately if you really need genuine products you simply cannot buy things off Amazon anymore.

I've used Amazon all of once so I don't know anything. What do you mean really need genuine?

Let's say you wanted to buy an iPhone or a Canon SLR camera or a Lenovo laptop. You can't buy these from Amazon? What happens if you try? Will they ship you a block of wood in a box, or a myPhone? And won't refund it?

Re: Washington state shuts down Amazon price-fixing program nationwide

#253

Post by [deleted] »

throwawaylinux wrote: post #252
pstrateman wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sold by Amazon and Fulfilled by Amazon seem to come out of the same box at the warehouse. Unfortunately if you really need genuine products you simply cannot buy things off Amazon anymore.

I've used Amazon all of once so I don't know anything. What do you mean really need genuine? Let's say you wanted to buy an iPhone or a Canon SLR camera or a Lenovo laptop. You can't buy these from Amazon? What happens if you try? Will they ship you a block of wood in a box, or a myPhone? And won't refund it?

[deleted]

Re: Washington state shuts down Amazon price-fixing program nationwide

#254

Post by vineyardmike »

throwawaylinux wrote: post #252
pstrateman wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sold by Amazon and Fulfilled by Amazon seem to come out of the same box at the warehouse. Unfortunately if you really need genuine products you simply cannot buy things off Amazon anymore.

I've used Amazon all of once so I don't know anything. What do you mean really need genuine? Let's say you wanted to buy an iPhone or a Canon SLR camera or a Lenovo laptop. You can't buy these from Amazon? What happens if you try? Will they ship you a block of wood in a box, or a myPhone? And won't refund it?

Consumable goods, eg. Toothpaste are things that you may want to be genuine. Sure it may say "Crest", but did it come from the Crest factory, or did a no-name company drop ship fake crest toothpaste to an amazon warehouse, and now their product is co-mingled with genuine crest?

(this is an example, you can google for real stories)

To add, there are stores of extreme coupons who will products (again, lets use toothpaste) from brick and mortar stores on discount, then sell them on amazon. Or buying returns/expired food products from brick and mortar stores, then selling into amazon.

Again, the issue in all this is co-mingling because any genuine sourced products compete with these less reputable ones.

Re: Washington state shuts down Amazon price-fixing program nationwide

#255

Post by salawat »

dylan604 wrote: post #109
urthor wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's actually surprisingly cunning. Run a very in depth training program on how "not" to do antitrust. Secretly, it's just a training course in antitrust. Gotta respect the level of commitment to evil.

This isn't new to Amazon. Leaving written paper trails is often times attempted to be avoided by simple messages like "let's chat about this over the phone" or "let's chat about this over a cup of coffee".

This is also why you viciously respond with a follow up message saying "You would like to "discuss in a non-recorded/discoverable medium?"

Yes. I've seen that tactic before, and it is very easy to counter with the pre-message and a post-summary message with CC and BCC. The fun part is dropping in statutory and case law citations. Nobody expects actual well formed legal research, and it makes it more difficult for legal to try to wiggle out of or deflect the awkward questions if litigation ever eventually comes up. This baking in of accountability is a valuable tool to ensure people stay on their best behavior.

Re: Washington state shuts down Amazon price-fixing program nationwide

#256

Post by legitster »

Permit wrote: post #231
snow_mac wrote: post #227

One thing everyone is getting hung up on is the fact that Amazon isn't wholesaling the dongle. The contract isn't a wholesale deal, meaning if your widget doesn't sell, it's sitting on your balance sheet, not on Amazon's balance sheet. It would be like if Costco instead of buying 1000 legos, just stocked legos in it's warehouse, then paid Lego company everytime a single unit sold. Then they figured out how to make th…

> It would be like if Costco instead of buying 1000 legos, just stocked legos in it's warehouse, then paid Lego company everytime a single unit sold. For some reason I was under the impression that this is exactly how it works at some physical retailers? Can someone confirm that this is not the case? Does Costco/Walmart/CVS/etc. eat the cost if the items don’t sell?

I worked a route at Frito Lay. The store bought the goods, but was rebated on anything that didn't sell. We bit the bullet on product that didn't move.

But merchandising and stocking the shelves was also 100% our responsibility.

Re: Washington state shuts down Amazon price-fixing program nationwide

#257

Post by vinay427 »

floxy wrote: post #102
blakesterz wrote: post #2

"There are about 2.3 million third-party sellers on Amazon worldwide, according to information from a 2018 Amazon letter to its shareholders" That number is pretty amazing. I never would've guessed over 2 million, and that number must be higher by now.

Does that include everyone who has ever sold a used book on Amazon? Because I sold a few of my old college text books on Amazon about 20 years ago.

I would assume the number includes all unique seller accounts as it doesn’t specify a constraint on seller activity or similar.

In fact, (less reputable) data from marketplace research claims a far higher number in 2021 of over 6 million.

https://www.marketplacepulse.com/articles/amazon-reaches-six...

Re: Washington state shuts down Amazon price-fixing program nationwide

#258

Post by salawat »

Jiro wrote: post #122
kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't about prevention. It's training to avoid recording damning evidence. The bad behavior can continue as long as it isn't written down. Preferably implemented in pieces that lend plausible deniability.

Even companies who are innocent, and don't have any damning evidence because they did nothing wrong, need policies like this. You can be innocent and someone can still sue you, find the suspicious-sounding messages, and use them against you. Proving your innocence may cost money and reputation, not to mention that since the justice system is imperfect, there's always a chance that you can still lose the lawsuit. This…

Counterpoint:

Corporations as a legal fiction have no expectation of privacy and as such all business records are free game.

Like it or not; if you're playing these word games out of necessity, it's time for a reckoning.

Re: Washington state shuts down Amazon price-fixing program nationwide

#259

Post by anticensor »

kfarr wrote: post #241
geoduck14 wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>That said companies care a lot about the legality of things and not necessarily the morality. I worked for a fortune 100 company. We are humans, and our customers are humans. We absolutely have morals - at an individual level, and those morals influence how we work

Morals don’t matter when the shareholders sue board members for failing to uphold fiduciary responsibility. Just saying, the law influences how we work

Fiduiciary responsibility does not mean operating like you are bankrupt tomorrow.

Re: Washington state shuts down Amazon price-fixing program nationwide

#260

Post by salawat »

DannyBee wrote: post #190
kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't about prevention. It's training to avoid recording damning evidence. The bad behavior can continue as long as it isn't written down. Preferably implemented in pieces that lend plausible deniability.

You are confused. The "damning evidence" is usually only damning in the court of politics and opinion. That's where it gets used too. You can't prove an antitrust case on the basis of some random set your of 500k employees saying "market share" in an email (unless they are like c level exec). Think how stupid a basis for liability that would be - "we are breaking up your company because a fresh college graduate you h…

...Unless you are aware fundamentally that the nature of litigation is not set ahead of time, and highly dependent on the receptiveness of a judge/jury at the time of litigation.

The Judiciary is completely free to "interpret statute however it wants in the presence of a reasonable and convincing explanation of why previous case law doesn't fit the bill". This is why even a lawyer's take should be taken with a grain of salt.

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