Amazon sellers still have mixed reviews regarding FBA. Some mention it’s amazing, others think it requires improvement. So how can a beginner on Amazon decide if they want to move forward with FBA or ship their products on their own?

FBA is an abbreviation of Fulfillment by Amazon, which means that Amazon stores, packages, and ships your products while you take care of other business areas. Convenient, right? However, it’s crucial to understand that apart from the ease it offers, it might not be the right choice for your business.

 Here are a few pros and cons of Amazon FBA; to help you decide if you want to sell on Amazon through FBA or skip it entirely.

Advantages of choosing FBA on Amazon:

1.  Solves storage issues

Amazon FBA allows businesses and sellers to leverage Amazon’s vast network of distribution centers as well as warehouses all around the globe to store and ship their products. This basically means that Amazon sellers can focus on scaling their operations quickly and efficiently without worrying too much about fulfillment logistics. Moreover, one thing is for sure; Amazon can deliver your products to the customers way faster than you can. It has the best-integrated online system to pick, pack, and distribute your items.

2.  Access to Amazon Prime

Isn’t that what every Amazon seller wants? By signing up with Amazon FBA, you get access to Amazon’s Prime program, which can help in increasing visibility and sales. Sellers that fulfill their orders through FBA can offer two-day Prime shipping, attracting most of the platform's customers.

3.  Customer service is taken care of

FBA takes care of customer service and returns, which can be daunting, time-consuming, and costly for Amazon businesses to handle on their own. By giving control to Amazon to handle these tasks, Amazon businesses can focus on expanding their business and product lines.

4.  Buy a Box

Amazon gives priority to FBA sellers when handing down the Buy Box. Being an FBA seller automatically increases your chances to win the Amazon Buy Box and get the majority of the sales. If your goal is to get maximum sales in less time, you must aim for the Buy Box and one way to go about it is by fulfilling your orders through FBA.

Cons of Amazon FBA

·        Can be costly

Unfortunately, Amazon FBA is not a free service. In fact, the fees of Amazon FBA can be higher than other fulfillment methods at times, such as FBM or joining hands with any third-party fulfillment service.

·        Increase in competition

Amazon FBA makes it easier for sellers to join Amazon and offer their products online, which results in increased competition on the website. This also means that you will have to deal with low-profit margins and have a hard time retaining customers.

·        Dealing with more returns

Since Amazon offers an easy return policy for customers, many sellers have noticed an increase in the number of returns once they joined FBA. It has become too easy for customers to send back your products and Amazon doesn’t even ask them questions as to why are they returning the items. Packages are directly returned to the fulfillment centers. This practice can turn out to be a major disadvantage.

·        Packaging

Yes, Amazon takes care of the packaging for you. But to deliver all the goods to the Amazon fulfillment centers, Amazon asks sellers to properly pack their products and label each one of them. You can’t just eyeball the process and ship products to the warehouse, the packages have to meet all the specific requirements or else Amazon doesn’t accept them.

In conclusion,

We sincerely hope the blog helps you make your mind whether you want to ship orders through FBA or take care of fulfillment on your own. Whatever you choose to do, best of luck!