As I understand it, the way to avoid this is to sign up for a Pro-Merchant account. If you sell more than 40 items a month it makes sense to do so anyway.
Of course, doing so will NOT guarantee that Amazon won't force some sort of reserve on you.
And I feel the OP's pain when it comes to DVD's. I once bought 300 DVD's at $2 each. They are legitimate DVD's, but the kind that you find in the $5 bargain bin at Wal-Mart, NOT the new releases.
And that is what you can get for them. Maybe $5. MAYBE. Deduct from that the $1 per item selling fee, PLUS the 15% commission fee. Shipping is a wash. Amazon gets $1.75, you get $3.25. Deduct the $2 cost, and you are left with $1.25 in profit for each one sold. And they will take TIME to sell! It took me six months to get rid of my inventory.
When you figure in the inevitable returns, your profit is even lower. Then, figure out how much time you spent listing and shipping them. If you figure your time as worth anything more than $1 per hour, you are operating at a loss.
Not to mention, I lost that account - it was my REAL account. Why? I got the recopied media letter! |