Is anyone importing/selling/dropshipping products on Amazon as a side hustle?

[killongy]

I recently got into amazon FBA.

One of my suppliers recently kept asking me about selling on amazon.

Only a matter of time until they figure out how to write good copy
and take quality pictures.

Make bank before the influx begins is what id reccomend.

Another good side hustle is brokering off truckloads of
liquidations inventory to the chinese but it's a lot of work
finding the inventory then sifting out the tirekickers to find buyers
can take at least 4 weeks but you can make a nice 3-7k being the middle man.

Fimdinmg suppliers is the harder part and finding buyers is the tedious part with lots of email back and forth

 

[zoom]

Any interests in here to start an RVF FBA mastermind group?

I'm down. Although I think it should be for general ecommerce, rather than just amazon.

 

[wi30]

I'm in on any sort of mastermind group. Just read this thread for the first time. I have experience on Alibaba with a private label apparel company I stared with one of my buddies. It isn't doing much but I learned a ton about screening factories and negotiation. I have an excellent clothing contact but my company doesn't have money to spend on advertising so it's more or less at a standstill.

I'm reading every link posted on this thread now and would love to get a side hustle going.

 

[jamaicabound]

I recently got into amazon FBA.

One of my suppliers recently kept asking me about selling on amazon.

Only a matter of time until they figure out how to write good copy
and take quality pictures.

Make bank before the influx begins is what id reccomend.

Another good side hustle is brokering off truckloads of
liquidations inventory to the chinese but it's a lot of work
finding the inventory then sifting out the tirekickers to find buyers
can take at least 4 weeks but you can make a nice 3-7k being the middle man.

Fimdinmg suppliers is the harder part and finding buyers is the tedious part with lots of email back and forth

It's impossible for us in the states to compare with China prices but many people only buy from USA or don't want to wait the long shipping times.

Does anyone know how China gets such cheap shipping. I know those epackets are cheap but I see people on eBay selling trinket type stuff for under a buck with free shipping. I know the nail stickers or whatever other crap they sell probably cost a penny or two but I would imagine even slow shipping has to cost more than a buck from China.

 

[worldtraveler3]

I see alot of people doing this Amazon FBA stuff in CHiang Mai.
Is there particularly need to be based there? compared to say like Bali Ubud (Bali did not seem like a center for this)?

What kind of initial investment is needed to get this stuff started (NOT by drop shipping)? I assume you need capital to buy the stock and warehouse fees.

 

[Vacancier Permanent]

Capital wise, it's really up to you and how much you're comfortable with. I have heard of a guy who started with just 125 bucks and scaled it to 5 figures within a few months. Others I've heard started with 5-10k. It really depends on you, your bankroll and your goal and how aggressive you want to be from the get go.

As a rule of thumb, start with at least 500 to test the market, whether it's getting just a few units of a single product or you could get samples of 3-4 products and move forward with the best one. The goal at that stage is to validate a product even if initially you're not making any money.

What makes CM a great place to start an FBA or any online biz for that matter is 1) the super cheap cost of living and high quality of life and 2) the networking opportunities as it's a major hub for location independent and aspiring LEs.

Bali, despite its mesmerizing beauty is not a hub for that for the simple reason that internet is still very spotty and not as reliable as say CM.

 

[worldtraveler3]

Hubud (a co working space in Ubud Bali), does have fast internet, usually speeds at 8-10 mbps. However it does not open 24-7, hence it would be difficult to have fast internet at night when you are working on a project or contacting people over in different time zones.

The Mifi (3G internet hub which uses the sim card has alright speed, however it is still alot more expensive considering it is using 3G data, so you would have to watch for your usuage when doing data intensive work.

 

[aeroektar]

Question to any of you guys doing private labeling: when it comes to the individual packaging of the product, for instance how there would be a little cardboard tag with brand insignia hooked onto clothes at the store, or how a pack of kitchen utensils will come in a cardboard sleeve, is it the supplier on alibaba for instance who does that or do you do that after getting the products into the states?

 

[Mentavious]

Time to get off Amazon and go through your own site.

They just raised USPS prices 25-30% for sellers while Amazon gets free shipping for themselveEs.

 

[Nomis]

Some good information in this thread!

 

[redbeard]

Question to any of you guys doing private labeling: when it comes to the individual packaging of the product, for instance how there would be a little cardboard tag with brand insignia hooked onto clothes at the store, or how a pack of kitchen utensils will come in a cardboard sleeve, is it the supplier on alibaba for instance who does that or do you do that after getting the products into the states?

I am looking for some insights on this too.

It seems that if you're going to ship it directly to Amazon warehouses, it's best to pay your supplier to add the label. But in that case, what's stopping the supplier from ripping your product off?

Do they want to avoid the risk?

The other option would be to order inventory to your house, dress it yourself, then ship to amazon. Yes it'll take time, but depends on your product and how much you want to protect the market share.

It'd be great if someone already involved in FBA could chime in...

 

[skptc]

You can have your freight forwarder/shipping agent hande the FBA inbound shipping labels so your supplier doesn't know where your order is going.

 

[skptc]

Its harder these days. You will want to target higher ticket products.

If you don't have 5k (preferably 10k) to invest I would go for another model.

 

[redbeard]

Another question: where is another place to hunt for legitimate suppliers?

While registering for Alibaba, they flagged my account and asked me to submit a copy of my passport for identification. Fuck that. I don't care what website it is, none are getting a copy of my fuckin passport.

Obviously I've searched Google and gotten a few leads, but there has to be a better alternative.

 

[skptc]

Another question: where is another place to hunt for legitimate suppliers?

While registering for Alibaba, they flagged my account and asked me to submit a copy of my passport for identification. Fuck that. I don't care what website it is, none are getting a copy of my fuckin passport.

Obviously I've searched Google and gotten a few leads, but there has to be a better alternative.

That is very strange. Never happened to me or to any one that I know.

Other decent b2b portals are www.made-in-china.com and www.hktdc.com.

I try to avoid Alibaba when I can.

 

[aeroektar]

Anyone had any luck with etsy? I found a supplier of some "bohemian" women's jewelry, good quality with semi precious gemstones, the price was so low I said fuck it and ordered a small shipment of a few different designs to test the waters. Did some brand design (pretty simple stuff but clean) Ran a small promotion to gain about a dozen reviews (all good with five stars) and built up a decent sized social media following on Instagram.

No one's buying this shit, even with competitive pricing compared to similar products of equal quality, not even when I run coupons for 10-20%

Im thinking of running a Instagram give away contest or just halving the price and seeing what happens. Sort of disappointed because it appears this should have potential. Maybe I need to give it more attention, it's honestly hard to be passionate about selling women's jewelry but I just want to build a side income out of this.

 

[redbeard]

Anyone had any luck with etsy? I found a supplier of some "bohemian" women's jewelry, good quality with semi precious gemstones, the price was so low I said fuck it and ordered a small shipment of a few different designs to test the waters. Did some brand design (pretty simple stuff but clean) Ran a small promotion to gain about a dozen reviews (all good with five stars) and built up a decent sized social media following on Instagram.

No one's buying this shit, even with competitive pricing compared to similar products of equal quality, not even when I run coupons for 10-20%

Im thinking of running a Instagram give away contest or just halving the price and seeing what happens. Sort of disappointed because it appears this should have potential. Maybe I need to give it more attention, it's honestly hard to be passionate about selling women's jewelry but I just want to build a side income out of this.

So you're going from supplier to etsy?

I haven't sold anything on etsy but I have bought a bunch of items off of it. I see a few issues off the bat:

1. You're selling something you don't truly know, people in the jewelry biz are better than you or know more about the industry

2. Your product doesn't have the "etsy vibe," which is "look at me I made this at my house." People love that shit, that's why I've bought off etsy, it isn't mass produced (in theory) like amazon.

3. Jewelry market could be extremely saturated.

Something to think about.

 

[aeroektar]

Anyone had any luck with etsy? I found a supplier of some "bohemian" women's jewelry, good quality with semi precious gemstones, the price was so low I said fuck it and ordered a small shipment of a few different designs to test the waters. Did some brand design (pretty simple stuff but clean) Ran a small promotion to gain about a dozen reviews (all good with five stars) and built up a decent sized social media following on Instagram.

No one's buying this shit, even with competitive pricing compared to similar products of equal quality, not even when I run coupons for 10-20%

Im thinking of running a Instagram give away contest or just halving the price and seeing what happens. Sort of disappointed because it appears this should have potential. Maybe I need to give it more attention, it's honestly hard to be passionate about selling women's jewelry but I just want to build a side income out of this.

So you're going from supplier to etsy?

I haven't sold anything on etsy but I have bought a bunch of items off of it. I see a few issues off the bat:

1. You're selling something you don't truly know, people in the jewelry biz are better than you or know more about the industry

2. Your product doesn't have the "etsy vibe," which is "look at me I made this at my house." People love that shit, that's why I've bought off etsy, it isn't mass produced (in theory) like amazon.

3. Jewelry market could be extremely saturated.

Something to think about.

Thanks. All your points are accurate expect point 2, it is handmade and looks like something someone could be making at their house because thats essentially what it is, but its made in China (theres no mention of that on the product page). I may just try moving them to Amazon FBA where there is actually a lot less competition for this style of jewelry.

 

[jamaicabound]

I'm just amazed that the relabeling works.

Is it packaging and better advertising than the bare bones offerings?

Let's say I wanted to do the keychain flashlight market. (As an example)

I'm getting my black flashlight from the same factory as the other guys on Amazon/eBay, but my presentation looks professional, and it costs more, thus people buy?

If that's what you're saying, I'll me scouring the listings looking for a good product.

WIA

To me private labeling is basically playing on the fact people like name brands. Think about it, if you go to the store and there's two HDMI cables. one comes in a plain plastic bag with a white cardboard label that reads "HDMI Cable" and another one for a few bucks more has fancy packaging, talks about how much data it can transmit, clear picture, talks about how the ends are gold capped, blah blah blah. It could be the same cable, same specs but because one has fancier packaging people will buy it, also because one lists the benefits people will buy it. Its just how our consumer behavior seems to work.

In the grand scheme of things most private label products are the same crap someone else is selling the generic version of.

The one edge I give to private label is if I'm going to put my name on something,I'm going to do some quality control and go with the best supplier. So if I'm ordering 1000 pieces of say a phone mount, I'm going to make sure quality is good. Someone else could be buying the same phone mount but maybe they are just buying off Ali Express using different suppliers everytime. They dont have a brand name to protect. They may have the same product as me but they may have 3 out of 10 phone mounts have a plastic piece crack off so someone knows because they buy from my brand that even if its the same product the quality will typically be better, there are no duds or at the very least are fewer duds because I have amazon reviews and a brand to protect.

 

[HonantheBarbarian]

Also typing and grammatical errors make a huge impact on my eBay/Amazon shopping purchases.

If it reads as if it was written by a Chinese person with autism, I'll pay a couple extra bucks and go with the clearly-worded listing. I know in my heart their the same product. I feel better with the clearly-typed listings.