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> It's almost impossible to beat Amazon in the supply-chain economics, unless you have a highly specialized product and deals with the manufacturer Yeah. And

by capote 10y ago

> It's almost impossible to beat Amazon in the supply-chain economics, unless you have a highly specialized product and deals with the manufacturer Yeah. And the opposite of a highly specialized product is exactly the example the article gave--a piece of metal to hold up your laptop. I don't think there's anything we stand to lose from this happening to products so simple and generic. Or is there?

tryitnow 10y ago
The biggest risk is that Amazon will act as a monopoly and jack up the prices of the products once it's destroyed competitors. Honestly, I don't think that's too likely as amazon's business model is built around razor-thin margins.
- MichaelBurge 10y ago
  A monopoly on pieces of metal shaped a certain way? I feel like both of your sentences are unnecessarily abstract here.
- perezdev 10y ago
  That's super unlikely to happen. At least with a product like this. Jacking up the price would just encourage other manufacturers to do the same as Amazon: release a cheaper product. What Amazon has done is best for the consumer.
- adventured 10y ago
  That isn't going to happen. See: Walmart's Great Value brand products. Walmart has used it for a long time to hold consumer prices in check. If Nabisco attempts a large price hike, Walmart deploys their Great Value brand right next to said Nabisco product and undercuts them down to a price they regard as reasonable. Despite Walmart's extreme size and market dominance in traditional retail over the last ~20 years, they've never used - at a wide scope - their Great Value brand as an opportunity jack up prices or destroy competitors.
- dragonwriter 10y ago
  No, the biggest risk is that Amazon will kill innovation by reducing the expected returns to product development expenditures so that investment in product development is reduced.
  - capote 10y ago
    But there's nothing innovative about the original versions of the AmazonBasics products. That's why they're called AmazonBasics. I'll agree with you when we have an AmazonBasics car or smartwatch, which turn will change the entire paradigm and probably won't happen.
    - dragonwriter 10y ago
      If that was true, that wouldn't need to free ride on other peoples product and market development. Yeah, it's not the flashy big-picture innovation that goes into inventing whole new product categories -- but it has a cost and provides values, and if Amazon is swooping in to eat the returns of other firms investments, they destroy the incentive to make the ivestments, and improvements in the product categories at risk will be impaired.
cc438 10y ago
I think the consumer can only gain from such entries into the market. AmazonBasic products are often just a standardization of a simple product in a market with too many options. Consumers trust Amazon to deliver on their promises and when confronted with a choice between 800+ USB hubs, I'll choose the cheapest option that is guaranteed to work. There is almost 0 utility for the consumer in choosing a "better" USB hub than AmazonBasic's offering but the downside of choosing a "no-name" hub is measurably significant. The genius in AmazonBasic concept was in realizing that building the better mousetrap doesn't always mean building the best mousetrap, it means building the best mousetrap for the price. There are so many goods with a market that falls into just two categories, ones that work and ones that don't. Whichever brand is able to gain consumers trust in knowing their offering will work will quickly rise to dominate such a market.
- r00fus 10y ago
  It's like the Walmart-ization of main street - except in the digital realm. Great for cost-cutting consumers today, bad in the long run. Personally for the product pictured - the Amazon version is gaudy - I don't want to see more AMZN branding on my stuff.
  - falcolas 10y ago
    I have one of these at work (and my colleague one of the name brand articles) - you don't see the branding on either one 99% of the time, because your laptop is covering it. Ultimately, it is just a laptop stand, and it's a quality one. I'm just surprised that it took Amazon to come up with a lower priced competitor - I've been looking for something that wasn't $50 for a long time. All of its competitors other than Amazon are overpriced, flimsy pieces of plastic.
  - escherize 10y ago
    I'm curious how you know what's good for consumers more than they do. Would you mind explaining why it's bad for cost-cutting consumers in the long run? Seems like amazon is content to run razor thin margins, and if they jack up the price after competitors go out of business, that move would recreate a market for item X and burn some Amazon good will. I also find the Amazon branding on that laptop stand to be really tacky, though!
bsder 10y ago
> I don't think there's anything we stand to lose from this happening to products so simple and generic. Or is there? The thing you stand to lose is the original making of that product. While making the laptop stand is "simple" (and I object to that statement as manufacturing anything is rarely "simple"), getting it in front of people, marketing it, and selling it is not. Amazon sits back and looks for any products that now sell over $X million dollars and then simply walks in. So, now if I'm a manufacturer, I will do several things: 1) I might avoid Amazon. Ever. Decreasing choice on Amazon certainly hurts the consumer, no? 2) I might make a shitty product specifically for Amazon to sell so it doesn't cannibalize my good product. I hope you like wading through even more crappy products on Amazon. That hurts the consumer, no? 3) I might simply not make the product. If I think that Amazon might clone me, I either might not develop the product or I might artificially restrict the sales if I know that Amazon flags products above "n units sales or $m total revenue". This is not new. WalMart was the offender last time. http://www.fastcompany.com/54763/man-who-said-no-wal-mart http://www.fastcompany.com/54763/man-who-said-no-wal-mart Note that Snapper got bought by Briggs who then decided that Sears and WalMart were just fine. Quality seems to have suffered, as expected.
- capote 10y ago
  First off, "simple" is relative. A laptop stand is relatively simple, that's just what it is. So, you're saying we stand to lose original making of products that are easy for Amazon to copy. That's exactly what I'm saying isn't that important. You point 3 is what you should do if your product is not innovative or cannot compete with a generic AmazonBasics version. If it's truly better, or complex enough that it simply won't be copied by Amazon, then make it and you won't have issues.
  - treebeard901 10y ago
    If Amazon is the only company willing to make a product, that gives them a monopoly by definition. When have consumers benefited when they only have one choice?
  - tremon 10y ago
    In his case 3 there will be no AmazonBasics version either, since there won't be a product for Amazon to analyze and copy.
illumin8 10y ago
I actually just bought the Rain stand for my rMBP a week ago, and have to say that I'm impressed with the industrial design. Sure, it's just a laptop stand, but it's solid aluminum and has solid design principles - it's a heavy piece of metal that looks and functions well enough it could have been designed by Apple and Jony Ive himself. I'm fairly certain the AmazonBasics stand isn't the same quality, but that's not really the market they're going for. They're going for good enough and cheap - AmazonBasics cables are a good example of this - they're not high end, but they're affordable and when you just need an HDMI cable, they work fine. Honestly, Amazon is in the perfect position to compete with their partners like this, and I don't see the harm. If anything the customer experience is even better because we now have reasonable low-priced options to buy that might not have been there before.
- capote 10y ago
  I also bought a different, brand-name stand for my rMBP. I'm one of the people who are willing to pay extra for a product because it looks better. I don't think Amazon is threatening higher-price/lower-quantity products that are truly outstanding (much better looking, much better quality). These make more money off of one sale, and have a smaller market. The more complex the product is, the easier it is for a company to set their version apart from the AmazonBasics one. I think they're only threatening those that are simply "easy enough" to copy without losing functionality and utility. The laptop stand is very close to the "easy enough" part of the spectrum. Things like USB hubs and ethernet cables, even closer.
  - rkho 10y ago
    Same. I'm not swayed by price. It's the build quality and materials that matter most to me. While there might be consumers who are drawn to Amazon's laptop stand, I'm willing to assume that the majority of buyers for Amazon's product would not have purchased the pricier options to begin with.
- falcolas 10y ago
  I have the Amazon one, my colleague the Rain version. When your laptop is on it, you can't tell the difference between the two. Yes, it's steel instead of Aluminum, which means it weighs around 3 lbs instead of the Rain's 2 lbs (it's thick). Otherwise, it functions perfectly well as a laptop stand, which is all I really wanted out of it.

by capote 10y ago

tryitnow 10y ago

The biggest risk is that Amazon will act as a monopoly and jack up the prices of the products once it's destroyed competitors. Honestly, I don't think that's too likely as amazon's business model is built around razor-thin margins.

MichaelBurge 10y ago
A monopoly on pieces of metal shaped a certain way? I feel like both of your sentences are unnecessarily abstract here.
perezdev 10y ago
That's super unlikely to happen. At least with a product like this. Jacking up the price would just encourage other manufacturers to do the same as Amazon: release a cheaper product. What Amazon has done is best for the consumer.
adventured 10y ago
That isn't going to happen. See: Walmart's Great Value brand products. Walmart has used it for a long time to hold consumer prices in check. If Nabisco attempts a large price hike, Walmart deploys their Great Value brand right next to said Nabisco product and undercuts them down to a price they regard as reasonable. Despite Walmart's extreme size and market dominance in traditional retail over the last ~20 years, they've never used - at a wide scope - their Great Value brand as an opportunity jack up prices or destroy competitors.
dragonwriter 10y ago
No, the biggest risk is that Amazon will kill innovation by reducing the expected returns to product development expenditures so that investment in product development is reduced.
- capote 10y ago
  But there's nothing innovative about the original versions of the AmazonBasics products. That's why they're called AmazonBasics. I'll agree with you when we have an AmazonBasics car or smartwatch, which turn will change the entire paradigm and probably won't happen.
  - dragonwriter 10y ago
    If that was true, that wouldn't need to free ride on other peoples product and market development. Yeah, it's not the flashy big-picture innovation that goes into inventing whole new product categories -- but it has a cost and provides values, and if Amazon is swooping in to eat the returns of other firms investments, they destroy the incentive to make the ivestments, and improvements in the product categories at risk will be impaired.

cc438 10y ago

I think the consumer can only gain from such entries into the market. AmazonBasic products are often just a standardization of a simple product in a market with too many options. Consumers trust Amazon to deliver on their promises and when confronted with a choice between 800+ USB hubs, I'll choose the cheapest option that is guaranteed to work. There is almost 0 utility for the consumer in choosing a "better" USB hub than AmazonBasic's offering but the downside of choosing a "no-name" hub is measurably significant. The genius in AmazonBasic concept was in realizing that building the better mousetrap doesn't always mean building the best mousetrap, it means building the best mousetrap for the price. There are so many goods with a market that falls into just two categories, ones that work and ones that don't. Whichever brand is able to gain consumers trust in knowing their offering will work will quickly rise to dominate such a market.

r00fus 10y ago
It's like the Walmart-ization of main street - except in the digital realm. Great for cost-cutting consumers today, bad in the long run. Personally for the product pictured - the Amazon version is gaudy - I don't want to see more AMZN branding on my stuff.
- falcolas 10y ago
  I have one of these at work (and my colleague one of the name brand articles) - you don't see the branding on either one 99% of the time, because your laptop is covering it. Ultimately, it is just a laptop stand, and it's a quality one. I'm just surprised that it took Amazon to come up with a lower priced competitor - I've been looking for something that wasn't $50 for a long time. All of its competitors other than Amazon are overpriced, flimsy pieces of plastic.
- escherize 10y ago
  I'm curious how you know what's good for consumers more than they do. Would you mind explaining why it's bad for cost-cutting consumers in the long run? Seems like amazon is content to run razor thin margins, and if they jack up the price after competitors go out of business, that move would recreate a market for item X and burn some Amazon good will. I also find the Amazon branding on that laptop stand to be really tacky, though!

bsder 10y ago

> I don't think there's anything we stand to lose from this happening to products so simple and generic. Or is there? The thing you stand to lose is the original making of that product. While making the laptop stand is "simple" (and I object to that statement as manufacturing anything is rarely "simple"), getting it in front of people, marketing it, and selling it is not. Amazon sits back and looks for any products that now sell over $X million dollars and then simply walks in. So, now if I'm a manufacturer, I will do several things: 1) I might avoid Amazon. Ever. Decreasing choice on Amazon certainly hurts the consumer, no? 2) I might make a shitty product specifically for Amazon to sell so it doesn't cannibalize my good product. I hope you like wading through even more crappy products on Amazon. That hurts the consumer, no? 3) I might simply not make the product. If I think that Amazon might clone me, I either might not develop the product or I might artificially restrict the sales if I know that Amazon flags products above "n units sales or $m total revenue". This is not new. WalMart was the offender last time. http://www.fastcompany.com/54763/man-who-said-no-wal-mart http://www.fastcompany.com/54763/man-who-said-no-wal-mart Note that Snapper got bought by Briggs who then decided that Sears and WalMart were just fine. Quality seems to have suffered, as expected.

capote 10y ago
First off, "simple" is relative. A laptop stand is relatively simple, that's just what it is. So, you're saying we stand to lose original making of products that are easy for Amazon to copy. That's exactly what I'm saying isn't that important. You point 3 is what you should do if your product is not innovative or cannot compete with a generic AmazonBasics version. If it's truly better, or complex enough that it simply won't be copied by Amazon, then make it and you won't have issues.
- treebeard901 10y ago
  If Amazon is the only company willing to make a product, that gives them a monopoly by definition. When have consumers benefited when they only have one choice?
- tremon 10y ago
  In his case 3 there will be no AmazonBasics version either, since there won't be a product for Amazon to analyze and copy.

illumin8 10y ago

I actually just bought the Rain stand for my rMBP a week ago, and have to say that I'm impressed with the industrial design. Sure, it's just a laptop stand, but it's solid aluminum and has solid design principles - it's a heavy piece of metal that looks and functions well enough it could have been designed by Apple and Jony Ive himself. I'm fairly certain the AmazonBasics stand isn't the same quality, but that's not really the market they're going for. They're going for good enough and cheap - AmazonBasics cables are a good example of this - they're not high end, but they're affordable and when you just need an HDMI cable, they work fine. Honestly, Amazon is in the perfect position to compete with their partners like this, and I don't see the harm. If anything the customer experience is even better because we now have reasonable low-priced options to buy that might not have been there before.

capote 10y ago
I also bought a different, brand-name stand for my rMBP. I'm one of the people who are willing to pay extra for a product because it looks better. I don't think Amazon is threatening higher-price/lower-quantity products that are truly outstanding (much better looking, much better quality). These make more money off of one sale, and have a smaller market. The more complex the product is, the easier it is for a company to set their version apart from the AmazonBasics one. I think they're only threatening those that are simply "easy enough" to copy without losing functionality and utility. The laptop stand is very close to the "easy enough" part of the spectrum. Things like USB hubs and ethernet cables, even closer.
- rkho 10y ago
  Same. I'm not swayed by price. It's the build quality and materials that matter most to me. While there might be consumers who are drawn to Amazon's laptop stand, I'm willing to assume that the majority of buyers for Amazon's product would not have purchased the pricier options to begin with.
falcolas 10y ago
I have the Amazon one, my colleague the Rain version. When your laptop is on it, you can't tell the difference between the two. Yes, it's steel instead of Aluminum, which means it weighs around 3 lbs instead of the Rain's 2 lbs (it's thick). Otherwise, it functions perfectly well as a laptop stand, which is all I really wanted out of it.