4 ms·

Is this only being down voted because of tone? I am curious if there actually are any laws relevant to this situation. As far as I can tell, this is exactly li

by berdon 7y ago

Is this only being down voted because of tone? I am curious if there actually are any laws relevant to this situation. As far as I can tell, this is exactly like Walmart or BigBoxCo pushing their own brands. It's not illegal and, generally, it's not even a bad thing for the consumer (in the short term). It really feels like most of the people taking issue with this are doing so because of their personal sentiments rather than legality.

Konnstann 7y ago
I have lukewarm feelings on the issue, but the difference to me is that BigBoxCo isn't selling counterfeit products in their stores, which means their brands have to compete on price/quality with the rest of the store, even if they are "pushed". With Amazon, the presence of counterfeit items, especially due to shared inventory, etc. means that even if I wanted another brand, I can't guarantee that I will even get a genuine item. This gives Amazon brands a huge advantage they wouldn't have at a big box store.
edoceo 7y ago
I think it's downvotes because Amazon is not a store, it's a marketplace. And it's well different than BigBox because there is way less capital outlay for both property and goods. Downvotes for bad information, not snark
- simplecomplex 7y ago
  “marketplace” is just a word, not a legal fiction/status like “corporation”. AFAIK US antitrust law does not have any concept of “marketplaces.”
IanCal 7y ago
It's a similar problem to why we have antitrust laws. If this was you or I, there wouldn't be a problem. If you are the only / pretty much the only store used then it (to me) would clearly be a problem for consumers. You'd be using your monopoly in one area (marketplace) to benefit you elsewhere (selling USB cables) rather than competing on a level playing field. In between it becomes trickier. At what point are they too big? How dominant would they need to be? I think there are differences to physical stores partly due to scale. If a shelf has 10 different variations of basically the same thing that's the equivalent of all products being on the front of the search results. If there are hundreds, then the ranking becomes vital.
luxuryballs 7y ago
Walmart has an interesting approach. They let whichever supplier has the best sales in a category design the shelving layouts for ALL suppliers in that category. If you abuse your rights you lose your category captain status. That means if Pepsi has the best sales they decide where Coke goes on the shelf. Pretty clever. At one point when coffee wasn’t a big section, the category captain of coffee actually helped bring in competitors to increase the overall size of the shelf space and thus attract more passing customers.

by berdon 7y ago

Konnstann 7y ago

I have lukewarm feelings on the issue, but the difference to me is that BigBoxCo isn't selling counterfeit products in their stores, which means their brands have to compete on price/quality with the rest of the store, even if they are "pushed". With Amazon, the presence of counterfeit items, especially due to shared inventory, etc. means that even if I wanted another brand, I can't guarantee that I will even get a genuine item. This gives Amazon brands a huge advantage they wouldn't have at a big box store.

edoceo 7y ago

I think it's downvotes because Amazon is not a store, it's a marketplace. And it's well different than BigBox because there is way less capital outlay for both property and goods. Downvotes for bad information, not snark

simplecomplex 7y ago
“marketplace” is just a word, not a legal fiction/status like “corporation”. AFAIK US antitrust law does not have any concept of “marketplaces.”

IanCal 7y ago

It's a similar problem to why we have antitrust laws. If this was you or I, there wouldn't be a problem. If you are the only / pretty much the only store used then it (to me) would clearly be a problem for consumers. You'd be using your monopoly in one area (marketplace) to benefit you elsewhere (selling USB cables) rather than competing on a level playing field. In between it becomes trickier. At what point are they too big? How dominant would they need to be? I think there are differences to physical stores partly due to scale. If a shelf has 10 different variations of basically the same thing that's the equivalent of all products being on the front of the search results. If there are hundreds, then the ranking becomes vital.

luxuryballs 7y ago

Walmart has an interesting approach. They let whichever supplier has the best sales in a category design the shelving layouts for ALL suppliers in that category. If you abuse your rights you lose your category captain status. That means if Pepsi has the best sales they decide where Coke goes on the shelf. Pretty clever. At one point when coffee wasn’t a big section, the category captain of coffee actually helped bring in competitors to increase the overall size of the shelf space and thus attract more passing customers.