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== Price gouging does cause users to associate the site with high prices. Particularly when third party sellers aren’t transparent about MSRP. Amazon risks losi
by take_a_breath 6y ago
== Price gouging does cause users to associate the site with high prices. Particularly when third party sellers aren’t transparent about MSRP. Amazon risks losing customers to physical shops if they become known for being 3x+ as expensive.==
If I go to a marketplace in the real world, I don’t associate the vendor’s individual prices with the entity that runs the market.
In a real marketplace wouldn’t we expect a vendor to notice the price gouging and take advantage of the arbitrage opportunity? Maybe Amazon isn’t really a marketplace?
- macNchz 6y agoI’d be curious to know what proportion of Amazon shoppers actually grok the fact that Amazon is a marketplace of many sellers. I was a longtime Prime member until last year, and spent a good amount of time discussing my concerns about the platform with family and friends before ultimately canceling. My impression from those conversations is that many folks just see Amazon as “Amazon” and have no real concept of who they’re actually buying from. A physical market in the real world makes it incredibly obvious who you’re shopping with, and that it’s independent of the marketplace itself. Amazon’s UI is clearly designed not to make this distinction, so marketplace seller behavior reflects more on the Amazon brand than it might otherwise.
- take_a_breath 6y agoSounds like another example of Amazon wanting to look like a marketplace (for regulatory reasons?) but not necessarily act like one.