Companies invest tens, hundreds of thousands of euros to build their assets, consisting of tangible and intangible assets such as trust, credibility, guarantee of product quality. It takes years and years to build products, select retailers, gain consumer trust.
In some cases, companies also invest in their flagship stores , on their websites and also in online sales .
Then Amazon arrives and brands are generally unprepared for what inevitably happens.
- The challenge of channel control.
- The challenge of price control.
- The challenge of brand control.
- This is a very common scenario.
We are often called upon to check the feasibility of a brand sales project on Amazon. This same brand does not know, or discovers only now, that it is already present with many references, an extensive number of sellers, a long list of products created by unknown sellers, second-market products, illegitimate barcodes.
We also find different colors and sizes of products sold at different prices, poor reviews on the brand’s products from customers who receive damaged products, dated versions of products sold together with the new versions.
These are just some of the problems that arise when a brand’s products are sold on Amazon without any control.
Distribution control.
A different scenario is the sale that takes place in traditional retail, where the manufacturer has better and relative control over all the material and immaterial aspects of the brand. The manufacturer decides which products to put on sale and when to withdraw some products from the sale. It cannot impose the minimum selling price of any product, because anti-competitive policies are not allowed, but the brand controls merchandising and marketing in stores that support the sale of its products through specific policies: display materials, advertising campaigns, discounts on assortments, participation in promotional campaigns.