Under the wind, there has never been a shortage of new people in the cross-border e-commerce arena, but now more and more sellers find that the "admission ticket" in their hands has become more and more expensive, and almost all mainstream cross-border e-commerce platforms are on the rise.
Amazon goes without saying that in the past year, it has been trapped by its own high costs and operating pressures. Amazon has repeatedly raised various expenses including distribution fees and storage fees, which has caused great pressure on sellers. In fact, this trend has not stopped by 2023. Recently, many sellers have received charging emails from Amazon, reminding sellers that many fees will be raised in April this year.
The first is the "storage utilization surcharge". Earlier, Amazon issued a notice saying: "Starting from April 1, 2023, Amazon will impose a surcharge on sellers with a storage utilization rate of more than 26 weeks. Among them, if the storage utilization rate is more than 26 weeks and less than 39 weeks, an additional US $0.69 per cubic foot will be charged on top of the original cost, while if the storage utilization rate exceeds 39 weeks, an additional US $0.94 will be charged." Obviously, after this regulation comes into effect, the selling cost of some sellers with poor storage turnover will further rise.
The second is the "multi-channel distribution (MCF) fee". Amazon said that due to the continuous inflation and increasing its operating costs, Amazon had to choose to continue to raise prices. Therefore, in recent days, Amazon UK and Japan have successively issued multi-channel distribution fee increase notices, of which UK sites officially took effect on April 7 and Japan sites on June 6.
for sellers, the price increase notice from Amazon is like countless sharp knives hanging over the seller's head, which may fall at any time, and the seller has no time to breathe. Since 2023, changes in FBA distribution fees, dangerous goods distribution fees, removal and abandonment order fees have all come into effect, and more cost adjustments will occur in the future.
Of course, Amazon's fee adjustments cannot all be price increases. In order to appease sellers, Amazon will appropriately adjust some of the fees while frequently raising prices. But from the overall trend, Amazon's own dilemma is not solved, the pursuit of cost reduction and efficiency is the general trend. In this process, Amazon will try its best to pass on the cost pressure to the seller, and the difficulty of selling goods in the future will continue to escalate.
2. selling difficulty upgrade
What is certain is that the global market turmoil is intensifying, and many cross-border e-commerce platforms are facing extremely severe survival tests. In this context, attempts like Amazon to pass on cost pressures to sellers have become a trend.
For example, not long ago, German fashion e-commerce platform Zalando announced that it would lay off employees in many departments. At the same time, the platform also adjusted the sales commission of third-party sellers. Starting from July this year, sellers will need to pay basic fees for the first time when selling goods on the platform. In addition, the sales commission will be restructured and increased. These changes will lead to further compression of the seller's profit margin.
The reasons why made these decisions can be found in the financial reports released by Zalando. According to the financial report, Zalando faced multiple challenges in 2022, with both annual revenue and annual net profit falling, with annual revenue of 10.3 billion euros and annual net profit of only 16.8 million euros. The test of survival has intensified, and Zalando naturally have to do everything possible to reduce the burden.
Coincidentally, U.S. e-commerce giant eBay also adjusted seller commissions on some sites shortly after announcing layoffs due to heightened concerns about the future. EBay UK announced that from March 2, 2023, sellers with lower performance levels will be charged fees, and the final value fees for some categories will be increased.
is affected by a variety of factors, the global consumer market is cold, and the performance of the giants is under pressure, followed by endless layoffs and various notices of cost increases. The price increase trend is hard to stop. It is conceivable that behind Amazon, Zalando and eBay, there may be more e-commerce platforms to reduce the pressure and announce fee increases.
, as many sellers complain, the cost of selling goods is rising and the profit margin is constantly being squeezed. At the same time, considering the increasingly fierce competitive environment, sellers dare not raise prices at will in order to keep sales volume. This dilemma makes countless sellers under increasing pressure. Future challenges are still there, and sellers still have a tough battle to fight.
Source: Cross-border Dark Horse