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What is going on with Amazon?

★★★ signal-strong   r/amazonseller  ·  ↑ 85  ·  💬 59  ·  2025-09-27  ·  kw: buy box price  ·  open on reddit ↗
your rating:
Tool
none
Issue
After restocking 320 units ($8000) of a product that previously sold 500+ units/month, seller cannot make a single sale in over a week despite lowering price and holding buy box, contrasting sharply with initial 36-unit batch that sold in under a week.
Cost
$8000
Recommendation
Check Keepa graph for sales activity; verify true buy box status in incognito; monitor warehouse distribution delays; use MCF to ship from alternative channels (Walmart, eBay); restock conservatively (max 2x historical sales); none consensus solution provided
Date context
September 2025; mentioned seasonal shift from summer to winter demand decline
extracted with
anthropic/claude-haiku-4.5 · 2026-05-08

Body

I bought 36 units of an eye care product. Sent it off to Amazon and they sold in less than a week. Quick and easy. So I make a deal with my supplier. Bought 320 units, around 8000 dollars. Send it off to Amazon... But i can't make a single sale now. The item sells 500 plus units a month. I lowered my price and have the buy box. But even after a week I can't get a sale. I am not sure what to do. But recently i had had some items that not selling well after i restock them .. but never this bad

Top comments (7)

[score=1] AutoModerator
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[score=22] pimpnasty
Social media post or temporarily marketed. It could also be an issue with the listing. Theres tons of reasons. This makes me think if it's possible to bait a wholesaler buying your own inventory from an in-stock Amazon seller, then waiting for a big prepaid order and calling it there.
[score=6] SuperSaiyanBlue
Check the ship date. Maybe your 320 units is being distributed to different Amazon warehouses across the country so may not be fully available yet. This time of year it takes awhile compared to when you shipped your first 36 units.
[score=7] 4N0N_K1ll3R
u go out of the stock u loose the ranking , check how many other sellers are on the listing, buy box not just about the lowest price, its mix of seller ranking, availability of stock and distribution of the stock as well, your stock might be still moving between amazon distribution centers so even though its available to sell buy dispatch date will appear longer. hope u figure it out soon, make sure its not seasonal product that another possibility, u did well in summer now we are moving towards winter demand is dying down.
[score=6] STheBarbarian
Lots of good answers, as a large scale long term seller with over 50,000 ASINs I see this all time, we list an item, it sells really well, we send more stock and it basically never sells again, even with advertising. We are left with dead stock and Amazon storage fees. Welcome to Amazon. A mixture of incompetence, unethical extortion from unsuspecting sellers, and a philosophy of punishing long term sellers as there are always new sellers to profit from. We are very cautious in our re-stocking, never more than double historical sales. In the past we have had personal Amazon reps and asked about this pattern and asked whether it was a ranking issue due to stock selling out, they know the game but said it could be, we ran tests of ensuring stock levels were maintained, result was more dead stock and no increase in sales. If you are in the US you are lucky and can pull back some of the stock. Amazon will give you the sales Amazon wants to give you, you can try to fight it but will be wasting more money doing so. From Amazon's perspective there is an argument that they are testing a new seller on a listing to see whether they perform as well as other sellers, then feed future sales to the best performer, just like when you are a new seller you get more exposure than old sellers, but my assessment is it's not this, I think Amazon is an AI manipulation company, trying to dish limited sales to a large seller base in the most profitable way possible. How can they manipulate you into spending more on ads, more on warehouse fees, etc.. with as little sales as possible (so they have more sales to manipulate other sellers). We seller's are the patsies. By all means optimize your listings etc, try to get ranking, watch the buy box etc.. but do not rely on previous sales to judge future sales, only invest what you are prepared to lose.
[score=5] wangmobile
Are you sure you truly have the buy box? Check incognito. Also what does the keepa graph say, are sales happening on the listing or no?
[score=4] ELY_M
you can use MCF and have amazon ship to your buyers if you are selling this same thing at other places like Walmart and ebay.