There are zero sellers I want a relationship with on Amazon. Almost all spam and annoyance I get by email is somebody I bought one thing for who wants a relationship with me. The vast majority of my shopping is transactional, and I want it that way. If I want a relationship with a seller, I can take care of making one

The most frightening part of the Senate bills are that they require Apple, et al to let people communicate with customers outside of the app store.

> There are zero sellers I want a relationship with on Amazon.

I understand. If we are talking about the 350 FBA sellers listing the same avocado peeler they all get from the same factory in China and private label under 350 different brands. Yeah. Could not agree more.

However, there are categories and products where you probably do want a relationship with the seller. Health and beauty products comes to mind as a potentially obvious one. For example, if there are recalls or any important notices pertaining to the products you bought, you would be well served to be on their email list. In addition to this, it is common practice to offer customers discounts for recurring business. This benefits everyone, the buyer gets the same product for less and the seller creates a subscription-based cashflow stream. Everyone wins.

If you look at it from the perspective of the typical mercenary FBA seller who took a $1,000 course to learn how to sell on Amazon, yeah, again, could not agree more. However, there are tons of sellers who honestly want to build a solid, reputable, caring family business that delivers good products. Most of these people work very hard --much harder than they did when they had a 9 to 5 job-- and it can take years before they turn enough of a profit to pay themselves a decent salary. I would caution anyone from seeing all FBA sellers through the same lens, that would not be an accurate assessment.

While I do understand your take, I'm not sure it's a net positive for consumers. Marketing to previous customers is a very effective marketing strategy. If you prevent that, small companies are losing one of the few ways they can compete with bigger operations. Otherwise they have to keep buying ads on Google and Amazon..

Yes, most mail from retailers is spam. But for a handful of small retailers I actually like their newsletters, because they remind me that they exist, so I remember them next time I order something.

That’s why you do FBM. More work on your part. But Amazon doesn’t control anything other than taking their cut. You list it, package it, ship it, initiate refunds and customer questions, etc..

FBM has its own set of nightmare-scenario issues. At the end of the day, Amazon can shut you down any day of the week, at any time. If you've done FBM long enough and have the kind of product that benefits from recurring business, you could survive post-shutdown by reaching directly to those who bought from you in the past. It can work. Sure.

I know a bunch of people who unplugged from the mothership starting by switching to FBM. The truth of the matter is that Amazon has such market dominance that being out there on your own might mean an 80% reduction in business. The exception is if you have very special products that are sole-source and well protected. In that case you could recover nicely to a decent run rate and make money.