Third-party sellers account for the bulk of Amazon’s sales. But this new breed of small business is enmeshed in Amazon’s e-commerce infrastructure in ways that both benefit and exploit them, says Moira Weigel, assistant professor of communications studies at Northeastern University. Photo by Alyssa Stone/Northeastern University What do former U.S. Marines, stay-at-home moms, retirees and Chinese business veterans all have in common? You’ve probably bought something from them on Amazon. Third-party sellers, people who sell their products through Amazon’s marketplace, come from every walk of life and increasingly make up more and more of the online giant’s sales. Amazon launched its third-party marketplace in 2000, allowing small business owners to put their products on Amazon (for a price). There are now millions of third-party sellers on the site, and third-party sales make up about 60% of Amazon’s physical product sales, Jeff Bezos told the House of Representatives in 2020. Third-party sellers at the center of Amazon’s ecosystem––and the debate around the company’s complicated place in the world. Is Amazon exploiting these small businesses or lifting them up? Moira Weigel , an assistant professor of communication studies at Northeastern University, says it’s not that simple. Moira Weigel, Northeastern University assistant […]
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