The differences between selling through Itasca's Amazon Advantage Account, and through our Amazon Seller Account.
Selling Through Itasca's Amazon Advantage Account
If you choose trade distribution through Itasca your book will be sold to Amazon through our Amazon Advantage account. In this case we provide information about your title to Amazon, including the list price you set. Amazon orders your book from us and we ship it to Amazon warehouses. Amazon sets the price that a consumer pays for your book on their website, which may or may not be the same as the list price you set. If a consumer orders a copy of your book Amazon ships it from their warehouse. Amazon pays us 45% of the list price to us, which we pay to you minus our fees. If Amazon decides it has too many copies of your book in their warehouse they will ship those books back to us, at your expense.
Selling Through Itasca's Amazon Seller Account
There is an alternative way to sell through Amazon, which is through our Amazon Seller account. In this case we provide your title information to Amazon, including the list price. In this case Amazon does not warehouse the book, we do. Also, the price consumer’s pay on Amazon will be the list price you set, not a price that Amazon sets. When Amazon receives a consumer order for your book, we receive the order from Amazon and ship the book from our warehouse. There are advantages in selling this way: you control the selling price, and you make more money for each sale: we pay you 57% of the list price instead of 45% minus our fees. On a $20.00 list price that would mean that you would get $11.40 instead of $7.20. T
Warning: Consumers cannot use their Prime free shipping to order your book, which may discourage some from ordering it.
In Summary
Selling Through Our Amazon Wholesale Account
- Allows consumers to use their Amazon Prime account to get free shipping.
- You make less money for each sale.
- You pay for shipping books to Amazon warehouses — and from Amazon warehouses back to us if Amazon decides to return book. (This happens often.)
Selling Through Our Amazon Seller Account
- You make more money for each sale.
- You do not pay to ship books to and from Amazon warehouses.
- As long as you maintain inventory at Itasca your book will never be out of stock, whereas Amazon may not have copies of your book at any given time to sell.
- Consumers can’t use their Amazon Prime account for free shipping.