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Rumor in the Chinese e-commerce market as Amazon opens a new sales channel for Chinese sellers. The American giant is coming up with a bargain section where merchants can sell directly to Western consumers at Temu-like knock-down prices.

Amazon announced its plans to do so yesterday during a presentation for sellers in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen.

This will allow Amazon to compete with parties such as Shein, Temu and AliExpress. Chinese sellers ship their items to a warehouse in China from which Amazon takes care of further logistics. The merchants pay a commission for this.

E-commerce expert John Lin learned details of the presentation. According to him, these are unbranded items with a maximum selling price of twenty dollars or euros. Possibly there will be a separate app itself. If not, at least there will be a separate corner on Amazon for these bargains.

Between ordering and receiving the goods is between nine and 11 days. Over time, that should be possible in less time, as AliExpress also manages to reduce that to about five days through local warehouses.

For the e-commerce market in Europe and the U.S., this means even more competition for cheaper items. Once the sales platforms are established, there will be little standing in their way to attract Western consumers to more expensive items as well.

Interest groups will protest Amazon's move, as they already do against the practices of AliExpress and Temu. In particular, the criticism focuses on the double standards of law and regulators. Sellers from the Far East avoid import taxes and oversight from NVWA-like organizations.

When publishing market figures for the first quarter, Marlene ten Ham, general director of Thuiswinkel.org, said this week, "We see a particularly strong increase in online purchases in China. We are fighting for a level playing field, because unfortunately this is not always going well now. We see that a number of companies do not comply with important legislation on unfair trade practices, customs rules, sustainability, privacy and product safety. Partly because of this, these companies are able to keep their prices lower, which in turn makes it more attractive for consumers to buy from them."

Photo: Nuno Alberto, Unsplash

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