In this article, let’s talk about how to choose an online arbitrage prep center this 2023.
Prep centers save time for you, the business owner, to travel the world and grow your business by leveraging other people’s expertise. If you’re like me, a person who wants to work ON their business and not IN it, then this article is just for you.
I’ll be discussing what prep centers are and what they can do to help you work on your business. Guiding you through all the things that you should know when you start thinking about using a prep center.
Topic Rundown:
- What is a prep center?
- What does a prep center do?
- What are the pros of using a prep center?
- What are the cons of using a prep center?
- What are the considerations when choosing a prep center?
- How much should you spend on a prep center?
- What prep centers do Fast Track FBA users use?
- List of prep centers you can check
What is a prep center?
By using third-party fulfillment services, your inventory is examined, combined, and kept in a storage before it's shipped to Amazon warehouses. Traditionally, Amazon sellers purchase products online and transport them to their houses for repacking and storing prior to delivering them to Amazon's fulfillment centers. However, utilizing a prep center involves partnering with a third-party fulfillment service provider to handle the storage, preparation, and shipping of your goods to Amazon's fulfillment center, freeing up your time and leaving storage space in your house.
What does a prep center do?
Prep centers receive your products from your suppliers, inspect and remove any pricing labels and then store them until it needs to be consolidated and labeled, ready before shipping them to Amazon in boxes or pallets.
What are the pros of using a prep center?
Can help you save time
If you’re not going to need to be packing all the time and preparing your products at home, you’ll be saving time by using a prep center. You can have most of your time spent sourcing products and completing other activities to grow your business.
More time outside your business
You can finish your tasks early and spend more time with your family, it can allow you to travel to different countries and spend more time for yourself and other business ventures you may have.
Safe from disease
If you’re worried about receiving packages, going outside, and delivering them, which may expose you to illnesses and sickness, having a prep center will put you out of that equation while being in the comfort of your own home.
What are the cons of using a prep center?
Using a prep center will increase your cost
To cover this cost, you can increase your deal criteria when sourcing, but that is easier said than done and this makes your existing deals less profitable due to, obviously, increased costs.
You need to allocate ample time
You still need to allocate ample time to track your products, monitor and manage your deliveries from your suppliers into your prep center versus what you order, challenge any delivery discrepancies, and also account for any losses, which all do take time.
Using a prep center for your Amazon business is an amazing opportunity that can really help grow your business, but you know what else can help grow your business? Having a virtual assistant within your business. Doing tasks, supporting you to grow.
Get the FREE Top 15 FBA Tasks to Outsource to Amazon Virtual Assistants
These 15 Top FBA Tasks To Outsource To Amazon Virtual Assistants are based on my own experience of running an Amazon Arbitrage business. I have taken the key tasks that make the biggest impact on my business and put them into this list, to help you in your business.
- These are the tasks I outsource
- I break it down into roles, sourcing, admin & purchasing
- This is regularly updated based on my actual business
- I explain what each tasks does and how it helps
- Use this to outsource your own business
What are the considerations when choosing a prep center?
It's important to have your own criteria when choosing a prep center, as this is based on the needs of your business.
We asked our Fast Track FBA community what their considerations are when choosing a prep center and the following are there answers.
Price
Many of our members in the community voted for the price as the number one consideration.
Customer service and performance
We should always take into consideration and base our choice on reviews, which I think is super important.
We can imply from this that your price is the most important factor to consider when choosing a prep center and then next is the quality of the service they are offering which can be seen from their reviews.
Inventory management software
It is one of the most important factors to consider, as you’ll want to go to a prep center that can fully supply you and accommodate you based on the needs of your business.
How much should you spend on a prep center?
When choosing which prep center to use, it is essential that you control your costs. We asked our Fast Track FBA community how much money they pay per unit for their prep center, and here are their responses:
Most Fast Track FBA Amazon sellers are paying 50p per unit, and it increases from there.
What prep centers do Fast Track FBA users use?
Fast Track FBA got the highest votes, next is complete prep, and the rest you can see in the image attached.
Be aware that only 2% of our entire community took part in the poll. Please, do your own research as well to find the best prep center for your business needs.
Which prep center would you choose?
Online arbitrage prep centers have revolutionized the way Amazon sellers operate their businesses. By taking care of the tedious work of prepping, packing, and shipping, an online arbitrage prep center frees up valuable time for entrepreneurs to focus on growing their businesses. With the increasing popularity of Amazon third-party selling, utilizing an online arbitrage prep center can give businesses an edge in this competitive market, enabling them to streamline their operations and maximize their ROI. Whether you are just starting or scaling your Amazon business, an online arbitrage prep center can make all the difference. So why wait?
If you want to manage your inventory and learn how to do just that, you can find a link here to a video specifically about that topic. But if you're still interested in knowing How to set up an Amazon Seller Account and How to get Ungated on Amazon, read our previous article about it.