As we head into the holiday season, ZQUARED is celebrating early! Renovations at headquarters are complete, providing much-needed room for our growing team and supporting warehouse expansion. We’ve been steadily preparing across all departments for the busy holiday season, despite the construction dust.
We’re looking forward to the ZQUARED Summit, when our entire team of 50+ employees will come together in St. Louis in early December. With team members traveling from cities across the east coast, our annual gathering offers the opportunity to enjoy fellowship and strengthen our workplace community. During this gathering, we’ll take time to intentionally pause and appreciate the growth we’ve experienced in 2022, while diving headfirst into planning for the year to come.
As we enter the holiday season and our calendars begin to fill up, don’t forget to take time to give thanks and appreciate all the good this year has brought!
Zach Cornett Co-Founder & CEO, ZQUARED
Pet Center, Inc. prides itself on creating all-natural pet products that are both healthy and safe for your furry companions. Opening its doors in 1987 in California, PCI was founded because the pet industry was lacking safe and healthy alternatives to treats. The brand has been widely applauded for their continued commitment to excellence, and their Chicken Nibbles have been recognized as the official treat of the American Canine Association.
Before partnering with ZQUARED, Pet Center, Inc. experienced high levels of success in the pet industry. However, the company faced new challenges as they expanded into e-commerce.
Pet Center, Inc. initially managed their e-tail business internally. They sought out support when they began to encounter issues, specifically with selling via Amazon 1st Party (1P). This setup presented difficulties, including:
Lack of price control and Amazon discounting
Inconsistent brand positioning
Disorganized catalog and listing structure
These problems stemmed from the struggle to enforce MAP on the Amazon platform. This issue led to listing suppression, a compromised brand image, and an inability to effectively enforce pricing policies on Amazon and beyond.
To further complicate matters, Amazon imposed high account deductions and chargebacks with little to no information on fee origin. These deductions cut into profits and left the PCI team unsure of how to address the problems. Additionally, erratic POs and Amazon payouts made financial forecasting and inventory planning particularly difficult.
PCI transitioned from a 1P relationship with Amazon to a 3P relationship with ZQUARED. This shift allowed PCI and ZQUARED to develop and enforce a revised MAP policy. Regaining control of sales prevented Amazon discounting. Consistent MAP improved relationships with authorized sellers and streamlined the brand image.
Working with ZQUARED also led to other improvements. In addition to streamlining the brand’s catalog and optimizing its product listings, the ZQ team began implementing a strategic advertising campaign. Moreover, PCI now receives payments in a timely manner and can plan ahead using accurate data while maintaining control.
ZQUARED has made my life so much easier. They made things wonderful again. We were selling directly to Amazon (1P). We realized the relief that switching over to ZQUARED brought to our company. We no longer receive random deduction fees or struggle to receive payment for our products. ZQUARED places POs, and we receive the payment on time and in the exact amount owed. Partnering with ZQUARED has also helped us keep MAP pricing in line and overall makes growing our brand a much more enjoyable process.
– Laura Griffin, National Sales Account Executive, Pet Center, Inc.
To see if switching from 1P to 3P can benefit your business, check out page 12
For the months of November and December, we’re highlighting FullBucket Health, Mueller Kueps, Ample Nutrition, and Zarasyl. We’re honored to be a part of the journey alongside these incredible brands.
Year Founded: 2011
Category: Pet & Animal Health
Year Founded: 2010
Category: Automotive
For every FullBucket product purchased, one is given to an animal in need. Since founding their giving program, they have led 19 Giving Trips, helping thousands of working animals in need of support.
Since its founding in 2010, MuellerKueps has received several industry awards including MOTOR Magazine’s Top 20 Tools, PTEN’s Most Wanted, and PTEN’s Top 100.
Year Founded: 2014
Category: Pet & Animal Health
Year Founded: 2018
Category: Pet & Animal Health
Ample Nutrition was founded by Dr. Kris Latson, a doctor in veterinary medicine, with a passion for bringing verified nutraceuticals to pets.
FACT
Zarasyl has been rated the #1 skincare solution for equine skin irritation in America.
E-commerce is booming. For businesses looking to capitalize on digital marketplaces, Amazon and Walmart are obvious online marketplace choices. With the option to sell via these platforms in two primary ways – 1st Party (1P) and 3rd Party (3P) – you might be wondering which model will best serve your brand.
In short, 1P turns the business into a wholesale vendor. The marketplace, i.e. Amazon, purchases your product in bulk; they then control and sell the product directly to consumers. With 3P, brands sell products directly to consumers, listing products with increased control.
Though the 1P model seemingly offers more logistical support in the e-commerce ecosystem, this setup essentially grants product ownership to Amazon or Walmart, trapping you into rigid pricing structures and significantly reducing brand control. On the other hand, 3P grants sellers control of pricing and marketing. But more control leads to more responsibility, a reality that often pushes brands towards a 1P relationship to outsource intimidating e-commerce logistics.
However, a dedicated partner like ZQUARED can help your brand navigate the e-commerce marketplace and maximize profits without losing ownership.
Amazon 1P vs. 3P
Amazon 1P is an invite-only club. To be invited to “Vendor Central” (the 1P seller’s portal), your brand must be established on the marketplace and recognized as a trusted brand. Though Vendor Central does not require a membership fee, Amazon takes a “referral fee”, which typically runs between 8% and 15% of each transaction. Sales are subject to a slew of additional fees that stack up quickly, including marketing costs, freight allowance, and chargebacks on orders for problems with labeling, packaging, and carrier mistakes even though Amazon handles the orders. As a 1P seller, you are paid within Net 90, which can cause a cash-flow problem for small companies.
On the other hand, 3P sellers use a “Seller Central” portal. This portal provides open access but requires a membership fee in addition to similar referral fees and add-on expenses. As a 3P seller, the brand takes responsibility for marketing and ensuring professional, timely delivery. Sales funds are transferred to 3P sellers every 14 days.
As a 1P vendor, Amazon will negotiate a minimum advertised price (MAP) for your product. However, Amazon’s price-matching clause overrides MAP should competitors offer a lower price. Once a price for your product is set, Amazon typically won’t raise it and generally negotiates pricing only once a year. This policy can cause issues when prices rise due to supply chain or macroeconomic events, as evidenced in recent
inflation fueled by the pandemic. On the other hand, the 3P model grants brands full control over pricing and allows for adjustments to market fluctuations with flexibility, ensuring profit margin protection.
Under a 1P arrangement, Amazon will place wholesale orders for your product based on demand. Though bulk product orders may be convenient, wholesale pricing is often much lower than standard pricing, and vendors should expect a 20%-30% profit reduction. While 1P qualifies brands for Amazon’s logistics systems (including free two-day delivery), relinquishing logistics may lead to sellouts and a subsequent loss of revenue. When in control of logistics as a 3P seller, brands can sell directly to customers, price accordingly, and adjust stock quickly to meet demand.
After entering a 1P agreement, Amazon manages branding and listing with marketing material provided by the brand. This arrangement requires you to work through Amazon Seller Support to address both large and small listing issues, which can be difficult and time consuming. Meanwhile, 3P sellers are in total control over their marketing, branding, and customer support – which is a heavy lift, but can lead to better campaigns, listings, and higher levels of customer satisfaction.
Like Amazon, Walmart has extensive e-commerce infrastructure, making 1P a similarly attractive proposition for businesses who cannot afford to develop their own. Yet, 1P sellers on Walmart run into the same frustrating issues in regards to product control and profit loss.
As with Amazon, Walmart 1P offers the opportunity to outsource complex, expensive logistics and benefits from the “sold by Walmart” label. Walmart also exercises control over listing optimization and marketing for 1P sellers. Walmart purchases the seller’s product in wholesale, and, like Amazon, will negotiate low MAPs for your product that are subject to Walmart’s low-price matching requirements and are difficult to change once set. On the other hand, as a 3P seller on Walmart, brands are required to oversee logistics but are granted more freedom in terms of brand management.
Both 1P and 3P are subject to referral fees that range between 8-20% of sales; however, unlike Amazon, Walmart doesn’t charge monthly account fees to 3P sellers.
With e-commerce rapidly expanding, keeping up with complex marketing and logistics requirements is becoming increasingly difficult. For many, building e-commerce infrastructure from scratch is often the reason sellers feel pigeon-holed into a 1P relationship. However, handing Amazon or Walmart marketing, operations, and logistical power is not the only option for businesses looking for e-commerce support. Working with a third-party e-commerce partner like ZQUARED allows businesses to outsource marketing optimization and logistics while maintaining ownership over their product and profit.
Working with ZQUARED in a 3P partnership model supports sellers’ strengths while utilizing ZQUARED to handle the complexities of e-commerce. ZQUARED purchases your product, manages logistics, safeguards pricing, and leverages vast e-commerce expertise to optimize listings with SEO and build customized advertising campaigns. ZQUARED works in close partnership with brands from strategic planning to market expansion across multiple marketplace platforms.
For more information about how partnering with ZQUARED to streamline your sales channels and regain control of multiple marketplaces, request a comprehensive assessment of your Amazon channel or send an email to partners@zquared.com
With inflation on the rise, consumers are becoming more price sensitive. Utilizing promotions and discounts appeals to shoppers who are looking to save and can be a powerful tool for boosting sales. Amazon offers a variety of options to sellers for discounting products, including coupons, promotional codes, and deal programs.
Amazon Coupons provide a way for consumers to save money by clipping digital coupons to receive either a percentage or dollar discount for eligible products. These coupons can be found directly on product listing pages or on the Amazon Coupons dedicated page where customers can see the most popular coupons and product categories.
One advantage to Amazon Coupons is their immediate visibility to shoppers. The platform displays a bright orange tag on both the search results page and the product detail page, prominently advertising that a discount is available. This visibility may result in additional traffic and higher conversion rates as bargain hunters will
easily be able to recognize your discounted offering.
Amazon claims that in the first year of launching a campaign advertisers saw an average weekly increase of 54% in glance views, and 40% in units ordered.
Another advantage of coupons is that no discount is applied unless a shopper actually “clips” the coupon by clicking the available checkbox to apply. Studies have shown that as many as one-fourth of shoppers may forget, miss, or mistakenly add the product to cart without applying the coupon. The result for the seller in these cases is a fullpriced sale that may have been incentivized by a perceived discount.
A drawback of coupons is the associated fees. Amazon charges $0.60 each time a coupon is redeemed. Depending on your margins, this fee may add up fast when combined with the discount given.
There are several types of promotional codes that Amazon allows sellers to create. While some of these options allow for direct advertising of the promotion on the product detail page, promo codes are generally utilized outside of Amazon with the goal of directing traffic to the listing.
Percentage-off promotional codes allow sellers to create a percentage-based discount between 1-99% of a product’s sale price. They can generate a code that the customer can enter at checkout to take advantage of the offering. Sellers can take advantage of several percentage-off promo codes depending on their sales strategy.
Sellers can utilize tiered promotional codes to incentivize shoppers to buy increased product quantities (ex. buy two, get 15% off), or they can combine the promotion with additional products in their catalog (ex. get 15% off when you buy x product and y product). This strategy is a helpful promotional tool when aiming to incentivize additional sales or cross-sales for complementary products.
If you want to limit the number of times a promotion can be utilized by a single shopper, one-time use promo codes give the seller additional control. While one-time use codes allow a customer to use the discount for only one purchase, it does not limit the number of units to which the discount can be applied. For example, if a shopper decides to buy five units of a single item, the discount may be applied to all five units as long as the purchase is made in a single transaction.
Buy One, Get One (BOGO) promotions are a popular way to influence customers to purchase multiple products or pay a higher price for a product while still feeling as if they are snagging a deal. BOGO promotions can be based on quantity (ex. buy one, get one free) or amount spent (ex. spend $100, get x free). These promotions reward shoppers for purchasing, which creates a win-win scenario for both sellers and customers.
There are several ways to set up a promotional offer. Depending on your strategy and distribution method, you can choose to offer unique claim codes to each shopper, a group claim code used by all shoppers, or no claim code.
Unique claim codes are designed to be utilized as one per shopper. When creating these types of promotions, Amazon will provide a list of individual codes at the quantity you’ve specified. Shoppers may only use these codes on a single account, and they cannot be shared. This option gives the seller more control over discounts. If you only have a specific number of units you want to discount or you have a specific target market for the promotion, this setup helps keep your preferred parameters in place.
Group claim codes are designed to be used by anyone. When creating this type of promotion, you can create a single code that can be widely distributed and used within any account. This strategy is a great setup for offering a discount code on a publicized social media promotion, insert, or email broadcast. Unlike single use promo codes, you have little control over where the code is shared and who uses it. You may specify one-time use or choose not to put limits depending on your strategy.
You can choose to have promotions that automatically apply to the shopper’s cart without the need to manually enter a code or clip a coupon. These discounts are shown directly on the detail page and can be used for percentage-off, tiered, and BOGO promotions.
Lightning Deals are specialized promotional offers on Amazon with a limited number of discounted units offered for a short period of time. Specific requirements are evaluated on a per-ASIN basis. Sales volume, star rating, and inventory levels are all points of consideration for determining eligibility. An eligible ASIN must be discounted by at least 15%. Additionally, the seller will need to choose the number of units they are willing to offer at the discounted price. Once live, the deal will run until all discounted units have been purchased, or for 24 hours – whichever comes first.
7-Day Deals are a version of Lightning Deals that work in a nearly identical fashion, varying only in the duration of the promotion. While Lightning Deals only run for 24 hours, 7-Day Deals run, as the name implies, for a full week. This setup gives your product the opportunity to gain higher levels of traffic and a larger sales boost.
Live Lightning Deals and 7-Day Deals display a deals badge in red on both the search results page and the product detail page. Additionally, they have the potential to be featured on the “Today’s Deals” page, which may drive additional traffic to your listings. Similarly to coupons, the visibility of these deals is an added advantage and may contribute to higher levels of sessions and conversion rates. After a successful deal, brands may experience residual benefits in organic ranking due to potentially improved metrics from the sale.
ZQUARED helps Brand Partners understand their consumer audience and assists in conceptualizing and establishing sales strategies. We provide end-to-end solutions that focus on growing our clients’ businesses through advanced brand optimization and marketing, strategy execution, logistical support, and more.
To learn how ZQUARED can help you stay ahead in the Amazon game, request a comprehensive assessment of your Amazon channel. Your audit results will focus on your listings, category, competitors, reseller landscape, and more with an individually-tailored strategic plan for capitalizing on opportunities.
Founded in 2010, ZQUARED is ranked as a top 125 AMAZON SELLER with over 75k reviews, 100% of which are positive over the last 12 months.
ZQUARED invests in brands who sell on online marketplaces and are poised and ready for growth.
Putting the “we” in e-commerce.
At ZQUARED, we are a team of professionals who understand the opportunities, risks, and challenges of selling online. With nearly 40 years combined experience of e-commerce sales, our primary goal is helping you multiply your success by serving as an extension of your team to maximize results. From distribution to advertising strategies, we have solutions proven to grow your brand.
Built on the belief that all boats rise with the tide, our services are based on this principle. ZQUARED invests time, money, effort, and energy into brands poised for success with the expectation of a worthwhile result— because we go all-in, growing together and winning when you win.
Our mission is to invest in brands who sell online and are poised and ready for growth by forming partnerships built on trust and rooted in relationship to maximize value and achieve results.
ZQUARED’s motto is “we—not me”, and we strive to build an unparalleled culture by incorporating this attitude into every aspect of our workplace, empowering a team built on communication and trust with a service-based mindset to get the job done.
We strive to provide unmatched quality when servicing each of our Brand Partners. By intentionally being proactive, prepared, and in constant pursuit of improvement, our promise hinges on delivering top-quality results in all aspects of our work.
Our partnerships are more than transactions—we invest in people and brands who share our drive and enthusiasm, deepening partner relations while collaborating to execute expert-level growth strategies.
With more than a decade of experience, we’ve learned what it takes to win on Amazon: ultimately, people matter more than products, and investing in people first leads to growth and profitable Amazon brands.
Originally named Advantage Nutrition, ZQUARED brothers and Co-Founders Chad and Zach Cornett set out to establish a brick-and-mortar retail company with an emphasis on health and wellness. They pivoted when they realized e-tail, particularly Amazon, was taking off, recognizing brands needed help navigating the everchanging e-commerce landscape.
Charlie Meyer was ZQUARED’s first official hire, and he’s been with us ever since. Our people are our foundation.
ZQUARED three times its original basement, footprint with and growing 50+.
ZQUARED has moved times since leaving original spot in Chad’s basement, doubling its with each move growing to a staff of
Inc. recognizes ZQUARED as one of the fastest-growing privatelyheld companies in the United States, while the St. Louis Business Journal names ZQUARED on its “Fast 50” list.
ZQUARED hires Jeff Bush as President, positioning the company for continued growth
Tim works as the Supervisor for 3PL and Merchant Logistics, overseeing our daily Lean Presentations and guiding the team in all things Lean Philosophy. Recently, Tim developed VSOP’s (Visual Standard Operating Procedures) for every single Merchant Operations process.
He has also worked on making our Daily Lean Presentations more engaging and informative. Tim has been married to his wife Jessie for 12 years and has three awesome Bernese Mountain Dogs: Kota, Dutch, and Otis.
Founded by brothers, ZQUARED’s roots as a family-oriented company run deep. Our “we—not me” team works together to achieve common goals while supporting one another individually, both professionally and personally. We intentionally invest in what matters most, and people are our greatest investment.
A united team is always behind something big. We work hard, laugh a lot, push the brainstorming boundaries, and have the best holiday parties in town.
Meet the people at ZQUARED and share the vision and values of our community. We’re driven by the idea that results are driven by relationships, diligence and enthusiasm.
Know Us!
At ZQUARED, Lean has become a way of life. It’s not something we simply do at work any more. As a team, we have adopted the mindset of getting “two percent better” every day –which over time, has added up to profound changes!
Director of Business Development Charlie Meyer joined ZQUARED as the founders’ first full-time hire in 2010. Charlie shines brightest when making investments in ZQUARED’s most valuable asset - its people. Charlie’s Corner offers a glimpse into his world, sharing his favorite Lean Improvement insights while offering a peek behind ZQUARED’s curtains.
In 2016, Joe Byers joined our team from General Motors Automotive facility. He and I took a tour of GM to learn from their finetuned efficiencies and productivity workflows. Around the same time, a workplace neighbor shared “2 Second Lean” with me – a book about one piece flow, fixing what bugs you, and eliminating waste. These two events propelled our team into a new mindset, as we began to implement daily “Lean Improvements”. Making daily two-second improvements continuously add up, and over time can have exponential results.
Setting up your daily processes so that each step connects to the previous one can save time and energy. Begin making efforts to avoid any form of backtracking, and focus on a continual workflow without interruptions. Step 1 should seamlessly lead into step 2, which flows into step 3, and so on.
A critical component of the Lean mentality is addressing the little things that irritate you and potentially slow you down. For example, at home, where do you keep your favorite coffee mug? Is it conveniently stowed in the cabinet by the coffee pot, or do you have to walk to the other side of the kitchen to find your cup? Fix what bugs you!
Are you spending your time, energy, or money on things that boil down to a waste of time in the long run? Are there things you can outsource, reconfigure, or eliminate altogether to improve your efficiency? Look for ways to “cut the fat” and eliminate the tasks and items that are wasting your resources.
