A supplier sends a 4,000-line spreadsheet
Your wholesale account manager sends the new price list on a Monday. Four thousand lines of health and beauty products, each with a barcode, a description, a case size and a price. Somewhere in there are a few dozen products worth buying for Amazon. Finding them means checking each barcode, finding the ASIN, looking at the current Buy Box price, working out fees, and checking whether you are allowed to sell the brand.
A person can check a few hundred lines a day if they are quick. By the time they finish the list, the next one has arrived, and the best deals have been taken by resellers who got there first.
Why sourcing from lists is so slow
Each line needs several lookups, and the answer is rarely clean. A barcode can match more than one ASIN, or a multipack listing. The supplier's description might not match Amazon's title. Fees depend on size tier and price. Some brands are gated, and some have a history of complaints against resellers.
- Barcodes can match several ASINs, including multipacks and bundles.
- Case sizes on the price list do not match pack sizes on Amazon.
- Buy Box prices change daily and depend on the number of sellers.
- Fees vary with size tier and category.
- Brand restrictions and your own avoid-list need checking for every line.
What slow checking costs
Opportunities are time-sensitive: other resellers get the same lists. Checking too slowly means the profitable lines are gone. Checking too quickly means mistakes, such as a pack-size mismatch that turns a good margin into a loss, or a gated brand you cannot sell. Much of your sourcing team's time goes on lookups rather than on judgement and supplier relationships.
There is also the risk of repeating work. The same product appears on several suppliers' lists, and nobody remembers what it looked like last time.
The classic mistake looks like this. A shampoo appears on the list at a price that seems to leave a healthy margin against the Buy Box. The barcode matches an ASIN, but the ASIN is a pack of three. Divide the Buy Box price by three, add the fee for a single unit, and the margin disappears. Spotted on the spreadsheet, it is a wasted minute. Spotted after the pallet arrives, it is a loss.
The price list matcher we build
- An upload page or inbox that reads each supplier's price list, whatever the column layout, and maps barcode, description, case size and price.
- ASIN lookup for each barcode through the Selling Partner API catalogue endpoint, with multipacks and bundles identified and pack sizes compared.
- Current offer data and fee estimates for each ASIN, and sales rank as a rough guide to demand.
- Margin per unit using the supplier price, your inbound and prep costs, Amazon fees and your VAT treatment, set by your accountant.
- Checks against your rules: minimum margin, maximum sales rank, brands you are not approved for, brands you avoid, and products needing documents.
- A shortlist sorted by margin and demand, with a history of how the same product looked on earlier lists, for a person to review and decide.
| Line result | What happens |
|---|---|
| Clean match, good margin | Shortlisted for review |
| Pack size differs | Flagged, margin recalculated per pack |
| Several ASINs match | All shown for a person to choose |
| Brand gated or on avoid-list | Excluded with the reason |
| No ASIN found | Listed separately, possible new listing |
Amazon's API has request limits, so large lists are processed over a period rather than instantly. The matcher handles this without your team waiting at the screen.
A Monday with the matcher
The price list goes in when it arrives. By the time your sourcing person has had a coffee, the first lines are processed, and the rest follow through the morning. They start with the shortlist rather than the full list, check the top candidates properly, look at price history in a tool like Keepa if they use one, and place an order the same day.
Over months, the matcher builds a history for every product across every supplier. You can see who offers the best price for a product, how its Amazon price has moved and whether it was worth buying last time.
Is your sourcing stuck in spreadsheets?
- Price lists take days to check line by line.
- Pack size mistakes have turned good-looking deals into losses.
- You have bought stock from a brand you were not approved to sell.
- Nobody remembers how a product looked on the last supplier list.
- Other resellers seem to get to the good lines first.