Amazon, Shopify, and Walmart have the potential to be on an episode of Business Wars. The battleground has been identified, and we can now see the three players going after each other's market share. Some of the strategies are very explicit, and some are not.

I call this article "Who is the cookie monster?" I have been asking myself a few questions in the last 12 months.

1. Why is Walmart WFS launching similar features to FBA?

2. Why is Shopify launching a fulfillment network (SFN)

3. Why is Amazon launching Buy with Prime?

Let's first review each service that Walmart, Amazon, and Shopify are launching to understand better these services and which company has had a competitive advantage.

Let's start with Walmart.

In February 2020, Walmart.com (3P) launched Walmart Fulfillment Services. Below I include a statement that I found on Walmart's marketplace.

Walmart Fulfillment Services (WFS) is a fulfillment service offered by Walmart that takes care of inventory storage, order fulfillment, returns, and even customer service for Walmart Marketplace sellers.

This sound very similar to Amazon FBA. Before 2020 3rd, party sellers could use FBA to ship Walmart marketplace orders using a white label (blind shipping), but packages still arrive to Walmart customers with Amazon packaging.

The rumor is Walmarts WFS is working on allowing 3rd party sellers to fulfill orders for other channels using WFS. More control 🎮.

Now let's move to Shopify SFN.

Before May 4th (may the force), Shopify was on a mission to enter the warehousing and shipping industry but as of 5/4/2023. News broke out that Flexport was buying Shopify’s fulfillment assets and Deliverr, which Shopify bought in 2022 for $2.1 billion.

Here is the article: https://apnews.com/article/shopify-fulfillment-flexport-ocado-group-6b504d0d67acd2ad1af6348cd1ec6425

Shopify launched the Shopify Fulfillment Network (SFN) to provide merchants with a more efficient and cost-effective way to fulfill orders. SFN uses a network of fulfillment centers across the United States to store and ship orders, which can help merchants improve their shipping times and reduce shipping costs.

Shopify is still in the game but holds less risk.

In exchange, Shopify will receive a stake of about 13% in Flexport, bringing its total ownership in the privately held company up to the high-teens, the company said. Flexport will become the official logistics partner for Shopify, which provides e-commerce tools for merchants. It will also acquire Shopify’s warehouses. - Apnews

Finally, Amazon buys with Prime.

Let's look at a program that Amazon launched last summer, but in Jan 2023, Amazon reps started to push the program to more sellers. There is a lot of confusion from clients that I support on how to implement the Buy with Prime strategy. I'll share the Google meaning of Buy with Prime means:

Amazon Buy with Prime is a program that allows merchants to offer Prime members fast, free delivery and easy returns on their products. When Prime member sees the Buy with Prime button on a merchant's website, they can click on it to check out using their Amazon account information. Their order will then be fulfilled by Amazon and shipped to them using Prime's shipping speeds and return policies.

Amazon 🤺double whamming (Payment process Fee and fulfillment Fee) revenue.

Amazon is going after Shopify Payment by taking revenue away from Shopify and Protecting the fulfillment market share that Shopify is going after. Once again, I call this double whamming.

For brands, distributors, or manufacturers. You have to think multichannel and develop a better SOP to capture as many orders as possible on each channel.

Conclusion

A lot has changed since I drafted this article. As of 5/4/23, Shopify sold Shopify Logistics and Deliverr Inc to Flexport. Shopify is still in the game, but it doesn't hold the risk of allowing it to focus on e-commerce development.

In the next article, I'll be talking about Amazon's program buy with prime

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