Should Amazon sellers have their own store?

What Amazon gives you, and what it keeps

Amazon is where a lot of shoppers start, and third-party sellers do a lot of the selling. In its fourth quarter 2025 results, Amazon reported that sellers accounted for 61% of paid units in its stores (Amazon Q4 2025 results).

You pay for that reach. The Professional selling plan is $39.99 a month, and each sale carries a referral fee that is 15% in many categories, with a $0.30 minimum (Amazon pricing). FBA fees rose by an average of $0.08 per unit in 2026 (Amazon 2026 fee update).

The bigger cost is the relationship. Amazon's Communication Guidelines let you message a buyer only to complete an order or answer a service question. Marketing messages and coupons are excluded, and links are allowed only when they are needed to complete the order (Communication Guidelines). Amazon's seller policy also prohibits any call to action that sends Amazon users to another website (Prohibited Seller Activities).

So a buyer who loves your product stays Amazon's customer. You can't email them next month about a refill or a new color.

What changes with your own store

On your own site, the buyer gives you their email at checkout. With their consent, you can send them news, refills and launches, as long as you follow the CAN-SPAM rules on unsubscribes and sender details (FTC CAN-SPAM guide).

The fees are different too. A card payment through Stripe costs 2.9% plus 30 cents on a domestic card (Stripe pricing), and hosted platforms such as Shopify start at $39 a month on monthly billing (Shopify pricing). There is no referral fee.

You also control the page. You can tell the story behind the brand, show how the product is used, bundle accessories, and answer the questions buyers keep asking in your Amazon reviews.

Who should wait

• Resellers of other companies' brands. Buyers are loyal to the brand on the box, and that brand isn't yours.

• Sellers with no time or budget to send visitors to a new site. A store nobody visits doesn't change anything.

• Sellers whose whole catalog is one cheap item people buy once. There is little to email a past buyer about.

Who should start now

• Brand owners, especially if the brand is in Amazon Brand Registry.

• Products people buy again: refills, filters, consumables, accessories, new sizes.

• Higher-priced or heavy products where buyers want details before they pay: dimensions, delivery, assembly, warranty.

• Sellers who want a second channel in case a listing or account runs into trouble on Amazon.

A low-risk way to test it

Keep Amazon exactly as it is. Put your best seller and a few related products on your own domain, collect emails from day one, and list the products in Google's free product listings through Merchant Center (Google free listings). Then look at the numbers once a month: visits, email signups, orders and repeat orders.

If you want a store built around your listings, paste your Amazon link on the store request page. A person reads it and replies about a store. This records a request, not a booking.