1P vs. 3P on Amazon. What’s the best route for your brand?

Let’s talk about the swoosh.
Nike started with Amazon as a 1P Vendor. Then, in 2019, they cut ties. They wanted more control, clearer customer data, and a cleaner brand presentation. So they broke up their 1P relationship. However they started a little situationship with 3P sellers. They became a so called gated brand and only approved sellers were able to sell the sneaker on Amazon.

In 2025, Nike re-engaged with Amazon as a 1P Vendor. Why did Nike just did that – again?
It was likely a mix of scale and marketing access. Plus Amazon is still one of the largest product search engines and a missed opportunity if you are not on it.
The twist? Adidas, Puma, and Under Armour all stuck with 1P. There’s even data that shows:
Brands tend to pick the same Amazon relationship model as their closest competitors.
If your category leader is 1P, chances are you’ll follow suit. Same goes for 3P. It’s like high school lunch tables, just with bigger margins.

You’re selling to Amazon.
Think of Amazon as your wholesale customer.
You ship them your goods, and they sell it to the end customer. Everything runs through Amazon’s so called Vendor Central. Vendor Central is your data management platform where you see how your brand is performing on Amazon.

You’re selling on Amazon.
You list your products on the Amazon marketplace, manage the pricing, customer experience, etc.
That’s all happening inside Amazon’s admin platform called Seller Central.

Why not do both? You use 1P for some SKUs/ ASINs, and 3P for others. You need to be smart about it. It’s important to keep those two separate. Otherwise, you risk cannibalising your own products.

When it comes to controlling your business on Amazon 1P and 3p differ quiet a bit from another. by shipping of your products to Amazon in a 1P relationship it seems like Amazon is taking over everything. Wherever by selling your items on Amazon as a 3P appears to give you all the control you need to succeed on Amazon. It’s not that easy. As a 1P, you give up a lot of control over your listings. You also lose some control over how your items appear on Amazon. Yet, being a 1P vendor is not a self-serving business. You still have to adjust, argue and keep your stats and data in line to successfully run this channel.

3P comes with other hurdles. For example, you have to choose whether you want to fulfill the shipments by yourself or through Amazon. In comes Amazon Prime guaranteeing customers that they’re order is shipped within one day. In Germany you might get away with that for an okay-ish shipping cost price. In other countries like America this might not be the case. Of course Amazon supports you in offering a fulfillment service called FBA (fulfilled by Amazon). Which comes with a lot of power regarding where Amazon’s warehouses are positioned all over the world. However, this comes with a price.

In the table down below I tried to lay it all out for you to compare those two when it comes to the most critical points.

• Easy onboarding (Amazon does most of the work)
• Large purchase orders (nice cash flow)
• More control over placement in Amazon’s own marketing (like Today’s Deals or Lightning Deals)

• You lose control over pricing. Hello MAP (minimum advertised price) violators
• Chargebacks and complex terms can hurt your business if not kept an eye on
• Limited data visibility, you don’t really get to know your customers

• Full control over branding, pricing, and messaging
• Possibly higher margins if done right
• D2C connection, you keep customer insights and flexibility

• You think 1P is a lot of work? 3P is even harder. You manage logistics, customer service, and ads
• Competing with Amazon retail is no joke
• Platform fees + FBA costs can pile up fast becoming a real liability

Trends come and go. And what’s hot in a minute can be shift in a second. In our customer pool over 20% of brands are using a hybrid model.

Why? Because:

• You keep your cash cow and possible unicorn ASINs in 1P to benefit from Amazon’s reach and to provide a good Net PPM and CM
• You launch new SKUs in 3P to test & learn
• You hedge risks e.g. supply chain issues, pricing wars, etc.

And with D2C growth, 3P gives you more control, better data, and direct customer feedback. Which is pretty important.

We’re not just here to tell you what’s what. We help you to just do it.

We provide a data management software that combines your whole business venture in a one stop solution. With an direct access to your Vendor Central or/and Seller Central we’ll import all the data you get from Amazon plus combine it with our 20 years of Amazon expertise. Plus we inform you on a daily basis how your products are doin on the platform. We automatically alert you when content changes happen in you 1P content, how your stock is holding up and we teach you about all the things you need to know when selling on Amazon. Our focus is on the 1P business with integration of 3P accounts. AMVisor is able to provide you with the data you need to partner with Amazon on an equal footing.

Let’s chat. Because figuring this out shouldn’t feel like herding cats.