When I first started selling on Amazon, I had nothing but my cellphone, and inkjet printer, and some 30-up labels. I didn’t start adding more tools and equipment until after a couple months of selling. While you can get started with very little, if you’re going to get serious and start focusing on scaling your operation, you need to invest in some additional equipment. If you’re looking for software recommendations check out this blog article.
Must Haves
Some equipment should be purchased sooner than others. If you’re still getting started and working with a limited budget, I would still recommend introducing a good USB scanner and a Dymo printer to speed up the listing process. These work well with software such as Inventory Lab. My listing process sped up considerably once I was able to scan the UPC, list in Inventory Lab, and then affix the label that the Dymo prints out. I’m currently using the following (affiliate links):
Stuff You Should Have If You Sell Apparel
A couple months after I started selling on Amazon, I branched out into bras and t-shirts. One issue with doing RA bras that I quickly encountered was clearance stickers. If you’re trying to scale, it’s difficult to remove clearance stickers off of 100+ bras with just your fingernails. Now I use a heat gun on the stickers to loosen them up, and then I peel them off with a scotty peeler to avoid getting sore fingernails. Occasionally, you’ll encounter surfaces you can’t use a heat gun on or stubborn clearance stickers. For those cases, I like to use Goo Gone to remove any adhesive. Additionally, if you sell any apparel, you need to put them in poly bags. I recommend purchasing a set of different sized poly bags to get started, and then reordering from uline when you know the specific sizes that you need. Here’s what I use:
Additional Shipping Equipment
Lastly, you’ll want to have a good scale to weigh your boxes, tape to seal them and affix labels, and a good laser printer to print out the shipping labels. This is what I use:
These hardware recommendations should help you grow your Amazon business. If you’d like additional software recommendations, check out this blog article.