Hello Fellow Amazon Sellers,

Welcome to another edition of our weekly Amazon Seller School newsletter, where we break down the biggest stories shaping the marketplace—and what they mean for your business. This week, seller growth slows, AI agents step deeper into commerce, and tariff uncertainty puts new pressure on pricing and suppliers. Here’s what you need to know:

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News

Amazon Seller Signups Collapse—But Survivors Are Winning Bigger Than Ever

Amazon saw just 165,000 new seller registrations in 2025—the lowest in a decade—signaling that rising fees, ads, AI competition, and margin pressure are pushing out casual sellers and raising the bar for entry.
For established Amazon sellers, this consolidation means less numerical competition and more traffic per seller, but only for those with the capital, systems, and sophistication to operate at scale.

U.S. Amazon Prime Tops 200M Members—And Sellers Feel the Impact

Amazon Prime membership in the U.S. climbed to an estimated 201 million users by the end of 2025, reinforcing Prime’s role as a major driver of shopping frequency and revenue on the platform.
For Amazon sellers, this continued Prime growth means a larger pool of high-intent buyers who shop more often—raising the stakes on Prime eligibility, fast fulfillment, and conversion optimization.

Google Unveils AI Shopping Protocol That Could Reshape Product Discovery

Google announced a new open standard, the Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP), designed to let AI shopping agents handle discovery, checkout, and post-purchase actions across retailers, with direct checkout inside Google Search and Gemini using saved payment and shipping info.
For Amazon sellers, this signals rising competition from AI-driven commerce outside Amazon—where discovery, discounts, and checkout may happen before a shopper ever searches on Amazon—making off-Amazon visibility, pricing strategy, and AI-friendly product data more critical.

Amazon Pressures Suppliers After Tariff Cuts—Pricing Talks Begin

Amazon is reportedly pushing suppliers to lower prices after U.S. tariffs on Chinese imports dropped, signaling that earlier cost concessions may be rolled back as trade pressures ease.
For Amazon sellers, this points to renewed margin pressure and tougher negotiations ahead—especially for import-reliant products—while uncertainty remains as the U.S. Supreme Court considers rulings that could further reshape tariff policy.

Retailers Flip the Script on AI: “Bring on All the Bots”

Major retailers at NRF 2026 signaled a sharp shift from blocking bots to actively embracing AI shopping agents, with companies like Kroger, Lowe’s, and URBN already enabling agent-driven discovery and checkout.
For Amazon sellers, this confirms that AI agents are becoming a core product-discovery and buying layer, making clean data, competitive pricing, and AI-readable listings essential to stay visible as shopping moves beyond traditional search.

Tariffs Are Finally Hitting Amazon Prices — And Sellers Feel the Squeeze

Andy Jassy says U.S. tariffs are now creeping into prices on Amazon as sellers run out of pre-tariff inventory and are forced to either raise prices, absorb costs, or split the difference.
For Amazon sellers, this confirms tighter margins ahead, more price-sensitive shoppers trading down, and tougher decisions on pricing, sourcing, and profitability in a low-margin retail environment.

Amazon Integrates QuickBooks Directly Into Seller Central

Amazon sellers can now connect QuickBooks Online directly inside Seller Central to track profit and loss, fees, expenses, payouts, and inventory across Amazon and other sales channels in one dashboard.
This makes financial visibility easier without exporting reports, helping sellers better understand true profitability and cash flow as costs and fees continue to rise.

Amazon Cuts SAFE-T Claim Filing Window in Half for US Sellers

Starting February 16, 2026, Amazon will reduce the SAFE-T claim filing window for US seller-fulfilled orders from 60 days to 30 days, shortening the time sellers have to recover losses from buyer abuse, damage, or lost shipments.
For Amazon sellers, this increases urgency around monitoring returns and refunds closely, since missed deadlines will now permanently eliminate reimbursement options.

Seller Tips & Tricks

Amazon Shares New Tips to Tighten Seller-Fulfilled Returns

Amazon reminds seller-fulfilled merchants that most returns are auto-authorized with prepaid labels and must be actively managed inside Seller Central, even as return abuse risks increase.
For Amazon sellers, the guidance highlights the need for tighter return workflows, better packaging, trend analysis, and faster documentation to reduce losses and protect margins.

Stop “Set-It-And-Forget-It” Pricing: Chad Rubin’s Playbook for More Profit on Amazon

Steven Pop e says most Amazon sellers lose money with static, competitor-matching prices, and shares Chad Rubin-style frameworks like dynamic pricing, “pricing ladders” to buy velocity, and gradual price increases to protect the Buy Box while improving PPC bidding power.
For Amazon sellers, the takeaway is to optimize for profit dollars (and even exit value), not just ACOS—using seasonality timing, competitor stock intel, and smart price moves to win rank and margins.

Video of the Week

Amazon Ends FBA Co-Mingling — Why Seller Accountability Is About to Change Fore ver

Watch this video on YouTube

Strong Opinions

Amazon Ends Inventory Commingling — A Win for Seller Trust and Buyer Safety

Amazon will fully end inventory commingling by March 31, 2026, meaning sellers’ products will no longer be mixed with identical items from other sellers, significantly reducing counterfeit and safety risks.
For Amazon sellers, this increases buyer trust and brand protection, but resellers will now be required to use Amazon barcodes, adding labeling costs and operational changes for compliance.

Should Sellers Optimize for AI Ads and Agentic Shopping? The Clock Is Ticking

Marketplaces and search platforms are rapidly shifting toward AI-driven discovery and advertising, making AI optimization and paid placement inside chat-based shopping experiences unavoidable for sellers.
For Amazon sellers, this means preparing listings, data, and creative for AI surfaces while balancing new ad opportunities against risks like inaccurate AI-generated product content that could hurt trust or compliance.

Stop Treating Agentic AI Like a Helper — Give It the Job

Agentic AI only delivers real results when businesses give it ownership of outcomes, not just task-level assistance, with companies seeing higher revenue and major conversion lifts once agents run end-to-end processes.
For Amazon sellers, this signals a shift toward AI managing pricing, ads, and optimization autonomously—meaning sellers who redesign workflows for AI-first execution will outpace those still treating AI as a simple productivity tool.

Do Amazon Sellers Need a Walmart Backup Plan?

Walmart’s edge in same-day delivery and its fast-moving AI partnerships with Google and OpenAI are making it a serious competitor to Amazon, especially in groceries and convenience-driven categories.
For Amazon sellers, the message is clear: relying on a single marketplace is riskier than ever, and building a Walmart strategy may be critical for diversification, speed, and future AI-driven discovery.

Todd’s Top Tip: Stay Ahead of the 2026 Low-Inventory Fee Changes

Use January to clean up how you manage stock so Amazon doesn’t start charging you extra for running too lean on FBA inventory.

Amazon’s new low-inventory-level fee looks at your days of cover per FNSKU, not just at the parent ASIN. That means it’s watching each sellable FBA listing separately—every unique barcode/label you send in rather than averaging everything at the “one product” level.

In practice:

If you have one FNSKU per variation (normal case: one FNSKU for “Blue / Large,” another for “Red / Large”), Amazon looks at days of cover for each of those variations on its own.

If you somehow have two different FNSKUs for the same ASIN and same variation (for example, you changed labels or packaging and created a second FNSKU), Amazon treats those as two separate FNSKUs. Each one’s days of cover is evaluated individually. There’s no guarantee they’re blended together just because they point to the same ASIN.

To protect yourself, think at the FNSKU level, not just “this ASIN looks fine overall.”

Your play:

Pull FBA inventory and recent sales and calculate days of cover for each active FNSKU.

Flag solid sellers that are living under roughly a month of cover and tighten your reorder rules so they stay in a healthier range.

For weak FNSKUs, don’t throw good money after bad just to dodge a potential fee decide whether to let them sell out, merge them into a single FNSKU going forward, or move them off FBA.

This keeps your best products in stock, reduces surprise fees, and stops slow, messy FNSKU setups from dragging down your margins.

Top Upcoming Amazon Events

AMZ Hacking Live 202 6 – January 24, 2026, Berlin, Germany
SELLER STRATEGY SUMMIT 2026 – January 27-29, 2026, Online Event
Vendor Connect 2026 – March 5, 2026, London, UK
ASGTG EVENT 2026 – March 5, 2026, Brooklyn, NY, USA
MDS INSPIRE 202 6 – March 9-11, 2026, Las Vegas, NV, USA
Prosper Show 202 6 – March 10-12, 2026, Las Vegas, NV, USA

The Amazon landscape continues to reward prepared, adaptable sellers. Stay sharp, stay compliant, and keep building real competitive advantages.

God Bless,

Todd Welch
Amazon Seller School