
Amazon Launches Own Pet Product Brand, Wag - 2_listerine_pls
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-05-02/amazon-launches-its-own-pet-product-brand-wag-starts-with-food
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givinguflac
I’m getting increasingly uncomfortable with the sheer number of markets Amazon
is getting into. I don’t like putting all my eggs in one basket, and I tend to
move my business elsewhere when I see a company getting to big for its
britches like this. I’ve moved to target for most things I’d get on amazon and
am quite content for now.

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2_listerine_pls
Retailers like Amazon or Walmart shouldn't be allowed to make their own
competing brands.

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skrowl
Should the government seize the means of production, comrade?

Businesses should be allowed to create whatever products they want, as long as
they don't do anti-competitive things like work together with their
competitors to fix prices.

Free markets are important.

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wgerard
> Businesses should be allowed to create whatever products they want, as long
> as they don't do anti-competitive things like work together with their
> competitors to fix prices.

Or say, if they owned a huge marketplace and eventually started producing a
product, and then refused to stock their competitor's product in the huge
marketplace.

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reaperducer
Do you demand that the local supermarket carry every brand of chili on earth?

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wgerard
I don't think that's a good analogy; there are significant differences between
a local supermarket (local, items must fit in the store) and Amazon's
marketplace (global, items can be located anywhere globally within reason).

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awat
This one is interesting to me. As someone with a brand new puppy (not our
first dog) I’ve noticed Pet Smart my only local pet-store charging higher and
higher prices. It’s gotten to the point where we are now buying some of the
same products at Target who also has thier own brand.

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cptskippy
Well Petco and PetsMart are the same company so there isn't really any
competition in that space.

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reaperducer
And PetsMart owns Chewy, the online competitor that Amazon is going after.

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cptskippy
Is this really any different than any other store brand? Is there a retailer
that doesn't do this?

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petra
The context here is Amazon, a company that is great at killing the value of
brands(via for ex. reviews, Alexa, more info), is going strong into private
labels.

That's different.

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bhhaskin
Amazon is slowly eating the world of retail. The amount of pure power that
Amazon has is a scary thought.

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radiorental
> slowly

I'd say rapidly. And, it's really hard to see how they can be stopped. They're
now capable disrupting any market they choose.

On the one hand, this can be a good thing, i.e Healthcare. On the other I feel
like we're going to end up with something like Pixar's 'Buy-N-Large'

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LyndsySimon
> it's really hard to see how they can be stopped.

I don't think they can "be stopped" \- at least not by competitors, as long as
they maintain their overall strategy of expanding their marketshare by cutting
margins below what their competitors can bear.

In my opinion, this is the way it should be. If a monopoly exists that is more
efficient than a competitor can be, then it deserves to exist and its
existence benefits consumers. On the other hand, if a monopoly becomes abusive
then it will be destroyed very quickly by others who will be more than happy
to undercut them.

Amazon (and all monopolies) will fail much more quickly than might be apparent
at first glance if they abuse their position. "Bigger" does not always mean
"stronger".

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mistermann
> On the other hand, if a monopoly becomes abusive then it will be destroyed
> very quickly by others who will be more than happy to undercut them.

> Amazon (and all monopolies) will fail much more quickly than might be
> apparent at first glance if they abuse their position.

Are these universal truths, with no possible exceptions in the past of future?

> "Bigger" does not always mean "stronger".

Crossing the street without looking both directions does not always result in
being injured or killed, but it often does.

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rapfaria
Problem is if my dog likes this and they shut it down in 10 months.

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bloopernova
They're not Google ;)

More seriously, I remember when Amazon was this amazing book seller in the US
and me (back in the UK) ordered from them because certain books were coming
out sooner in the USA.

I get why they expanded and ate everything around them, I know that they
probably wouldn't exist if they hadn't done that. But I do wish they could
have done it by treating their employees better, and making the world better
instead of just available faster.

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dbcurtis
Lawsuit with Wag hotel for pets in 3... 2... 1...

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notyourwork
Amazon owns wag.com as part of an acquisition. I doubt a lawsuit will go far.

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Xuper
Based on what is going on with marriage/divorce rates, getting on any pet-
related stock/market will be an extremely smart move mid/long term.

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zerostar07
fear not! facebook is launching a dating service

