

Amazon Business - Bookington
http://www.amazon.com/business

======
Someone1234
Everyone is going to focus on the discounts thing, but I think this is the
real USP (over a standard account):

> Create a single or multi-user business account, approve orders

I've been in a lot of companies where they want to offload buying (e.g. office
supplies, computer equipment) but don't have a dedicated department to oversee
it, and don't really want to be handing out the company credit card to every
employee who might need it.

Amazon's new product has two benefits: You don't have to give other employees
the company credit card (presumably) and the orders come back to management
for final approval. It is like having your own buying department in terms of
friction (as a lot of buying departments seek final approval from management
anyway).

This mostly applies to small purchases. Big purchases (e.g. servers,
furniture, etc) will likely remain invoiced by the normal means even if just
for cashflow. But business I've worked in spend a lot more than you'd think on
Amazon just buying "day to day" bits and pieces (that are often cheaper than
Staples, or similar local places).

~~~
mmahemoff
A multi-user business account is even bigger when you consider this is more
than just the sale of physical products. It's also computing services via AWS,
hiring remote workers via Mech Turk, and books+apps+other virtual goods via
Kindle/App marketplace.

Amazon just launched local services too, so this could let an authorised
employee hire contractors under a managed, audited, workflow.

(I don't know if all of those services are available now, but I bet they will
be in the future.)

~~~
discodave
Source for AWS and MTurk?

~~~
sukilot
AWS has had muti-user accounts for 5 years.

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jasode
Based on Amazon's choice of clipart images (bulk janitorial supplies) and
verbage (lab beakers, break room snacks) they chose to highlight this launch,
it looks like AmazonBusiness is competing with companies like Global
Industrial[1], ULINE[2], etc more so than Office Depot and Staples.

Most of the items (paper, pens, etc) people bought from Office Depot, they
could get already get from the normal amazon.com/office.../ [3]

The integration they offer with businesses accounting systems' purchase order
workflow may be another enticing feature.

[1][http://www.globalindustrial.com/](http://www.globalindustrial.com/)

[2][http://www.uline.com/](http://www.uline.com/)

[3][http://www.amazon.com/office-products-supplies-
electronics-f...](http://www.amazon.com/office-products-supplies-electronics-
furniture/b/ref=sd_allcat_op?ie=UTF8&node=1064954)

~~~
keenerd
Unrelated, but have you looked at the high end (+$100) AmazonBasic items?
Monitor swing arms, paper shredders, a fire pit, and a gas-powered patio
heater. Tripods get an honorable mention at $80.

I'm not sure who these are being sold to, and why under the Basics label.

~~~
IgorPartola
What's so unclear here? This is the store brand, and it is often times nicer
than competition at the price. I have an AB branded camera bag, and it's
great. I have also bought cables, and other small accessories from them and
they have been of good quality. If I need a monitor arm and can get one for
$100 from Amazon or $140 from another manufacturer I wouldn't think twice and
just get the AB one.

~~~
keenerd
Basics was launched to compete with the likes of Monoprice. And due to the
pricing structure of FBA, it doesn't make much sense for 3rd parties to sell
items through Amazon for under $10. The majority of Basics items are
inexpensive to take advantage of this. Almost every item in the Basics catalog
are items that a person will buy at least once a year.

How many copper fire pits do you think the average person buys per year?

~~~
thaumasiotes
My Basics purchases so far: mouse, bluetooth keyboard, capacitive stylus,
travel case for a portable hard drive, HDMI cable, USB extension cable, USB
hub.

Here's the first page of results if I search Amazon for "amazonbasics":
"portable power bank", USB--Lightning cable (6 feet) (I assume this is for
connecting an iPhone to a USB port?), 67-inch monopod, bluetooth "audio
receiver", travel case for small electronics, dual monitors mounting arm, USB
wall charger, laptop backpack, microUSB--Lightning adapter, 24 pack of
microfiber cleaning cloths, 8-pack of AA rechargeable batteries, USB--
Lightning cable (3 feet), GoPro carrying case, double rod freestanding closet,
large portable bluetooth speaker, 12 pairs of banana plugs (6 red, 6 black).

None of those, except possibly the cleaning cloths, are items I'd expect
someone to buy once a year.

~~~
keenerd
I'm not exactly a good data point because I hate buying things without a good
reason and buy stuff as infrequently as possible. But I also keep good records
of my purchases. On average every year despite being anti-consumerism* I will
buy one set of rechargable batteries, one cable, one charger, one protective
case, one adapter. (So far only one of my purchases have been from Basics.)

8 of 16 of the search results fit this (rather arbitrary) "once a year"
description.

Anyway, on your own purchases. Stylus, case, cable, cable. Basics has only
been around for six years. And you really need to count all of the _non-
Basics_ purchases, because that is what Amazon is trying to capture.

* I don't feel this way, but multiple people have told me the economy would collapse if everyone acted the way I do.

~~~
thaumasiotes
But at one cable a year, you're not even close to buying each cable product
every year, nor to buying each product _that you 're a customer for_ every
year. If I fit the model you describe ("the items in the catalog are items
that a person will buy at least once a year"), I wouldn't be buying one cable
a year -- I'd be replacing every one of my cables every year. Instead, I never
replace them at all, making them items that I bought once.

If you want to say "the items in the catalog fall into categories, and a
customer will typically buy a single item from any given category once a
year"... then you've descended into meaninglessness. You can categorize fire
pits however you want. They'll fit that definition some ways and they won't
fit other ways.

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vosper
Unconstructive nitpick: the text quality in the images on that page is awful.
Very aliased, and the letters seem kind of randomly sized and kerned. It's
quite strange.

~~~
veidr
Seriously, look at the typographic alignment in the _very first word_ of this
paragraph (which happens to be "Amazon"):

[http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/img15/amazon-
busi...](http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/img15/amazon-
business/pages/landing-page/ambz_lp_solut._V306693268_.jpg)

It has always seemed freaky to me that Amazon still uses images for paragraphs
of text. I have assumed it is because the real-world web is more broken than I
know.

~~~
sukilot
Amazon has an incredibly tightly packed homepage with images and text. that's
an obscene challenge to layout without obscuring content or missing up
proportions. The inside pages use regular layout and are more liberal

~~~
r00fus
Luckily for us, their iOS app and mobile browser experience is really nice
(only I can't see some comment metadata like up/downvotes).

Only time I visit Amazon on a desktop is when I happen to deep-link into a
product page from a review site.

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bane
This is a great idea. It's amazing how many businesses keep Office Depot and
Staples (and other office supply companies) on life-support simply because
they're setup to handle corporate accounts. So now there's almost no reason to
go to either place unless you need to print off in volume (becoming less and
less common) or need something absolutely right now this second.

~~~
jonknee
Staples isn't on life support, it was the second largest online retailer in
2014 (more than Wal-Mart, Apple, etc etc). I'm sure they're concerned about
this move though, but they have a nice advantage over Amazon for doing their
own deliveries through their physical stores.

~~~
bane
> they have a nice advantage over Amazon for doing their own deliveries
> through their physical stores.

That is a nice point. Staples.com has been growing and is robust, while
Staples Inc. stores have been shrinking (they're closing 225 stores by the end
of 2015).

They don't break out brick & mortar from on-line in their earnings reports, so
you have to infer.

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brianolson
This is replacing "Amazon Supply" which was the acquisition of smallparts.com
, which was one of the best ways I knew to get a box of just the right bolts.
But now they're closing that down and folding it in to this other thing? Does
"Buy products available exclusively to Amazon Business customers" mean that
those products get hidden behind some new special section of amazon? Do I have
to get an "Amazon Business" account to buy bolts? Is the
smallparts/amazonsupply portal going away and now I don't have a good way to
browse bolts (for those times when I'm not sure if I want it made out of steel
or brass or nylon)? In short, I miss smallparts.com

~~~
exmadscientist
All of the fasteners I've bought on AmazonSupply have also been available on
Amazon proper, they were just harder to find there. I really hope Amazon can
improve their search interface for this stuff. While AmazonSupply was much
better than Amazon itself or Grainger, McMaster still destroys everyone else
in this space -- McMaster wins a _lot_ of business based on nothing more than
the ease of finding products on their website.

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nulltype
Looks like this is the new version of
[http://www.amazonsupply.com/](http://www.amazonsupply.com/) which is now
shutting down.

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geekrax
Wow. Images for the text on landing page? Seriously, Amazon?

~~~
nearengine
And a table-based layout, and the navigation is a single image with maps.
Pretty incredible to see in production on Amazon in 2015.

~~~
samsol
Amazon clearly knows that it is not the beauty of html behind the page that
will make this initiative successful OR cause it to fail . At the end of the
day, these images are used to get the message across and its Just doing that .
That's what it is.. Nothing beyond it.

~~~
cakoose
It's not just the behind-the-scenes stuff that's ugly. Whatever they used to
render the text is much worse than what my browser does. And there's no mouse
hover changes. And you can't copy/paste the text. Following best practices
would have gotten them a long tail of benefits for free.

Sure, the page gets the message across, but I think even non-technical people
are at least subliminally aware of the fact that there's something low-quality
going on.

If some smaller website did this it wouldn't be as surprising. It's just that
this seems like an amateur mistake from a company that we all assumed to have
competence in web design.

~~~
sukilot
Amazon is a store, not a website design luxury showcase. They aim to deliver
the most products at the lowest prices with reliable delivery, and they aren't
selling copy-pasteable ad copy. They rte quite competent in their web design.

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hop
Does Prime shipping still apply? It only says free 2-day shipping on orders
over $49.

Edit: Found FAQ on that - If you have this in addition to prime, there's no
order threshold.
[http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html/ref=b2b_...](http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html/ref=b2b_faq_ot_pf?ie=UTF8&nodeId=201733090)

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paxtonab
A business is the perfect use case for the 1-click buy button Amazon
introduced a few weeks ago, Amazon Dash.

~~~
discodave
By the printer, or the coffee in the break room... good thinking.

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kriro
Would be extremely awesome if university libraries could be hooked up and I
could select a book on amazon and they'd approve it. The current ordering
system here takes long and the books are usually more expensive, too.

Same goes for our procurement department. You find stuff on amazon (or other
sites) and they just order it somewhere else for more money and it takes
forever. I think I'll have a talk with them. They could essentially outsource
the procurement to the employees (who'd gladly do it) and would only have to
approve/deny stuff. The current process for standard stuff is pretty much
"found it on amazon, sent a link, they ordered it somewhere else after x-time"

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jhonovich
What type of discounts are available beyond what you could buy traditionally /
personally?

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pranav7
At bizongo.in, we are already building something similar to tackle the
problems and inefficiencies in the Indian B2B industry. Currently in its beta,
it has multi-user accounts, not only for the buyer, but also for a supplier.
We've built a nifty quotation generator, to respond to quotation requests in
minutes. This is where having multiple team members on the portal helps, as
anyone in the team can respond to quotations. We are also building approval
workflows, for both buyers and suppliers, where quotations can be approved,
and further orders can be purchased.

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testingonprod
So where does that leave Costco and Sam's Club?

~~~
georgemcbay
Today? Fine.

In the future? Very possibly in the same unfortunate spot a lot of bookstores
and then general B&M retail chains were put in due to Internet-shopping in
general but Amazon particularly.

IMO they have a lot of reason to be worried mid to long term if they are
paying attention, especially in light of Amazon's obvious push to get things
delivered to you ridiculously fast if you opt for it (and this goes way beyond
their whole drone PR).

~~~
r00fus
Costco + Google Shopping Express for me beats Amazon Prime. Same day delivery
is better than 2-day or even next day. Prices are better, and I can even order
fruits.

If Google keeps expanding Express, Amazon may be in a position where they're
playing catch-up.

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polskibus
Seems like an offensive against AliBaba's plan. Good to see competition in
this area.

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richardw
I've long wondered about the streamlining benefits of company Amazon accounts.
Just shipping savings would be huge, especially to large foreign companies
whose staff receive many packages a day.

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JohnLen
New business experience.

