“Amazon nomads” scour the country’s Walmarts to find things to re-sell

Discussion in 'Wall St. News' started by dealmaker, Jul 11, 2019.

  1. dealmaker

    dealmaker

    “Amazon nomads” scour the country’s Walmarts to find things to re-sell
    A small group of Americans are traveling to remote Walmarts and Targets to resell rare and odd items on Amazon.

    According to The Verge, they live in RVs and vans and move from store to store constantly, focusing on rural outposts.

    They look for limited-edition goods, like Game of Thrones Oreos, weird cleaning products and discontinued merchandise. One nomad has found discontinued 99-cent dental floss at Big Lots that fetches $100 online.

    ‘Amazon is just an extension of my arm’

    The nomad economy works because of Fulfillment by Amazon. The nomads resell products and send them to an Amazon warehouse.

    Amazon then packages and ships items to the buyer. Another tool, a scanning app, allows nomads to see the estimated resale value of many items before they make a purchase.

    “It’s almost like I’m the front end of the business, and Amazon is just an extension of my arm,” Sean-Patrick Iles, a nomad, told The Verge.

    Lifestyle over profit

    Most of the nomads aren’t getting rich -- $40K yearly salaries aren’t uncommon. Instead, they’re anti-consumerists who don’t value possessions -- they’re doing it for the freedom and the ability to see the charms of small-town America.

    In Pomeroy, Ohio, for instance, nomad Chris Anderson was amazed to find the local McDonald’s had a pizza on the menu.
     
    murray t turtle likes this.
  2. S2007S

    S2007S

    I have heard of this before. There was a story going around how some guy started an entire company around this and is making millions in sales a year. I can see how it works but it's no guarantee, the stories I read about people reselling these items online sound like they constantly sell each any every item they pick up for a profit....never a losing sale. Try doing this I guarantee you 8 in 10 items would collect dust after trying numerous times online to list it in an already over saturated market.
     
    Clubber Lang likes this.
  3. fan27

    fan27

    Good God! I can think of no worse hell than traveling to Walmarts across the country in search of junk I can mark up and sell on Amazon. I can picture it now....an old couple broke down outside of PoDunk, Mississippi trying to barter dental floss for RV repairs.
     
  4. R123

    R123

    This sounds like a pre promo launch for a new cable TV show to compete with storage wars, etc.
     
    S-Trader likes this.
  5. guru

    guru

    I remember one of these guys as his video got 2 million views a few months ago:
     
  6. S2007S

    S2007S


    I remember this video.

    Saw this when it was all over the news
     
  7. Snuskpelle

    Snuskpelle

    Hah this is quite similar to going "I made $2500 from one trade; trading is a great business now!". (Well, technically, this is trading too, but let's stick to the type of trading on this forum.)
     
    Last edited: Jul 11, 2019
  8. SunTrader

    SunTrader

    Might be next pilot for the Reality Prez after office.