Chances are, you’re a seller like Todd who strives to support other small sellers in your area. If so, you’ve come to the right place. While it may not feel like much, here’s what you can do to shop local and support small businesses on Amazon. Stay tuned.
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There’s A (Chrome Extension) For That
Step 1: Download Cultivate. Cultivate is a Mark Cuban-backed plugin that quickly highlights US-made products on Amazon. The plugin works best on Google Chrome but it’s also available as an iOS app.
While the product recommendations aren’t phenomenal, the plugin does give you a quick glance at companies based in the US.
Once you install Cultivate, you should see the icon in your top toolbar. If not, head to the extensions (puzzle piece) button and “pin it” to activate it.
Start Shopping
Step 2: Now that you’ve installed the plugin, start shopping on Amazon and watch US-based products flood your results page. While the products may not be ideal, take note of the companies selling them and consider them for future purchases. More importantly, when you click into a specific product, Cultivate highlights where the seller and brand are from – an easy way to weed through options! Find information directly underneath the product title.
No Cultivate?
Even if you don’t have the plugin, there are simple ways to find local sellers. When you’re considering a product, simply click on the seller, and on the right-hand side under Add to Cart, there should be a line that says, “Ships From Amazon, Sold By Brand.” This shipped from and sold by information helps you determine where these products and sellers are located.
Also, when you click on the brand listed beside sold by, it will take you to a page that lists Detailed Seller Information. Here you’ll find the seller’s business address. If the address is in the US, you’ve got a winner.
Quick note – some Chinese sellers list US or USA after their name on the dot.com platform to trick people into thinking they’re US-based. Do your due diligence and don’t fall for it!
Overall
It’s difficult to purchase products made in the US but buying from US-based sellers or companies is definitely doable. No matter the country you’re in, hopefully these tips will help you shop smarter and stay local.
Happy selling everybody.
Resources From This Episode
- Cultivate (direct link)
Outline Of This Episode
[00:32] Todd’s introduction to this episode
[01:32] The perks of Cultivate
[02:58] How to shop local
[04:58] Shopping smart without a plugin
[10:34] Todd’s closing thoughts on this episode
Transcript
Todd (00:00):
And under the detailed seller information, it’s going to tell me the business address for that seller, the address that they have entered into the Amazon platform,
Announcer (00:15):
Welcome fellow entrepreneurs to the entrepreneur adventure podcast, where we talk about Amazon wholesale and how you can use it to build an e-commerce empire, a side hustle or anything in between. And now your host, Todd Welch,
Todd (00:32):
What’s going on everybody. Welcome to another episode. And today we are diving into how to buy from USA companies on Amazon, or you could use this to buy from Canadian companies, UK companies, Australian companies, Japanese companies, wherever you’re located and are shopping. If you want to buy from companies in your country, which is a very big thing, especially in the USA right now, this is the best way that I’ve found to be able to do it. It’s not the easiest thing in the world to buy us made products for example, but you can add a minimum buy USA or buy from USA company. So let’s go ahead. I’m going to share my screen if you’re watching this on YouTube. If you’re listening on the podcast and explain this in detail as we go along, but let’s go ahead and dive into this. All right.
Todd (01:32):
So the first thing you’re going to want to do is download and install this extension for Google Chrome. They also have an iOS app it’s called cultivate, and you can find it at, we cultivate.us. It’s a Mark Cuban backed venture. And while I don’t think currently their product recommendations are that fantastic. It kind of depends on the products you’re looking for, but they’ll show you U S made products of products that you’re looking at on Amazon. What I really like this for is it gives me a quick glance. And if the company that’s selling the product where they’re from, if they’re from the USA, China, whatever the case may be. So I’ve installed this already on Google Chrome. That’s where I think it works the best. You could also use the iOS app. I don’t have an iPhone, so I haven’t tested that, but either way I prefer shopping on a computer.
Todd (02:29):
It’s just the easiest for me to be able to look at products and things like that. So once you have that installed, you’re going to have this little app up here, or a little icon. If you don’t have this little icon, you might have to click on the extension thing in the upper right corner. It’s like a little puzzle piece and click the little pin next to cultivate so that it automatically will always show at the top of your Google Chrome. And that’s in the upper right-hand corner. Once you have that installed, you can then start searching on Amazon, which I’ve got this search open for kitchen scales and cultivate will actually show you us made product right at the top, which is kind of cool in this kitchen scale. It doesn’t really show me very good options. They’re showing me literally five and $600 options here.
Todd (03:22):
When I’m looking for a scale that is maybe, you know, 20, 30, 40, $50 kind of thing. So not great recommendations on this, but that’s not really what I’m looking at it for. So I’ve already gone ahead and open up a few of these kitchen scale items on my search on Amazon. This first one, what is, this is a nice well food scale. And what’s really awesome with the cultivate extension. Is that right at the top? Under the title on Amazon, it’s showing us right here. It says seller is from gung dong China and the brand is from China. So if it knows where the brand is from, it will tell you where the brand is made and even more important or just as important is where the seller is from. Because even if we’re going to buy, say Chinese made products on Amazon, we can at least buy from a USA seller.
Todd (04:23):
And that way we’re supporting small businesses like myself. I’m a USA seller. I sell some Chinese products, some us products, some Canadian products, but if we’re buying at least from a USA seller, we’re supporting USA businesses, which is definitely a step above supporting businesses from other countries. Or if you’re from Canada, you can support Canadian countries. If you’re from the UK, UK countries, et cetera, et cetera. So this brand I would not want to buy from now, if I didn’t have that plugin, there’s another way that I can look at this. And that is by clicking on the seller. So a lot of times over on the right hand side, under the add to cart button on Amazon, there will be where it says shifts from Amazon sold by nicewell now sometimes this is under the price as well, right above the bullet points or above the description.
Todd (05:23):
But you have to find where it says shipped from and sold by. And then you click on the sold by and in this case. That is nice. Well, so I’m going to go ahead and click on nice. Well, and that’s going to take me to the page for that seller and under the detailed seller information, it’s going to tell me the business address for that seller, the address that they have entered into the Amazon platform. And so this is important also, if you’re a seller Amazon, to know that your address is showing on your seller profile. So right here, we can see this seller is from gung dong China. It’s got their full address and everything. So I would close out of that product and not buy from them. Now, this next one is a food scale by LAN Shang is the brand name quite obviously not a us brand name, but perhaps the seller is from the USA.
Todd (06:27):
In this case, the cultivate plugin is telling us that the seller is from China. Again, if we look over into the ships from sold by this is sold by Lang Shang us now, this is important thing to keep an eye out for. I’ve noticed a lot of Chinese sellers are putting us or USA after their name on the.com platform is probably the same in Canada and UK. I guess they’re probably trying to trick people into thinking that they’re a USA company. So don’t take that for granted. I’ve seen a lot of it with the Chinese companies. And so if we click on Lang ShangUSA sold by Lang Shang USA, we can see again, these guys are from gung dong, Shang China. So no-go on that one. The next one here is eat tech city food kitchen scale. And this one is sold by amazon.com. So we have no way to tell where the seller of this product actually is coming from because Amazon has bought this product and is still selling it directly.
Todd (07:43):
Even the cultivate does not know anything about this brand, just as sold directly by Amazon, right underneath the title. And so I just skip these products completely. I don’t want to buy directly from Amazon. I want to support small businesses like myself, and maybe like you, if you’re a seller on Amazon, the smaller mom and pop sellers that are on Amazon. So I do not buy any products that are sold by amazon.com. They’re a giant behemoth. They don’t need more of my money. They’re getting the fees from the third-party sellers anyways. And if you’re not familiar with third-party sellers, third party sellers are people like myself who are buying products and then selling them to you or to other people on the Amazon platform. And those are the kinds of people that I prefer to buy from this next one here. It says the seller is from CA United States of California United States.
Todd (08:42):
And the brand is from Hong Kong. So that is again, the cultivate extension. That’s giving us that information right under the title. So that’s really convenient, but I could also click on the NEC tech direct, which is so the, what this product or who this product is sold by. That’s the third party seller. And we can see that that business is in Anaheim, California. Now, obviously this is not foolproof. It’s technically a Hong Kong company or Chinese company could register a company in the USA, but then at least that company for sure is registered in the USA. They’re paying some USA taxes and things like that. But for the most part, a lot of the Chinese sellers I’ve seen you just have their Chinese business address because it is a whole nother step, another complication to register a USA business. So that is a USA seller.
Todd (09:45):
I would potentially buy from that company. Next one here, greater goods, digital food, kitchen scale. And this one, again, the plugin is telling us that are from M O United States would, should be Montana. And this one, the sold by is underneath the price here, right above the color variations. And it’s sold by greater goods. So if we click on that, we can see that they are from M O USA, M O is actually, that’s not Montana. Let’s see. Where is that? That is Missouri, Missouri. I need to learn my abbreviations. The Missouri is where that company is from. So I would potentially buy from them. All right. So there you have it. That is how I shop on Amazon. I’m a small USA seller. So I like to support other small USA sellers. And if at all possible USA made brands as well. And if you’re a seller or a buyer, you probably want to do the same.
Todd (10:57):
That’s probably why you’re watching this video. Or if you’re a seller you want to support other companies like yourself, small USA companies, small Canadian companies, UK companies, Japanese companies, Australian companies, wherever you’re from. You can support sellers in your area. That’s what I do. I hope you will do that out there as well. If you want to get the show notes or the links that I talk about in this episode, head on over to entrepreneuradventure.com/56. And you can pick that up and you can get that extension at entrepreneurventure.com for slash shop local. And that will take you right to the website. And if you want to go direct, it’s wecultivate.us, and you can grab that there as well. So I appreciate you watching the show. I hope you got some good use out of this. So it’ll help you do some better shopping in the future support local companies. And please make sure to share this on whatever social media platform you enjoy out there, help us grow the show spread, how do buy from the local country. So with that, this is Todd Welch with entrepreneur adventure signing off happy selling everybody.
Announcer (12:21):
This has been another episode of the entrepreneur adventure podcast. Thanks for listening fellow entrepreneur and always remember success is yours. If you take it.
