Amazon Vendor Central Changes: What Brands Need to Know in 2026

Amazon sent termination notices to hundreds of Vendor Central accounts in November 2024. Brands generating under $10 million annually were told their vendor relationships would end by November 9 and they should transition to Seller Central. No negotiation. No extension. The shift from rumor to reality happened fast.

This wasn't new. Amazon has been pushing brands from first-party (1P) wholesale to third-party (3P) marketplace selling since 2019. But the November terminations made the strategy undeniable: Vendor Central is becoming a tier reserved for enterprise brands. If you're not doing $20 million or more in annual sales, you're at risk.

Here's what's actually happening, what the operational differences between 1P and 3P mean for your business, and what to do if you're caught in the transition.

What's Happening With Amazon Vendor Central

The Timeline: From 2019 Rumors to 2024 Terminations

Amazon started quietly moving brands from Vendor Central to Seller Central in 2019. Reports that June confirmed Amazon was "purging small suppliers," but the criteria were vague and the enforcement inconsistent. Some brands were pushed. Others negotiated extensions. Most just waited to see what would happen.

For five years, the shift was gradual. Amazon raised wholesale fees, tightened purchase order automation, and increased chargebacks. Smaller vendors felt the squeeze but many held on.

Then in late 2024, Amazon formalized the strategy. Vendors generating under $5 to $10 million annually received termination notices with a hard deadline: November 9, 2024. The timing—right before Q4 holiday season—created chaos. Brands scrambling to set up Seller Central accounts, secure FBA capacity, and transition advertising campaigns had weeks, not months.

This was the largest single action Amazon has ever taken on the 1P to 3P shift. It turned speculation into policy.

Who Amazon Is Keeping (and Who They're Cutting)

The revenue thresholds have become clearer:

Under $5–10 million annual revenue: Highest risk of termination or forced transition. Many of the November 2024 notices went to brands in this range.

$10–20 million range: Uncertain. Amazon evaluates case by case based on category, margin profile, and strategic value. Grocery, CPG, and consumer electronics tend to have more Vendor Central retention than apparel or home goods.

$20 million+ annual sales: Likely to remain on Vendor Central. These are the enterprise accounts Amazon wants to maintain direct supply chain relationships with.

The shift isn't purely about size. Amazon also considers:

• Category fit (does Amazon want direct inventory control in this vertical?)
• Margin structure (can Amazon make money as a wholesaler here?)
• Private label competition (is Amazon planning to replace your product with an Amazon Basics version?)
• Fulfillment complexity (do you ship direct or require Amazon warehousing?)

If you're in a category where Amazon is investing in private label and your revenue is under $15 million, you're vulnerable.

Why Amazon Is Doing This

Amazon's business model has shifted. When you sell wholesale to Amazon through Vendor Central, Amazon buys your inventory, holds it, prices it, and fulfills it. They take the margin but also the risk.

When you sell through Seller Central, Amazon takes a referral fee (around 15%), FBA fulfillment fees if you use their warehouses, and increasingly, advertising spend. They bear zero inventory risk. And the advertising revenue—which has become one of Amazon's fastest-growing segments—comes almost entirely from 3P sellers.

The math is clear: Amazon makes more money and takes less risk when brands sell 3P.

Add in the operational burden of managing thousands of small vendor accounts, the chargeback disputes, the co-op billing negotiations, and the margin pressure from brands who want better wholesale terms. Amazon decided it wasn't worth it for smaller vendors.

Vendor Central is now a tier, not a default.

Vendor Central vs. Seller Central: The Real Differences

If you've only ever sold 1P, the operational shift to 3P is significant. Here's what changes:

Pricing and Margin Control

Vendor Central (1P)

Amazon sets retail prices. You negotiate wholesale cost, but Amazon controls what shoppers see. If Amazon decides to discount your product to win the Buy Box or compete with a third-party seller, your wholesale revenue doesn't change, but Amazon's margin shrinks. They eat the discount.

Seller Central (3P)

You set retail prices. You control margins. If you want to run a promotion, you decide the discount depth and duration. Amazon takes their referral fee regardless. You keep the upside, but you also own the repricing strategy and Buy Box competition.

Practical impact: You get margin control, but you also inherit the complexity of algorithmic repricing, competitive monitoring, and Buy Box management. If you're used to Amazon handling pricing, this is a big operational lift.

Inventory and Fulfillment

Vendor Central (1P)

Amazon purchases inventory from you via purchase orders. Once they buy it, it's theirs. They manage stock levels, forecast demand, and handle fulfillment. You ship to Amazon warehouses, they distribute to customers.

Seller Central (3P)

You own the inventory until it sells. If you use FBA, you ship inventory to Amazon fulfillment centers and they handle storage, picking, packing, and shipping. If you use Seller Fulfilled Prime or merchant fulfillment, you handle logistics yourself but must meet Amazon's performance standards (2-day delivery for Prime, 24-hour customer service, under 2.5% order defect rate).

Practical impact: You own inventory risk and cash flow. Unsold inventory sitting in FBA warehouses incurs long-term storage fees. Slow-moving SKUs become a cost center. You need better demand forecasting and inventory planning than you did as a vendor.

Advertising and Brand Tools

Vendor Central (1P)

You had access to Amazon Marketing Cloud, vendor-specific reporting, and certain advertising tools tied to your 1P relationship. Amazon also ran some demand-side advertising on your behalf (often without much transparency).

Seller Central (3P)

You run your own Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, and Sponsored Display campaigns. You control budgets, targeting, and creative. You get more transparency and control, but you also need to know how to run effective PPC campaigns or hire someone who does.

Brand Registry, A+ Content, and Stores are available in both models, so those tools don't change. But the advertising shift is real. If you weren't running ads as a vendor, you'll need to start as a seller.

Practical impact: Advertising spend becomes a line item you control and refine. Competitors who outspend or outperform you win the Buy Box. You need internal PPC expertise or agency support.

Data Access and Customer Relationships

Vendor Central (1P)

Amazon owns the customer relationship. You get high-level sales reporting through Vendor Central, but customer data is limited. You know what sold and where, but you don't see buyer emails, return reasons, or review feedback in the same granular way.

Seller Central (3P)

You get more detailed sales data, traffic reports, and customer feedback visibility. You still don't own the customer email list (Amazon protects that), but you see more operational detail. You can also access the Business Reports dashboard, which gives you conversion rate, sessions, and traffic source data that Vendor Central never surfaced.

Practical impact: Better data access, but you're responsible for analyzing and acting on it. Vendor Central abstracted some of that. Seller Central puts it in your lap.

Your Options When Amazon Pushes You to 3P

If Amazon has terminated your Vendor Central account or you're expecting it, you have three paths:

Full Transition to Seller Central

This is what Amazon is pushing. You shut down your 1P relationship and move everything to 3P. You set up a Seller Central account, migrate your ASINs, establish FBA capacity, configure your repricing strategy, launch advertising campaigns, and start managing customer service.

Best for:

• Brands with strong internal operations teams who can handle fulfillment, advertising, and account management
• Brands with higher-margin products where they can absorb the FBA fees and advertising costs
• Brands comfortable with the complexity of managing Amazon as a channel, not a customer

Risks:

• Sales disruption during transition if not managed carefully
• Loss of Buy Box during ASIN migration if a third-party seller undercuts your price
• Inventory gaps if you underestimate FBA lead times
• Advertising ramp-up can take weeks, creating a traffic dip

The Hybrid Approach (Running 1P and 3P Together)

If Amazon hasn't forced you off Vendor Central yet, you can run both models simultaneously. Many brands now:

• Keep high-volume, low-margin SKUs on Vendor Central (where Amazon still wants direct supply)
• Sell higher-margin, seasonal, or specialty products through Seller Central
• Test new product launches in 3P before offering them wholesale to Amazon
• Use the hybrid model to reduce concentration risk and maintain optionality

Best for:

• Brands in the $10–20 million range who still have a Vendor Central relationship
• Brands with large catalogs where different SKUs have different margin profiles
• Brands who want to test 3P performance before fully committing

Risks:

• Operational complexity of managing two platforms
• Potential pricing conflicts if Amazon discounts your 1P products below your 3P prices
• Internal confusion over which SKUs should live where

Working With a Third-Party Selling Partner

This is the path most brands forced off Vendor Central take. Instead of managing Seller Central internally, you partner with an agency or reseller who becomes the seller of record. They handle pricing, advertising, fulfillment coordination, customer service, and account management. You sell to the partner wholesale (or on consignment), and they sell to Amazon shoppers as a 3P seller.

Best for:

• Brands without internal Amazon expertise or headcount
• Brands who want to focus on product development and brand marketing, not Amazon operations
• Brands transitioning under pressure (like the November 2024 terminations) who need help fast

Risks:

• You lose direct control over pricing and merchandising decisions
• Partner margin comes out of your revenue (but should be offset by the operational cost savings)
• Quality of execution depends entirely on the partner you choose

The key when choosing a partner: look for operational depth, not just promises. Ask about their fulfillment infrastructure, their PPC team structure, their account suspension experience, and their customer service SLAs. Many "partners" are resellers with thin operations who will just mark up your product and leave you to deal with problems. Read more about finding the right Amazon selling partner.

How to Transition Without Losing Sales

If you're moving from Vendor Central to Seller Central, the migration itself is the risk. Done poorly, you lose Buy Box, your rankings drop, and competitors fill the gap. Done right, the transition is invisible to customers.

Protecting Your ASIN History and Rankings

Your ASINs don't disappear when you leave Vendor Central. The product listings, reviews, and ratings stay. What changes is who owns the offer.

When you set up your Seller Central account, you'll create new 3P offers against your existing ASINs. The ASIN remains the same, but the seller changes from "Amazon.com" to your seller name.

Critical steps:

• Create your new Seller Central offers at least two weeks before your Vendor Central inventory runs out
• Match or beat your current 1P price during the transition to protect Buy Box
• Ensure you have FBA inventory in place before Amazon's 1P stock depletes
• Monitor Buy Box percentage daily during the first month

If a third-party seller sees that Amazon is out of stock and starts undercutting your price, they can steal the Buy Box during the transition. Price competitively and move fast.

Fulfillment Strategy (FBA vs. Seller Fulfilled Prime)

Most brands transitioning from 1P use FBA. It's the closest operational model to how Vendor Central worked: you ship to Amazon warehouses, they handle fulfillment.

But FBA has costs Vendor Central didn't:

• Fulfillment fees per unit (vary by size and weight)
• Monthly storage fees
• Long-term storage fees for inventory sitting more than 365 days
• Removal or disposal fees if you need to pull inventory out

FBA makes sense when:

• Your products are standard size and weight (oversized items get expensive fast)
• You have reliable demand forecasting and can avoid long-term storage fees
• You want Amazon to handle customer service and returns
• Prime eligibility matters for your sales (it almost always does)

Seller Fulfilled Prime (SFP) or merchant fulfillment makes sense when:

• You have your own distribution infrastructure and can reliably ship in 2 days
• Your products are high-value or custom and you want direct control over fulfillment
• FBA fees would eat too much margin

Most brands start with FBA and only move to SFP later if they have the operational capacity.

Repricing, Advertising, and Buy Box Considerations

As a Vendor, Amazon handled repricing. As a Seller, you own it.

The Buy Box algorithm factors in:

• Price (most important)
• Fulfillment method (FBA gets preference over merchant-fulfilled)
• Seller performance metrics (order defect rate, late shipment rate, cancellation rate)
• Inventory availability

If your price is uncompetitive, you lose the Buy Box. If you lose the Buy Box, your sales collapse.

Repricing strategy:

• Use a repricing tool (manual repricing doesn't scale past a handful of SKUs)
• Set floor prices (minimum acceptable margin) so the algorithm doesn't race to zero
• Monitor competitor pricing daily, especially in the first 90 days
• Adjust advertising spend based on Buy Box win rate

On advertising: your Vendor Central ad campaigns don't transfer to Seller Central. You'll rebuild from scratch. Budget for a ramp-up period. Expect 4–8 weeks before your campaigns stabilize at previous performance levels.

Brand Registry and Content Migration

If you're already enrolled in Amazon Brand Registry, that stays with your brand, not your Vendor Central account. Your A+ Content, Stores, and Brand Analytics access carry over to Seller Central automatically once you verify your seller account is associated with your registered brand.

If you're not in Brand Registry yet, enroll before you transition. It protects your listings from hijackers and gives you access to better content tools.

What This Means for Brands in 2026 and Beyond

The Future of Vendor Central

Vendor Central isn't going away, but it's becoming exclusive. Amazon will keep direct wholesale relationships with:

• Enterprise brands generating $20 million+ annually
• Categories where Amazon wants supply chain control (grocery, electronics, consumables)
• Strategic partners with private label collaboration or exclusive distribution

For everyone else, 3P is the model. The hybrid approach might stay an option for mid-tier brands, but Amazon's economic incentives favor marketplace selling. Expect continued pressure on smaller vendors.

Building a Resilient Amazon Strategy

If the November 2024 terminations taught brands anything, it's this: don't build your business on a single channel or a single relationship. Amazon's platform shifts constantly. Vendor Central contracts don't guarantee stability. And even strong sales performance doesn't protect you if your revenue falls below Amazon's threshold.

Resilience means:

• Diversifying fulfillment (don't rely entirely on FBA if you can avoid it)
• Building a hybrid model if you still have Vendor Central access
• Investing in your own DTC channel so Amazon isn't your only revenue source
• Working with partners who understand the platform and can adapt when Amazon changes the rules

Amazon's marketplace is the largest e-commerce channel in the U.S., and that's not changing. But the terms of access keep shifting. Brands that treat Amazon as one channel in a broader strategy—not the entire strategy—are the ones that survive the transitions.

Frequently Asked Questions