Jason Boyce and guest Chris McCabe discuss the federal indictments against several Amazon consultants involved in bribing Amazon employees to help their clients and take their competitors down.
Our guest today joined us last year for our “When Sellers Attack” episode. This time we revisit a story we briefly mentioned on that episode that everyone in the Amazon space is talking about this week.
In September 2020, Spencer Soper of Bloomberg reported that several employees in India were indicted along with 6 Amazon consultants by the DOJ for a bribery scheme worth $100mm dollars to those involved.
One of those accused was Ed Rosenberg, Founder of ASGTG, a membership group for sellers looking to get ahead on Amazon and share expertise. Ed’s company consultants paid for Account and Listing Reinstatements, among other things.
This week, after swearing the allegations were false, Ed went onto Social Media to admit that he had been lying all along and that we were, in fact, guilty of bribery.
Ed has now changed his not-guilty plea to guilty.
My friend and guest today, Chris McCabe, former Amazon employee and founder of eCommerce Chris, and firm that provides the valuable service of Account and ASIN Reinstatements.
However, Chris, like our director, Malia Kim, here at Avenue7Media, doesn’t break the law and doesn’t send suitcases full of cash to Amazon employees!
He has followed this case closely and shares what it's all about. Tune in!
Key Takeaways
- The background to the bribery story (01:54)
- The federal indictments and guilty pleas (03:51)
- Bribery, Lies, and Scandal (05:19)
- The road to hell is paved with good intentions (11:14)
- Ignorance of the law is no defense (16:22)
- Two wrongs don’t make a right (26:08)
- How the bribery scheme affected other sellers and brands (28:06)
- It’s not worth it to soil your relationship with Amazon (30:25)
- Has Amazon done enough to weed out the bad practices (33:53)
Additional Resources:
Links to the news story:
- https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-09-18/amazon-ex-employee-charged-by-u-s-in-merchant-bribery-scheme?leadSource=uverify%20wall
- https://www.cnbc.com/2023/03/27/amazon-seller-consultant-admits-to-bribing-employees-to-help-clients.html#:~:text=Ephraim%20%E2%80%9CEd%E2%80%9D%20Rosenberg%20wrote%20in,on%20Amazon's%20third%2Dparty%20marketplace
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- Chris McCabe LinkedIn
- Click here to contact Chris McCabe
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Day 2 Podcast has a goal of helping Amazon sellers learn how to launch, grow and protect their brand on the world's largest online marketplace (and beyond).
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