In this coronavirus pandemic where more people are stuck at home for work and school, online shopping has become essential and unsurprisingly, many are flocking to platforms like Amazon to purchase items. This has also unfortunately resulted in some third-party sellers jacking up their prices due to the increased demand.
Now, Amazon has systems in place that will prevent products from being overpriced, but it appears that some third-party sellers have found a way around it by marking their products as being “collectibles”. Given that a value of a collectible is subjective, Amazon does not have any systems in place to prevent price gouging of such listings, and so some third-party sellers are taking advantage of that.
As spotted by The Verge’s Casey Newton, some sellers have been selling a set of Bowflex dumbbells for over $1,000, which were also listed as collectibles. The price of those dumbbells would have typically cost $279, so clearly there is no justification for a 400% increase in its price other than to profit from the number of people who are turning to home workouts now that gyms are closed.
This price gouging has also extended to a variety of products including video games, bread makers, and mobile phone accessories, just to name a few. That being said, we imagine that no one would be willing to pay for these overpriced products, but we suppose all these resellers need is just one or two people to buy their products to make it a lucrative endeavor.